Eat Like a Pig, Run Like a Horse: How Food Fights Hijacked Our Health and the New Science of Exercise

by Anastacia Marx de Salcedo

There is no magic pill. There is no perfect diet. Could it be that our underlying assumption—that what we’re eating is making us fat and sick—is just plain wrong?

To address the rapid rise of “lifestyle diseases” like diabetes and heart disease, scientists have conducted a whopping 500,000 studies of diet and another 300,000 of obesity. Journalists have written close to 250 million news articles combined about these topics.

Yet nothing seems to halt the epidemic. Anastacia Marx de Salcedo’s Eat Like a Pig, Run Like a Horse looks not just to data-driven science, but to animals and the natural world around us for a new approach. What she finds will transform the national debate about the root causes of our most pervasive diseases and offer hope of dramatically reducing the number who suffer—no matter what they eat.

It all began with her own medical miracle—she has multiple sclerosis but has discovered that daily exercise was key to keeping it from progressing. And now, new research backs up her own experience. This revelation prompted Marx de Salcedo to ask what would happen if people with lifestyle illnesses put physical activity front and center in their daily lives?

Eat Like a Pig, Run Like a Horse takes us on a fascinating journey that weaves together true confessions, mad(ish) scientists, and beguiling animal stories. Marx de Salcedo shows that we need to move beyond our current diet-focused model to a new, dynamic concept of metabolism as regulated by exercise. Suddenly the answer to good health is almost embarrassingly simple. Don’t worry about what you eat. Worry about how much you move.

In a few years’ time, adhering to a finicky Keto, Paleo, low-carb, or any other special diet to stay healthy will be as antiquated as using Daffy’s Elixir or Dr. Bonker’s Celebrated Egyptian Oil—popular “medicines” from the 1800s—to cure disease. And just as the 19th-century health revolution was based on a new understanding that the true cause of malaria, tuberculosis, and cholera was microorganisms, so the coming 21st-century one will be based on our new understanding that exercise is the only way to metabolic health. Fascinating and brilliant, Eat Like a Pig, Run Like a Horse is primed to usher in that new era.

Genres: Nonfiction, Science, Health

336 pages, Hardcover

First published July 5, 2022

About the author

Anastacia Marx de Salcedo is a nonfiction writer whose work has appeared in the Atlantic, Salon, Slate, Vice, and on PBS and NPR blogs. She has worked as a public health consultant, news magazine publisher, and public policy researcher and lives in Boston, Massachusetts.

Reviews

[Tara L. Campbell · Rating 1 out of 5]

Subtitle should be: I found what works for me and now I'm proselytizing it for all. The author is a freelance writer, not a doctor, not a scientist, not even a science writer. The book is a memoir that uses selected science articles to build a case supporting her way of life. Her self-centered, judgemental outlook doesn't do any favors, and I gave up at ch 8.

[William Schram · Rating 2 out of 5]

When I read a book, I have expectations of the author. First, I like clearly defined theses. Second, I think the story has less impact but is still a part of the book. Eat Like A Pig, Run Like A Horse is a book. The cover shows a burger leading to a pair of running shoes, and those shoes leading to the burger in a virtuous circle.

I didn’t get what Anastacia Marx de Salcedo was talking about for the first sixty pages of her book. The messages are muddled, and people are confused. Eventually, she gets to her point; exercise is a linchpin for a healthy lifestyle. Exercising should be more effective than dieting, according to the author.

The author opens her book with her MS diagnosis. The next thing we knew, she ran away to South America. I couldn’t follow her thoughts. I assume South America provided some comfort, but I don’t understand how one led to the other. Maybe the medical care is cheaper there? She cries a lot, and I grok that. Multiple Sclerosis is a debilitating illness.

Now Marx de Salcedo discusses her one daughter and how her hair is falling out. I assume it’s because she isn’t active, but we will see where this goes. The book is part memoir, part science, and part confusion. That is merely my take on the book, though. Eventually, it grew on me, and I got used to the author’s style. Not enough to give her a good review, though.

In a sense, the author was lucky. Not all of us can flee to Columbia. Thanks for reading my review, and see you next time.

[Rebecca · Rating 2 out of 5]

Focus was on running and obesity epidemic. Did not learn anything new.

[Vincent · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not my jam.

This is more of a personal journey than popular science. I felt like I was reading Eat, Pray Love.

[Joseph Hamilton · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m a little surprised this book didn’t get better ratings here. Perhaps its because the “new science of exercise” subtitle is a little grandiose, i. e., overpromises. Anyway there is a lot in here that I didn’t know. The Man Against Horse Race in Prescott, Arizona every year, for example. A man - the same man - has won it twice. The Bat World Sanctuary in Weatherford, Texas twenty-five miles west of Fort Worth.

The author has a love for small furry creatures - well, a qualified love since she lets her house cats out with the full knowledge that they will kill anything they can get their claws and fangs into. (I’ve read elsewhere that cats kill millions of small mammals and birds in the United States every year.) But she is unphased even after interviewing a woman who has installed “cat furniture” - tubes, slides, galleries, catwalks in other words - throughout and on her house.

She is also convinced, although mentioned only in passing, that COVID-19 came from bats at the Wuhan wet market. But then (on page 221) she is also convinced that Ebola and Marburg are carried by bats which, if you have read “The Hot Zone,” you know is unproven despite attempts to do so.

I would agree that you should exercise regularly, i. e., run like a horse. But eat like a pig? She believes that transfat is the only unhealthy food. It would seem to me pretty obvious that its easier and less time consuming to not consume calories in the first place than to burn them off. Then add in the constant rising of food prices and the many Americans we are told are experiencing "food scarcity" every day and I think you can see why “eat like a pig” is bad advice.

[Donna Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a series of stories. Some stories are about the author’s life and personal health, her children, her mother, her partners and friends. At times it reads like a memoir. But then there are stories about animals, about plants, and about people, cultures, and living conditions around the world. These stories are more factual, informational, and sometimes scientific. Through the stories, the author tries to show that exercise and movement are more valuable to our health and longevity than the food we eat. In my mind, the stories and author’s opinions and conclusions are interesting, but not definitive.

[Ferginator88 · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book. I was expecting a more scientific, exercise more, eat the right stuff book, but was met with a really interesting thought process on life, our animal brethren, what it means to be healthy, and what we as an animal actually need to do with our bodies. The author weaves stories so well between personal experience, interviews with experts, and what the data says about exercise. I’d recommend this for anyone.

I also want to say how this book reminded me how complicated the human body, the study of animals, and science in general is. It’s amazing what we know about ourselves, and what we still have to learn.

[Reader · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interesting but factually wrong on several points, so take the whole thing with a grain of salt. For example, she claims saturated fat does not increase LDL. This is just not true and is one of the most sure things in nutritional science. The exception is stearic acid, which makes up quite a small fraction of the total saturated fatty acids we eat. All other saturated fatty acids increase LDL. And even foods “high” in stearic acid are even higher in palmitic and other acids.

The willingness to be so wrong on such a simple point takes a lot away from the enjoyment of a book that wrings so many pages out of the simple fact that exercise is also good for us.

[Vincent Da · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has captured the ability of explaining the science behind living a healthy life by using the intriguing life experience of the author and her family to make the science behind attempts to understand the metabolic processes in human and non-human animals; and make it meaningful to the general public without promoting an agenda. Something that just doesn't happen in books that are promoting a science or have an agenda

[Nancy Varley · Rating 3 out of 5]

The premise was interesting but she meandered so much it was difficult for me to get any information out of this.

Bottom line and encouragement is that humans are meant to move and even if we are overweight, exercise and fitness provides protective health benefits

[Diane Flemming · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good combination of science and memoir. There are times where the prose is beautiful and times where the side trips and stories are so loosely tied, I wasn’t sure where the author was going.

Presents a very strong argument as to why people need to move more and focus less on diet.

[Emily · Rating 3 out of 5]

The idea that exercise trumps everything else when it comes to health is an encouraging one. I don't agree that what a person eats doesn't matter--at the very least it helps you be able to exercise well.

[Alex M. Bendersky · Rating 4 out of 5]

Informative, well worth a read.

[Dot · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting theory on diet and exercise.

[Meena Yegan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great Read.
The author stated so many instances where we have to move around on an hourly basis to get the body going.

Sedentary lifestyle after 21st century was clearcut.

[Mariko · Rating 2 out of 5]

I couldn't finish this, I didn't enjoy the author's personal stories that were trying to illustrate her points.