The Unforgiving Hours: The Grit, Resilience, and Perseverance at the Heart of Endurance Sports

In this inspiring debut report, Hogan, a former professional mountain biker, recaps the astonishing achievements of endurance athletes. She opens with a nail-biting account of 71-year-old Gunhild Swanson’s participation in the 100-mile Western States Endurance Run in 2015 and recreates the crowd’s uproarious reaction when Swanson crossed the finish line with five seconds to spare after running for more than 29 hours straight, becoming the oldest female finisher ever. Hogan drives home the physical toll that endurance sports take on athletes’ bodies, describing how in 1972, 15-year-old Lynne Cox had to periodically rinse her mouth with fresh water to prevent her tongue from swelling and salt water from shredding her gums while swimming the English Channel in a record-setting nine hours and 57 minutes. Elsewhere, Hogan covers how Tina Ament became the first blind woman to complete the Kona, Hawaii, Ironman World Championship course in 2014, and how John Stamstad braved windchills of as low as –85º F to snatch the bronze in the 1992 Iditarod Trail bike race through the Alaskan wilderness. The vivid recreations of grueling races capture the adrenaline of endurance competition, serving as testaments to the virtues of grit and perseverance. This will have readers cheering. Photos. (Apr.)