RED Episode 311 Bart Yasso Talks About His New Book, 100 Runs of a Lifetime

May 21, 2025·49 min·3 clips

Bart ran out of Tanzania’s Ngorongoro Crater at sunset after convincing a guide to let him try.

1. Run Eat Drink Podcast centers this episode on Bart Yasso and his book, “100 Runs of a Lifetime: The World’s Ultimate Races and Trails.” 2. Bart Yasso appears as guest and former chief running officer at Runner’s World, and Amy and Dana host the conversation because they cover destination races and local food. 3. The episode asks how National Geographic’s 100-series became a running book and why Bart chose the races that made the cut. 4. Bart says National Geographic contacted him after a colleague at Runner’s World suggested his name for the project. 5. He explains that National Geographic already had “100 scuba dives of a lifetime,” “100 hikes of a lifetime,” and “a hundred ski slopes you should ski in a lifetime.” 6. He says the book took about two years from manuscript to print. 7. Bart describes building a “book map” after compiling 200 possible races and narrowing them down to 100. 8. He says the structure became four parts, with races and runs placed into the proper order before manuscript work began. 9. He notes that copy editing and photo placement came after the outline was approved. 10. Bart says writing a book feels like “doing two ultras every day” because ideas change after he goes out for a run. 11. He says the book contains only one photo of him, taken at Big Sur Marathon, while National Geographic supplied the rest. 12. He jokes that the Big Sur image shows him with a mullet and “35 years ago” hair. 13. Bart identifies the Ngorongoro Crater in Tanzania as his favorite run of his life before it became a “run of a lifetime.” 14. He says the crater is 30 kilometers around and about 2,000 feet deep, with lions, giraffes, and other wildlife inside it. 15. He describes asking a guide for permission to run out of the crater at sunset and says a hyena jumped out from behind a bush. 16. Bart says the book is not “100 runs of Bart Yasso” but a guide to runs that readers can use as their own bucket list. 17. He says one of his favorite categories is part four, which includes non-race runs such as the Nepali coast in Kauai and Sandapu near Darjeeling, India. 18. The interview stays conversational and detailed, with Amy and Dana asking follow-up questions about race logistics, difficulty, coffee, and finish-line culture. 19. Runners planning bucket-list trips and readers who like destination race stories would likely enjoy this episode. 20. Listeners wanting abstract training theory or short clips only might skip it.

As heard by us

A destination-race conversation that turns Bart Yasso's book into a practical running travel guide.

Run, Eat, Drink stays on its best ground here: destination race travel that runners can actually use. Bart Yasso talks about his book, 100 Runs of a Lifetime, and the conversation keeps returning to places listeners can imagine planning around, including Garden of the Gods in…

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Bart Yasso turns a race-book chat into a race-cation map for you.

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