Sports and Recreation Books

I really enjoyed this book. I personally am a gymnast so I can relat. It is a really great book. It tells you about a girl who is the under dog but comes out on top. Then when she is on top and after her first Olympics everione says she is too oldfor a gymnast. But she goes over what everione says .And she wins the Olympic Gold

This book goes into great detail about Shannon's gymnastics career from the beginning up until the 96 Olympics and her professional career. It's the best book I have read on her so far. This book is great for a fan who wants this book as a "map" of her career, or for someone who did not watch gymnastics before 96.

I am a huge Shannon Miller fan, and this book is great. I have read it twice and I am still not bored with it. It gives great insight into her past competitions, what she went through, and the things that led up to them. It is really wonderful and detailed.

This is a great book to know what Shannon Miller was like what she she had to do everyday. everything she won all the times she fell and practicly everything you wanted to know.

Here's another awesome gymnastics bio from Krista Quiner! This was a terrific, nice and detailed book about Shannon Miller's life. From the minute she was born to the end of the '96 Olympic Games, this book is the ultimate one to learn about Shannon Miller. The book had plenty of great information, and you learn tons and tons of stuff about her. There were also tons of awesome pictures too! This is a must-read for all gymnastics fans.

This is the true story about the girls who had the good fortune to spend their summers in the most idylic settings to be had. The specific camp didn't matter, for all of them share the same values. I have sent this book to many of my camp friends and all have been most enthusiastic!

This book is a beautiful creation that will deeply touch any woman with wonderful camp memories. I couldn't put it down until I had studied every photo, read every caption, and ordered a copy for my best camp friends. I felt like a recognized the face of each and every girl in this timeless tribute. Kahn has complied a scrapbook for all of us to remember suntanned summers swimming in the lake and joyously eating burnt food from the fire.

I have had a copy of this book for three years now - and it the favored book by our CITs at resident camp. Several have received it as a graduation gift and they pass it around and around and around the unit. No matter what camp you go to - some things are universal.

I went to a camp in the Pocanoes for 12 years, my daughter now goes to this very same camp! 90 years!! This summer, while spending a week with other alum from my camp, "Sleepaway" was recommended to me. This book, from cover to cover, perfectly summed up all our camp experiences. There are many, many pictues of campers all the way back to the early 1900's...very neat to see what camps looked like back then! We were excited to see our camp in there!

I am 15 years old right now, and i have been going to sleepaway camp for 3 years now. I went to camp not knowing many people, mabye 3 girls and now camp is something i can't live without! For four weeks, and starting summer '04 it will be eight weeks-i have thought about camp all year round. Camp is one magical place where you can get away, and this book captures that special feeling that camp gives you. For any camper old or new this book is amazing!!!

This is a great book! im a keeper myself and it works for me. The pictures and disriptions are great too. ***** 5stars
GREAT VALUE!!
:)

I have over 100 soccer books including goalkeeping books by Wilson, Shilton, Luxbacher, Waiters,Machink and the videos of Machnik, Hoek and Dicicco. Lincoln Philips's book was worth the money and more for several reasons. He has the wisdom of years of playing experience at the the national team level as well as college coaching and USSF Staff coaching duties. He has an excellent discussion on the art of stopping penalty kicks and develops a list of visual cues goalkeepers can use to predict where kicks will go. He examines techniques for prevailing in 1v1 breakaways I had not previously encountered. Finally he has an excellent section on defending restarts which is particularly valuable to the goalie in light of the high percentage of goals which result from poor defensive communication and organization at these times.

I have reviewed many goalkeeping books and own four. This book is by far the best. It is well organized and explains the details of soccer's most difficult position in an approachable manner. It is obvious that Lincoln knows his stuff. If you read it in his book you can be sure of it, which is not the case in some other books I've read. Can't go wrong with this one.

I knew nothing of goalkeeping before purchasing this book. This book is easy to read and understand, well organized, and full of easy-to-follow visuals. I purchased it to understand our goalkeeper's job and loaned it to him to read. He played keeper for years, and even he learned from it and INSTANTLY improved. An injury prevents him from playing this season. With this book as my only coach and practicing what was in it, we (myself and my defense) earned a shutout in just my second game as keeper. Lincoln Phillips provides coaching in every aspect of goalkeeping and tells you exactly what you need to know. I recommend this book for beginning keepers, experienced keepers, coaches, and anyone else interested in the position and its importance. BUY THIS!

Lincoln Phillips is one of the outstanding teachers of the game today. He brings a warm and open presence to the subject, revealing the secrets to playing the position with a common sense approach that is guaranteed to bring success. This is a must-have addition to any coaches or players library.

Howard and Ali were pals...you can feel their love for each other in this book. We miss both of these players...

Where else but in American sports can an old, white, Jewish veteran befriend a young Black Muslim draft dodger? They may not have been friends who loved each other, but it was convenient for both of them. If you can't take advantage of a friend, then he's not. They had things in common. Both were driven. Both had over inflated egos. They were the greatest. If you don't believe it just ask them. Well, Howard Cosell is dead & Ali doesn't talk any more. Their early life & struggles are covered well so that you understand where they came from. Cosell was a World War II vet. He earned a law degree then decided he wanted to do sports on television. He was brash, obnoxious & smart. His relationship with Ali & Monday Night Football made him a nationally recognized sports journalist. Ali, originally Cassuius Clay had a fairly normal upbringing. Then he won Golden Gloves Championship & Olympic gold metal in 1960, that propelled him into his pro career. Before he was finished he had became & is the most recognizable man on earth. He was the world Heavyweight Champion, that most singular of all championships, three times.
Ali was despised for his faith, his refusal to serve in the military & of course his race. Eventually, he overcame all these obstacles. The U.S. government pursued him, denying his draft deferment status. As a result he was also denied the right to box for several of what would have been his most productive years. He lost millions of $$$ & was stripped of his championship. Eventually, he was aquitted. Cosell covered him all along his journey. The author, Dave Kindred spends quite a bit of time on Ali's three fights with Joe Fraizer & rightly so. Ali's life has become an inspiration to kids on all continents but especially the impoverished millions in Africa. He was persecuted by his own government & cheated by the leaders of the Black Muslim faith that managed him. He apparently is now a quiet soul bearing no malice to anyone. Cosell on the other hand became embittered after his MNF gig. He wanted to be taken seriously as more than a sports announcer. When he wasn't he didn't take it well. Poor health eventually claimed him. A good sports book for all us fans of a certain age that remember Cosell & Ali in their prime.

David Kindred has written what amounts to a duel biography of the controversial odd couple that is Muhammad Ali and Howard Cosell. The author tells us that Ali elected to not join the military because the Muslim Nation told him not to. To cross them was to literary toy with his life. The assassination of Malcolm X being used as an example. While not necessarily agreeing with Ali's decision Cosell supported Ali stating that taking his heavyweight championship away from him without any semblance of due process was completely wrong. There appears to be evidence that Cosell may have already been experiencing dementia when he came out with his second book entitled I Never Played the Game. Aware of the criticism in his book of his cronies in the TV booth for Monday Night Football Cosell was asked before publication whether he wanted to include these strong opinions. Since he always prided himself on telling it "like it is" he felt it would be hypocrisy of him not to do so now. Cosell was a devoted family man while Ali ventured into nocturnal delights. It was hard for sports fans to be neutral in regard to either of these men, but boxing was the ingredient that brought these two men together first in mutural respect and then in friendship. Incidentally, page 247 has a hilarious anecdote of Howard using his colorful vocabulary in breaking up fisticuffs involving teens in Kansas City. Whether you are a fan of either man or the part they played in sports you will find this to be an extremely enjoyable book to read.

Dave Kindred has done lovers of sports and history a favor with Sound and Fury.

Using two cultural giants - Mohammad Ali and Howard Cosell - he has produced a fresh and readable social history of the latter half of the Twentieth Century. Let me be clear. I love Ali. Kindred refers to him as the most influential sports figure of the last century. In my mind, he understates the case; Ali is the most influential person of the last century.

Cosell, on the other hand, may have hesitated to tell you he was. He was not. Trained as a lawyer and gifted with the ability to articulate complexity, he brought a thinking man's view to radio and television sports journalism.

Individually, they were interesting. Together, they were hypnotizing. They produced controversy, drama and comedy almost every time they appeared together.

Dave Kindred tells the story of this alliance from a unique perspective. As a newspaper and magazine sports columnist with nearly 40 years experience, he covered Ali's early fight days as a reporter for the Louisville Courier-Journal before moving on to the The Atlanta Journal- Courier and The Washington Post. He draws upon his experiences to re-create the Ali-Cosell story in ways I have never seen attempted.

The result is a fascinating portrait of two outsized figures - their heroics and their demons. Drawing on personal observations, fresh reporting and interviews, Kindred writes a page-turning treatment of two lives that together changed sports, television and I would argue, the world, forever.

Sound and Fury (14 hours, 11 cds, unabridged, Blackstone Audio) is a duel biography of Howard Cosell and Mohammed Ali.

Sport writer Dave Kindred knew both men, he has written a bio that transcends his knowledge of both men. His text is an honest, no hold barred , warts and all biography. When a third person (like Kindred) writes a biography, he tends to put his personal touches with his own bias, this book is NOT that.The book showed an unlikely partnership created by media hype.

In the audio narrative hands of Dick Hill, this audio project seems more like a docudrama in its scope. Hill's narrative voice takes on verbal personas of Cosell and Ali, without mocking them. His talent has grown from the days at Brilliance Audio.

Sound and Fury is an amazing production . . . you won't forget it audio, long after you heard it

Bennet Pomerantz AUDIOWORLD

SOX AND THE CITY IS WRITTEN BY RICHARD ROEPER WHO IS ALSO A MOVIE CRITIC ALONG WITH ROGER EBERT IN CHICAGO AND THEY HAVE A SYNDICATED TV SHOW. I REALLY LOVED THIS BOOK. I AM NOT A SOX FAN BUT AN INDIANS FAN AND I KNOW MANY MANY SEASONS HAVE PASSED SINCE A WORLD SERIES VICTORY. ROPER BRINGS BACK MUCH NOSTALGIA FROM BASEBALL IN THE 1960'S TO PRESENT DAY. I REALLY ENJOYED THE SEGMENTS ABOUT THE 1967 TEAM AND DICK ALLEN. I ESPECIALLY RECOMMEND THIS FOR ALL SOX FANS AND EVEN IF YOU ARE NOT, THIS IS AN EXCELLENT READ FOR ALL BASEBALL FANS. HE DOES A GREAT JOB DESCRIBING IN DETAIL HOW THE 2005 SEASON WENT WITH SOME GREAT BEHIND THE SCENES STORIES. I THINK THE ONE MAIN THING I ENJOYED MOST WAS HIS EXPERIENCES FOLLOWING THE SOX AS A CHILD WHEN WE ARE YOUNG AND NAIVE AND HOPE IS ETERNAL. A MUST READ.

Roeper writes very well for a journalist (ha-ha), and this book was both funny and captured the essence of being a White Sox fan. He takes you through his personal experience of being fan from his childhood in the 1960s to attending the World Series in 2005. The book would be a fun read even if you were not a White Sox fan as Roeper includes a lot of jokes about pop culture such as movies and music, and many of the stories of being a fan are universal regardless of the team.

Fantastic recap of decades of Sox lore! This book was a quick and interesting read, containing trivia, stats, and facts all interwoven with personal anecdotes and memories. Terrific for new or old fans - a must have for all who know and love the Sox!

Thank goodness the White Sox have southside Chicago native Richard Roeper as a fan! The Cubs and other more popular MLB teams have a much longer roster of both author/fans (e.g. Stephen King and the Red Sox) and A-list celebrity/fans (of which the White Sox have none - sorry Jerry Springer, you're B-list). But the White Sox, with their long, interesting history and their amazing 2005 World Series run, needed someone to step up to the plate and deliver what the fan base needs: a book documenting what it means to be a White Sox fan in the four decades up to 2005. Roeper delivers a solid home run, albeit not a grand slam.

Roeper deftly interweaves three main storylines in "Sox and the City": the highlights of the past 40 years of Sox history; Roeper's own personal experiences as a fan attending more than 1000 Sox games; and the highlights of the 2005 season and World Series run. Along the way Roeper provides a personal, often humorous view of the main topics in Sox history: the different Sox teams that have been assembled over the years; what it means to be a Sox fan in what will always (unless the demographics of Chicago change radically) be a Cubs town, including especially the Sox/Cubs rivalry among the fans (which, because of geography is more passionate - at least on the Sox side - than any other intercity major league rivalry); Harry Caray's move from the Sox to the Cubs; Bill Veeck's attempts to generate excitement (and bring in paying fans) on the southside; Disco Demolition Night; the move from Comiskey to the Cell; and much more.

There is so much White Sox history that it is impossible to capture it all in a single volume, but Roeper hits all the highlights. His prose is very accessible, humorous, and direct. "Sox and the City" is likely to become the definitive guide to what it means to be a White Sox fan in the present day.

Why only four stars? Roeper's done an admirable job in all areas of the book except two: explaining precisely what made the 2005 team different than all other White Sox teams, and capturing the excitement and impact of the Sox's 2005 World Series victory on the city of Chicago. Perhaps the latter is an impossible task to translate into words - you had to be there.

All literate White Sox fans should read this book.

"Sox and the City" is a great read for any baseball lover, but particularly White Sox fans. They say that as a baseball fan you are wedded to one team for life, and live and die with them each season. Or to paraphrase one of those east coast baseball fans, baseball is not life or death, but the [White] Sox are!

"Sox and the City" will most interest Chicagosns, of course. But all baseball fans might enjoy it. After all, being a White Sox fan in a city with more than one team, and an ancient generational rivalry (I won't name that OTHER team) is an experience few living baseball fans still know. the annual highs and lows (and finally triumph) that made the suffering all worth it. Only perhaps New Yorkers share the experience (and even the New York Mets are stand-ins for the old Yankees-Dodgers-Giants rivalry).

If you love baseball, pick this one up!

I was a summer camp counselor for seven summers, and this guide was fantastic for those years. It is a staple reference at our camp for other counselors to read. A true reference from a distinguished psychologist and counselor given to other counselors. Thanks

This is a really helpful book for preparing for summer camp. Here's a tip I got from a friend: if you buy it through acabookstore.org (ACA = American Camping Association) then it comes with a DVD-CD set. My son, who's pretty anxious about going to camp, watched the DVD and that really helped turn his anxiety into excitement. The book and DVD give great tips on preparing (packing, etc.) for camp, but also gives great insight on how to approach the camp experience. Together they answered a lot of questions I didn't even know to ask. It's one of those things you can't afford not to get.

This book really covers what you need to know before you send your child to sleepaway camp. The part that was most helpful to me was the research the authors have done on homesickness. Before I got this book I was guessing about how to handle my daughter's homesickness, and I came up with one or two of their recommendations. But after I read this book I felt I understood how to handle this with my daughter and also what the camp and counselors can do to help. There's a great list of all the things you can do. And everything the authors said rings true with my experience.

It's well written, easy to follow, and has parts written just for kids to read. There's even a section to tell kids how to get the most out of camp - from general guidelines on how to treat others to good advice on how to deal with living with lots of kids in a small space.

Every parent, camper, counselor and camp director should read this book! Parents will have a more relaxing time while their kids are away, campers will know better what to expect and how to have the most fun, counselors will know better what to do, and camp directors will have fewer problems with kids AND parents.

The best thing about this book was that it was so helpful to both me and my daughter when it came time to start preparing for her first stay at summer camp. We relied on the suggested internet search engines in the book to find the camps and used the section on co-ed vs. single-sex camps to come to a conclusion that my daughter and I(!) were comfortable with. I've already spread the word about this book to all the parents I know that are thinking about sending their kids off to camp. Every parent will feel better once they've read the homesickness section.

I bought Chris Thurber's book on Friday, and watched him on NBC's Today Show this morning (June 9, 2003). Seeing him in person confirms what I thought: he is a camping expert with a wealth of helpful information for parents and kids alike. I feel so much better sending my son to camp knowing that Chris and Jon's research has helped us prepare in a way that will maximize the fun and minimize the homesickness at camp. Buying this book is a small investment in a positive experience whose benefits, I am sure, will last a lifetime. (I found the perfect camp for my son by visiting the American Camping Association's web page: acacamps.org.)

it covers every aspect of swimming in great depth, such as hydrodynamics, stroke techniques, nutrition, weight training, starts and turns and much more.

high recommended for all fitness and competitive swimmers.

I've readed a lot of books about swimming and I must declare that this one is probably the best.
It analise every aspect of this sport and supported by an impressionant bibliography it can separate facts from suppositions and errors.
This book has helped me to understand the deepest aspect of training and swim propulsion in the four strokes, and it can be well used in addiction with other manuals.
I'm emotionally waiting for Maglischo next work.

This is the best swimming book I have ever read. Everything a swimmer or coach needs: training principles, swimming technique, and mental aspects of the sport. It covers everything even how you should split your race. Lots of drills for every stroke.

This book has served me well as a coach for many years, and I have given it as a gift to several coaches and top swimmers. Whether or not you care to get lost in the endless debate over Bernoulli versus Newton, this book has much more to offer. I trained under Ernie Maglischo and this book has served as the marvelous manifestation of his patient and persistent work on deck. I recommend it without reservation.

I'm primarily a rower, so I can't speak about the swimming-specific sections of this book. But I can rave about the more generally applicable sections. I've used this book for several years to design training programs for various rowing events, from 500 meters (about 1.5-2 minutes) to 2,000 meters (about 7-8 minutes) to head races (20 minutes and longer). Maglischo's explanations of how to balance the levels of effort in a training program for sprint or endurance events is tremendously helpful, as are the explanations of how to periodize training programs and create daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly programs.

The only tiny criticism I have of this book is that I would find it slightly more useful if the swimming distances included approximate times for the events. That way, it would make transferring the principles to comparable events in different sports more straightforward.

I recommend this book to any coach or athlete of any racing sport. You'll find not only physiological issues addressed, but also issues concerning pacing and race strategy -- a must for anyone desiring an internal focus during racing.

Trail Food by Alan S. Kesselheim is a spectacular little read for anyone interested in adventuring in the outdoors, self reliance, preperation, or even just making healthy snacks at home for a fraction of the price of storebought. Encouraging, practical, and written by an obviously experienced author, Trail Food helped enhance my outdoor experience. If you're still buying those freeze dried meals or even worse living off of ramen noodles when you're out in the wilds, I really suggest you consider dehydrating your own food, and this book is a great place to start. In addition to dehydration the author seasons the book with a bunch of other tidbits. There's little blurbs about the pros and cons of cooking over fires and various stoves, advice on setting up the camp kitchen, and at the beginning of every chapter there's a little blurb of a story about canoeing, backpacking, dogsledding, or just cabin living, that helped get me in that outdoorsy frame of mind. My two dehydrators are going to be working overtime!

good and informative book for the price. I tried a few of the recipes and was able to improvise from there.

As a boyscout leader, we like to outdo the scouts on our creative cooking to inspire their creativity. It is a great book, to show how to make creative meals without the weight of heavy food items. This has been great!! Thanks C>

Learn to use a food dehydrator and pack for those camping and hiking trips. There are also great tips on preserving fruits and vegetables.

Good airflow throughout the cabinet meaning everything dries close to the same rate. The sound is basically is low and unobtrusive - lower than a humidifier. I like the square shape because it maximizes counter space in the kitchen. I dehydrate entire meals for backpacking. In addition to the standard fruit and veggies, I've dried chili, lasagna, chicken enchilada & rice, tuna noodle, spaghetti & sauce, lemon lentil soup, and more. Again, size of the trays and airflow work great for spreading out the food and getting it dried evenly. Rehydrating food out on the trail is much easier and tastes better than carrying ingredients separately and combining them out there. Dehydrating my favorite recipes for the trail also beats a week of store bought mac 'n cheese type foods out there. Geez, I should have been doing this years ago.

This book has lots of drills to improve athletic performance. Although I haven't had a chance to try them out yet (I'm currently injured and unable to train), they seem like they would definitely improve your athletic performance.

This is a great book, it covers a wide range of training. I coach little league and have been able to take parts of this book and incorporate them into our conditioning and training at all levels. Have not used the DVD all that much but the book alone is worth it

Exactly what I was looking for.
Some brilliant drills in here.
I was hoping for more speed ladder stuff, but the amount of different stuff in here is great.

It's nicely organized with some good text.

A few descriptions were not so great.

Definitely recommended.

This is a great book and DVD set for plyometrics. Both the book and the DVD start with an "Athlete Fitness Assessment" so you can understand the athlete's performance at the beginning of training. This is lacking in many of the other plyometrics books and DVDs, which begin with instruction right away, without emphasis on assessing the athlete's ability prior to training. The materials are nicely organized into sections for Speed, Agility, Balance, Quickness, and Reaction Time. A "Purpose" is clearly defined for each set of drills, so readers at any level can understand the results which the exercises are intended to achieve. I am using this book to see where I am in my performance, and where I need to go. My only complaint is that the DVD plays the drills one at a time. It would be nice to have a "Play All" option in each section, so that I'm not using my remote every 30 seconds or so. The DVD is easy on the eyes and ears, though. Buy this set first, and save your time and money returning the other books and DVDs! Enjoy!

I thought this book was great for coaching athletes and putting together specific groupings of exercises to work on specific skills. The challenge though was that I bought it for myself and thought it would help me design something to help my triathlon speed. I'm thinking it requires a higher degree of background knowledge than I have at this point.

This was a fine book. It tells tales from the origins of Okinawan martial arts. It reflects an extremely positive philosophy for karate specifically and martial arts in general. It's well written and entertaining.
Unfortunately, as history, it's quite weak. The almost utter lack of dates & times and something less than a linear chronology just take away from this aspect of the work.
I do recommend it, but be aware that while it tells wonderful and fascinating stories and contains a powerful and compelling point of view, it just is not a good reference book for any sort of history of Okinawan karate.

Kims book provides the reader with some very colorful tales and great historical background on Okinawan karate and its earliest fighters. The book is well written and well sourced. IT's not so deep that you get lost between the pages, although another chapter or two would have been nice. Kim provides some great insights into karate's ethics and philosophys, which many could learn from today. Although first published almost 30 years ago the information is still a reliable source for todays karate-ka.

I enjoy Sensei Kim's wiritngs. This as a matter of fact, was the first book I had ever read by him and to this day I still enjoy reading it again and again from time to time.

This is a great book if you want to hear the tales of the founders of karate. If you are looking to this book however to be a fact based history book then this is not for you.

This book is truly a great insight into the philosophy and ethics of the true karate-ka. Too bad Mr. Kim did not write this book himself. Shame on you Mr. Kim for not following the path of truth and honesty. For taking Eizo Shimabukuro Senei's journal and notes you have dishonered yourself and your family.