{"product_id":"coffee-table-book-of-track-and-field-hardcover","title":"Coffee Table Book of: Track and Field (Hardcover)","description":"\u003cp\u003eCoffee Table Book of: Track and Field is a large-format coffee table book of track and field, printed edge to edge in colour, one picture to a page and the widest carried across two: the track, the sprints, hurdles and the steeplechase, the relay, the jumps and the throws, the marathon road, the ancient games and runners seen from far off.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIt opens with the track: a small red oval far off in a green valley at dawn, dew on the synthetic surface, a heap of old cinders and a track under tall lamps at night.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThen hurdles and the steeplechase: a white hurdle alone on dewy grass, a hurdler clearing a hurdle against a sunrise sky, a heavy timber barrier at the rim of a water pit and a hurdle knocked over in its lane.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThen the throws: an iron shot on the grass, a throwing circle with its curved stop board, a discus with a metal rim, a tall cage of netting round an empty circle, a discus thrower winding up at sunset, a javelin stuck point first in dewy grass and a hammer on its steel wire.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThen the marathon and the road: a lone runner far off on a country road at dawn, a crushed paper cup on an empty road, a runner on a coastal headland, a road climbing in long bends up a green hillside and a runner on a straight road across flat fields at sunset.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThen the ancient games: a stone starting sill with grooves for the toes, a pair of stone jumping weights, a bronze javelin point green with age and an empty ancient stadium in a valley of olive trees at sunset.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eToward the end, distance running and the track from afar: a pack of runners on the far straight at dusk, a track under fresh snow, a small track in an alpine meadow below snowy mountains, a brass bell beside the track and a small track far off on a lakeshore at dusk.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eShort notes run through the book. They are about the sport, its track, events, rules, implements, roads and history rather than about the pictures: the 3000 metres steeplechase with its 28 barriers and seven water jumps, poles once used to jump over canals and rivers before vaulting for height became a sport in the 1790s, the men's javelin redesigned in 1986 so that it lands point first, and the marathon's road distance, fixed in 1921 after early races of different lengths.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePrinted in full colour on heavy 150gsm coated paper at 216 x 279 mm (8.5 x 11 inches), as a hardcover with the art printed on the case.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Cedar Pine Editions","offers":[{"title":"Case Bound - PPC","offer_id":68151315235120,"sku":"9671456005140","price":22.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0262\/2357\/5085\/files\/9671456005140.jpg?v=1792655647","url":"https:\/\/www.thegreatbritishbookshop.co.uk\/products\/coffee-table-book-of-track-and-field-hardcover","provider":"The Great British Bookshop","version":"1.0","type":"link"}