About
Bill Donahue
I’m a journalist. In reporting stories, I’ve searched for fallen meteorites in the Sahara Desert, snuck into Manuel Noriega’s abandoned beach house, and camped out with Army soldiers in the minus 30 degree chill of the Alaskan Arctic. For publications ranging from The Atlantic and The New York Times Magazine to Harper’s, Wired, Bicycling, Runner’s World, Outside and Harvard Public Health, I’ve worked in over 20 countries.
I’m aware, with every story I write these days, that we’re living in a volatile world beset by climate change, the rise of fascism and the increasing corporate control of daily life. Even if I’m working on a profile of a runner or a cyclist, I try to write with my eyes wide open to the big issues.
My work has been republished in several anthologies, including Best American Sports Writing and Best American Travel Writing. I’ve won the Lowell Thomas Gold Medal for Adventure Travel Writing three times–in 2012, 2016 and 2022–and my 2024 essay on the murder of an unhoused man won first prize at the City and Regional Magazine Awards.
My 2024 book–Unbound, published by Rowman & Littlefield–is a collection of endurance sports pieces reported on five continents over two decades. Outside magazine called it “a slam dunk for any endurance person.”
I live in New Hampshire, and I try to get out on my bike or my cross-country skis every afternoon.