I have been infatuated with running as a sport and an anecdote to promote a healthy lifestyle since starting to train in high school in 2004. I probably started reading LetsRun since late 2004 or early 2005. My love for the sport grew as I became a student of the sport, diving in to read about past coach and elite runner's philosophies and training programmes from this board and training logs and books recommended from here. These included Cerutty, Lydiard, Bowerman, Prefontaine, Bikila, Wolde, Yifter, Bekele, Dixon, Walker, Quax, Halberg, Snell, Rose, Lindgren, Geis, Clayton, Virgin, Nurmi, Dellinger, Hill, Salazar, Shorter, Rogers, Landy, Elliott, Bedford, Nelson, Story, 70s and 80s "blue collar" sub elites in the marathon or 5k/10k in general, and on through the hoards of threads on Levins, Fernandez, Ritz, Solinsky, Derrick, Merber, Puskedra, Lalang, Chelenga, Kipchoge, etc as the years went on the past 15 years. I never really post too much but LetsRun has become an integral part of the fabric of my life in becoming a student of the sport and would later become the catalyst as a healer of a later post-collegiate lifestyle.
I grew having a 21 minute 5k PR in 9th grade to running sub 9:30 and running at a D1 school in a major conference. I breathed the sport and although the team culture was pretty heavily revolved around drinking a ton on the weekends or maybe starting Thursday's depending on workouts/racing schedules I still steadily improved and did not skimp on training or have any major injuries save for one my freshman year that helped me get a redshirt to make my fifth year of cross my most improved year. I scored a few times at conference, ran under 14:20 for 5k and finished decently high up for NCAA xc nationals in the double digits of finishers. A lot of my motivation and enamouring of the sport came from reading here about the runners aforementioned and "comeback" stories of older runners who in some ways fell away from the sport only to come back years or even decades later.
This is more or less, on a smaller scale, what happened to me. After finishing my eligibility I was quick to jump headfirst into temptations that came from playing guitar and bass in bands for the first time in a number of years since time constrictions and the main priorities being training, studying, and getting to bed by 10 or 1030 for morning practice. The two worlds were completely different, now I was the odd one out since I did not spend all my after work hours drinking and chain-smoking at bars. The rock'n'roll lifestyle never appealed to me even as much as I enjoy playing guitar, writing songs, and playing out. It seems to me to be such a drag to drown yourself in alcohol, smoke a pack or more a day, and rail coke on a daily/nightly basis but I more or less was surrounded by this lifestyle since graduating 6 years ago and diving headfirst into music with the same vigor as running. I tried everything mostly, besides heroin, crack or DMT, I did coke/meth a handful of times, a couple of painkillers/downers, molly once, and of course drank a lot and smoked a fair amount of weed for 6 years. Smoked maybe seven or ten cigarettes when offered (usually flicked it after half or less smoked) wheb drunk or feeling low and enticed but never did regularly and always hated the dizzyness, smell, taste, etc. For the first few years I even ran sporadically 3 4 or 5 times a week (then would stop for a few weeks or month or two and come back for a few weeks and then stopping, repeating the process) while smoking weed 2-4 times a day, many runs completely blazed or dehydrated. I still kept my foot in to running but gradually this went away. I still read here and still kept up with some elite results, its like I never wanted to forget, but the drugs did lead me to some bad environments and roommate situations.
My life became directly influenced by the want and (probably) need to smoke everyday after work or all day on my days off. I grew to drink alcohol less frequently but would still go on benders where I would slam a few tall boys back to back or randomly go to a bar alone and get hammered on cheap beer or cokes and rum for an hour and two before walking back to my apartment or riding my bike back drunk. I kept active my biking around to and from work and even to the grocery store and walking most places where i was living so my weight never ballooned up too much over 5 or 7 pound. If anything I lost a lot of muscle mass particularly in the quads from not hardly running at all. I just always wanted to be numb in some sense, for a while it almost felt liberating and freeing after running so many 60-85 mile weeks for years on end. I realized as time went on that it just became an empty escape and I was running from my true desires to be motivated to change my life around and live more holistically and take everything more seriously. I started to become disillusioned with the musicians and "hipster" spawn i was constantly around at house parties or shows so I started to reclude. I woukd go through phases where I would quit drinking or smoking but never at the same time. Always with one at the expense of the other. I didn't want to spend as much money at bars or socialize with these people i begun to loathe and see as so much different than me, i was an addict but I had grown to become so much more through my determinations of running and reaching a higher level of success in competition that was directly related to self-control and having the strength within yourself to not abuse mind-altering drugs/alcohol and to sleep and eat well. I wasn't like these people who stayed out until 1 or 2 every night and drove home drunk or took an Uber and woke up hungover for work everyday. It's like their whole goal in life was to forget the day they had and to always have the question in their head of wheres the next drink, what's the best move for tonight what bar, and banging a bunch of random gross alt girls. I really love challenging myself on guitar but i began to despise the people who i had to be around to play music in public. I was somewhere in no mans land, not a "normie" boring sports fan and not a too cool for school indie hipster know it all.
The most time I took off for toking was 5 weeks before now. I attempted to quit drinking twice and made it 3 months a few years ago and 4 months the year after. Now is the first time I have been completely sober without a drop of alcohol or a hit of pot. It has only been 9 weeks at a little over 2 months total but here's to 9 more weeks and beyond. My dreams have been absolutely insane, lucid, and scary at times. I have gotten back into running, maybe too quickly and vigorously as i think i have a minor tear in my calf or a calf strain at the least. I started running again in January after stopping for the longest time i ever have since 2004 (7 months). I bought Be Fit! Or Be Damned! And How To Become A Champion by Percy Cerutty and feel like i want to run through a brick wall again and go balls out, but patience should be a virtue since pulling the calf ive started back two seperate times and the pain has started again and I walked back to my house as it started the other day after a mile but i wont lie i did run through it a bit a week or a week and a half ago. Im so happy of the personal transformation im having that i was not patiwnt with this injury because I as so excited to fly outside on my feet again! I suppose i will take another 10-15 days completely off as hard as it may be reading Percy :)
I really wanted to get this off my chest to the place that really has helped and influenced me to take back the reigns of my health and my life. I know theres a lot of trolls and annoying threads at times but as a sheer force of power and emotion that i have needed over the years I know I speak for others in saying LetsRun is so important to us and goes far beyond just being a message board
Thank you, dreams do become a reality in more ways than you could ever fathom.