The day after my finest moment as an athlete, I began to change

I almost won a marathon once. It was 1994. Edmonton. I hadn’t trained excessively leading up to the race, but I’d trained enough. I always trained enough. And I was light. A buck-35 with my shoes on. And I was 38, the perfect age for so much of life, including running marathons.

The course was a figure eight, with the first 20 miles making up the big loop on the bottom and the final six making up the smaller loop on top. Because it was a figure-eight course, the 20-mile mark intersected with the spot where the race began and where it would eventually end. As I was aware I’d not trained with proper and rigorous dedication, I planned to quit the race at 20 miles and then kick back and watch the runners as they crossed the finish line. Problem was, at the 20-mile mark, I was in third place. And I could see the two runners ahead of me. And I was gaining on them.

Quitting seemed an unthinkable option. So, I pushed on, and, in that moment, in the instance of that decision, who I am changed.

I’ll explain. Somewhere around mile 18 my left knee started to hurt. I knew the pain. I’d had it before. I was intimate with the symptom. It was patellar tendinitis, also known as runner’s knee.

Given my familiarity with the injury, I knew that if I didn’t stop, and stop immediately, recovery would be months – three at least, but more likely six. The decision to push on at mile 20 was made with the certainty that my summer of leisurely running the glorious valley trails of Edmonton would not happen.

But I was in third place.

And I could see the two runners ahead of me.

And I was gaining on them.

I finished fifth. My time was a little more than 2 hours and 40 minutes. My knee was a mess. What now to do with myself?

Promises made; promises kept

Put aside the argument around the clinical definition of what is and what is not addiction, I consider myself addicted to running. Have been since I was 18. When I can’t run, almost always only because of injury, I go through the five stages of grief as defined by psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross in her seminal book On Death and Dying: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and, finally, acceptance.

The morning after the marathon, I woke up with a left knee in a swollen state of acute dysfunction. It was May. I wouldn’t be back running with an accustomed seriousness until November. A week or so after the injury, now in the bargaining stage of my grief, I promised myself two things:

1. I was injured because I raced, so I promised never to race again. I have kept this promise. And while I have suffered injuries in the past 25 years, they have been trivial by comparison. Nothing a month of rest and rehab couldn’t handle;

2. I would go to the gym and do whatever it is people at the gym do in order to maintain my fitness while away from running. I have kept this promise, too. This is the promise that changed my life, changed who I am, changed how I look.

When I first started going to the gym, I could barely curl a 25-pound straight bar with no weights on it. I could do maybe three chin-ups. I couldn’t bench press the weight of the bench. But after the first week of lifting, putting down, lifting again, putting down again, I started to derive some pleasure from it. As exercise goes, it wasn’t giving me the endorphin-releasing kick of a good run, but it gleefully played with that part of my brain where the addiction cells vigilantly stalk my every decision in life.

By the time I was back running, I looked more like a decathlete than a marathoner. I liked the change. Twenty-five years later, I still run most every day and lift weights three days a week. The photo posted with this story well represents the change. The gym image, taken earlier this year, is me 40 pounds heavier than the race image, taken 25 years ago, the day I almost won a marathon.

Sidebar, if I may:

I have had addiction issues in my life, alcohol mostly, but other stuff, too, like dieting. My dieting addiction (more commonly referred to as an eating disorder) manifested itself in a funny way when I was in my early 20s. I’d finished my first marathon in Seattle placing a respectable 19th, completing the course in just under 2 hours and 40 minutes. I became obsessed with breaking the 2:30 barrier. I’d read somewhere that the ideal body weight for a world class marathoner was two pounds per inch, so I did the math and began starving myself to reach a goal weight of 120. I did it. My mother thought I was dying. I found it so difficult maintaining that weight, yet, I also found an odd kind of pleasure in the achievement. I was running more than 100 miles a week and eating next to nothing. Then, one day in a class at UBC, a nursing student named Patricia asked me if I ate a lot of carrots. The remainder of the conversation went something like this:

Me:“As a matter of fact, yes, I do. Twenty a day, I’d say.”

Patricia the nursing student:“Thought so. Your skin is an orange-yellow, but your eyes are clear, so I know it’s not jaundice. The only other explanation is carotenemia, which is what happens to your skin after prolonged and excessive consumption of carotene-rich foods like carrots.

Me:“Is it dangerous?”

Patricia the nursing student:“Harmless. But I have to ask, why are you eating so many carrots?”

Me:“I’m trying to maintain my ideal marathon weight, which is 120 pounds.”

Patricia the nursing student:“Why is 120 pounds your ideal marathon weight?”

Me:“I read it somewhere. The ideal is two pounds per inch of height.”

Patricia the nursing student:“How tall are you? Me:“Five-10.”

Patricia the nursing student:“Um, that works out to 140 pounds.”

Me:“!”

I ate well that night.