Ultra-Redemption

Why would anyone want to run that far? It’s more of a statement than a question for the average person, as many sane individuals would never dream of running anything more than the standard 26.2 mile marathon, and to be honest, I don’t blame them. Last year, I attempted my first ultra-marathon, a 50 Kilometer foot race in Gunnison, CO starting around 8,000 feet and peaking at just over 9,200. The DNF (did not finish) I received from that race propelled me into a self destructive spiral that drained my bank accounts and crushed my spirit.

One year ago I was a sober man who spent most of his time smoking weed, a vegan who would compulsively cheat on M&M’s, an athlete who skipped the majority of workouts, and a good employee who commonly found excuses to leave early or miss work all together. I was nothing but the image of who I wanted to be without actually being that man. The 50K was a way for me to prove that my faking it was good enough to get through life, and around the halfway point of that race I learned just how wrong I was. My body was physically strong, but my mind had completely caved. 

I quit. 

I don’t believe I will ever have a way to describe the pain that I was in mentally and, truthfully, there is no excuse that would have been a good reason to quit. I simply did not have the mental fortitude to finish. That race broke me. It crushed everything I thought I was and only left room for the real me to shine through. The broken man with no idea of who I was. 

While running an ultra you basically find yourself in the middle of no where and getting back to civilization is no easy task. In that race it mean a long drive with a few of the volunteers who were definitely having a great time, so good in fact, that they offered to share their alcohol with me. In one of the worst mental states I have ever been in, in the middle of no where, in a truck with absolute strangers, I finally realized just how important my sobriety actually is to me. It was not something I was willing to sacrifice, and was the only thing I was able to hold on to that day.

The road didn’t suddenly get easier from there, in fact my life continued to spiral out of control. Being fired from a good job, an emotionally destructive relationship, a drug-induced road trip around the country draining my savings, and finally giving up completely and running home to stay with my parents with my tail between my legs. It was a new sort of rock bottom. Not the type of rock bottom I hit in the Marine Corps and I was sent to rehab, or the drug and alcohol bender I went on before running away to Utah, or the time I received my first DUI, and this is not to mention the countless nights of blacked out Nic who was definitely not as cool as the bartender Nic that everyone seemed to love so much. Hell, I had been living on rock bottom for nearly a decade and even in sobriety I never learned how to mentally pick myself up off that floor. I learned to hide behind a few athletic achievements and a false sobriety because I was far too scared to actually live authentically. 

I feared failure above everything else. I feared opening up to the world and people finding out how big of a fraud I actually was. The running, the weight loss, the lifestyle changes, all of those were just masks I was hiding behind… They were hiding me from the world. Those masks were building up the person I wanted to be, rather than just allowing myself to be. 

So here we are. Taking steps to remove the masks that hide the insecure man I really am. Taking on challenges that really scare me. Finding new ways to push myself outside of that comfort zone to reveal a little bit more of the Nic that is inside. As the word ultra passes my lips I get the sense that it’s time to take a leap and set out to accomplish a feat that has conquered me in the past. A feat that will require the Nic that is buried deep inside to surface and show his true colors. How much pain can I take? Am I ready for the world to see the real me? The me that typically hides behind jokes and one liners and witty comebacks? The me that claimed to be so many things but for so long lived a life filled with the opposite.