Josiah Hesse - Runners High: How a Movement of Cannabis-Fueled Athletes Is Changing the Science of Sports

Pot is fun.

Allen Ginsberg

As the jovial bro announces that its almost time for the race to begin, I cant help but feel a little out of place. Thousands of runners have filled this Denver park on a chilly spring morning in 2015 for the Colfax Marathon, all of us sporting racing bibs, spandex compression tights, and expensively engineered rubber shoes. Were segregated into different groups according to our athletic ability, patiently awaiting our turn like cattle to the slaughter.

Weve all paid a decent chunk of money, devoted hundreds of hours in training, and endured near crucifixion-levels of pain (not to mention climbing out of bed at this unholy hour). And for what? I ask myself. Why exactly am I doing this?

The teenage rebel inside me says that I dont belong here. As a kid, I subscribed to the naive, Breakfast Club view of social dynamics, which pegged me as the punk-rock, anti-authority Judd Nelson archetype, or at the very least the squeaky goth girl in heavy eyeliner. Either way, I definitely wasnt Emilio Estevez, the thick-necked jock with daddy issues. I got my ass kicked by people like Emilio in high school, and ever since Ive viewed anyone with so much as a gym membership suspiciously.

But all that changed a few years ago. After a decade of hard drinking and smoking, I began running obsessively every day, structuring my entire life around sprinting across mountain trails and through city parks. On this beautiful Denver morning I am in the best shape of my lifea low bar, admittedlyand am about to run a marathon down my favorite street in America while listening to a meticulously curated playlist of my favorite songs.

So what am I so worked up about?

Theres a combination of gleeful excitement and stage-fright anxiety surging through all of us as we wait for the air horn to announce the start of the race. The thinnest slice of pink daylight is creeping out of the eastern sky, illuminating the snowcapped Rocky Mountains to the west. A crisp chill in the air is turning our breath to steam as we stock up on as much oxygen as we can before the race begins. Remixes of top 40 radio songs are thudding from nearby speakers the size of my house, punctuated by an announcerfar too chipper for 6:00 a.m.reading a list of marathon sponsors.

Despite living in Denver for half my life and feeling like Ive met nearly all 2.9 million of its population, I dont recognize a single soul here. Everyone I know is still in bed, sleeping off hangovers and ringing ears after a night spent flailing before amplifiers blasting live rock music (its own kind of cardio workout). I accidentally make eye contact with a middle-aged man wearing a Broncos hat and one of those pink shirts proclaiming hes racing for a cure for breast cancer. He gives me a hearty smile and a thumbs-up, and I look away.

I dont want to be rude, but some part of me is just not excited to be here.

Or at least I wont allow myself to be excited about being here.

Its a childish, idealistic side of me, to be sure, but it stems from the sincere belief that combining exercise and competition is inherently ridiculous. There are few things in life that bring me as much pleasure as running, but Ive resisted the urge to document my running in any numerical way. To me, calculating the data of a run makes as much sense as measuring your heart rate while dancing, or counting your hip thrusts during sex. Running, for me, is about losing myself in the moment; consciousness, time, money, ambition, fear of deathall of it should melt away in the hypnotic rhythm of one step following another.

If youre doing it right.

Ive always had a hard time keeping myself in that state whenever numbers enter the picture. Especially if those numbers are viewed in relation to someone elses, and then suddenly Im back in high school, unable to jog so much as a lap around the gym as bullies and teachers laugh in disbelief.

Unwarranted defensiveness fuels my criticism of this race and its participants. Im tired and grumpy, and easily find something to hate about everyone around me. But then I sigh and tell myself to stop being such a snob. These people have just as much right to be here as I do, and who gives a shit if they dont run with the same quasi-spiritual, anti-competition mindset that I do?

And besides, I remind myself, you have plenty of rebellious heroes who were avid runners. So its not like theres no cultural precedent for your being here.