How going sober improved my running recovery

And my pick of the week

Last year I wrote a candid piece about how going sober had not supercharged my running. It was one of my most popular newsletters to date and sparked a lot of conversations with my readers, friends and running buddies.

I’m now on the other side of this experiment and I still don’t really know whether I drink or not.

I stopped drinking alcohol on January 1^st 2024 and didn’t have a drop until Christmas Eve 2024. I had a couple of drinks over the Christmas period but nowhere near what I would normally consume.

The main reason for this was that my body simply didn’t like the taste anymore. I’d sit down to enjoy a glass of my favourite pre-sober wine and then immediately want to spit it out because it tasted like vinegar. This was extremely disappointing. I used to enjoy a full-bodied red, or a crisp dry wine, and now it all tasted like poison.

I also found that I got a hangover while drinking. After a glass of wine I’d start to get a headache and then feel a bit sick.

I think there were three reasons for this. Firstly, I had lost the ‘acquired taste’ for alcohol that we develop over years of drinking, and it was like drinking alcohol as a teenager again. Secondly, as I previously discussed, when I gave up alcohol I developed a massive sweet tooth and if I did drink something alcohol free it tended to be a sweet Nosecco (fake Prosecco) or an alcohol free lager which again was probably relatively sugary compared to wine. The caveat to all this was that spirits like rum or whiskey still tasted great with nothing more than a cube of ice.

The third reason was that subconsciously I felt my body was rejecting the alcohol as a way of telling me not to poison myself. But then why did it not reject spirits?

No longer my favourite sunshine tipple (Photo by Zan Lazarevic on Unsplash)

It has all been very confusing, and for the past two months I’ve been drinking and not drinking. I was completely sober at a friend’s 50^th birthday celebrations but there have been a couple of Saturday nights at home when I have built up my tolerance to manage three glasses of wine.

I’m also finding that now I have broken the sobriety seal I think about alcohol an awful lot. This happened for the first six months of being sober but gradually it faded. Now it has returned with a vengeance.

So, what has this all got to do with running?

Sobriety hasn't supercharged my running

In my previous post I lamented that I didn’t ‘feel’ fitter as a result of sobriety. And that is true. But I was getting results. I got PBs at every distance I raced and scooped up a few podium positions. I also ran my furthest distance ever and most importantly recovered quite quickly. And this for me is the biggest thing. Being sober doesn’t necessarily affect my performance but it does impact upon my recovery. I sleep better and my body heals itself faster. This means I can get back to quality training quicker.

But there are still exceptions to the rule. Some trail events I have run slower sober than previous years. And last year I got myself a coach which may have had more impact than giving up drinking.

So, do I still drink? The honest answer is, I don’t know. Or perhaps more accurately the answer is ‘sometimes’. I have definitely stopped drinking on nights out as I’m an all or nothing kind of person. And I still enjoy an alcohol-free lager a few times a month following a hectic day. In the past I would have opened a bottle of wine but the placebo effect of a zero-alcohol drink seems to lighten the mental load just as effectively.

But I think there will be a handful of occasions where I will enjoy a few drinks such as Christmas or the rare occasion I go to a music gig. But I am now incredibly mindful of timing these away from periods when my body needs to rest and recover – so no post-ultra benders for me!

I know that not drinking is better for me physically, but I don’t feel the need to be hard line about it. I think I have become a better judge of when, and when not to drink but as always it is a work in progress. I am wary that I could slip back into old habits, particularly over the summer, so I need to keep this in check. I will largely base it around races and recovery, to identify the peak periods when drinking needs to be avoided altogether.

I’ve also noticed things changing in the running world as well. At a recent Big Bear Events race (see photo at top running with dog) I received a can of alcohol-free lager at the end. I really appreciated this and thought it made much more sense than a bottle of 5% beer. I didn’t drink it for a few days as even a 0.5% lager can make me dehydrated and groggy, but the sentiment was a welcome change.

It takes huge cultural shifts to change our attitude towards alcohol (‘it’s social’, ‘it’s a treat’, ‘I deserve it’) but I feel that things are gradually shifting in my world and the world around me.

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Pick of the week

This Substack post by author Rachel Hewitt is an incredibly thoughtful and insightful piece evaluating women only spaces. Even if you don’t agree with her viewpoint on women only races, it is definitely worth a read. Scroll down to the section titled ‘Bullies’ and ‘Bigots’: The Maligning of Women who Defend Female-Only Spaces.

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Thanks for reading this week’s newsletter. If you have any running news for me, let me know! Send feedback to lilycanter@yahoo.co.uk or suggest topics you’d like me to cover.