Taking on the Steve Parr Round – Howard Dracup

Social pressures present in our lives, no matter our age. As adults, most of us have gained a maturity to navigate through those anxieties and have developed the ability to compartmentalize external pressures and voices. As teenagers, we stand no chance! In the early stages of developing emotional maturity, social pressures can become great weights, overwhelming our emotional bodies and dictating how we choose to move through life. This can be incredibly detrimental for some teens, but for me, it was the pressures I felt in my own environment, that led me towards the strongest and healthiest version of myself, and for that, I am grateful to have been through what I have.

When I was 13 years old and up until I turned 16, I weighed in at around 19 stone. No way to sugar coat it, I was morbidly obese. All my friends had girlfriends and I did not, and that sucked, but what really hit me hard was feeling alienated because of the way I dressed. It bothered me that I could not wear the trend brands at the time and watching all my mates dripping in the swag of Fred perry and Ralph Lauren, I felt like an outsider.

I remember going through the rails in Matalan, looking through the sad piles of apparel that either no one else wanted, or no one else could fit into. On one occasion I turned up, as I would regularly, to rummage, praying for a miracle that I would find something with a Nike logo, at least. There was nothing! It hit me in the chest like a brick, and in that moment, I knew there was no way around it, I was going to have to lose weight!

From 16 years old to around 30, I turned myself into my own experiment. Gauging what was possible for my physical form. I became addicted to health in general, and along my journey, I visited some really unhealthy avenues, such as starving myself to drop the pounds. However, it was those lessons, learned on the playground of sport and all that it encompasses, that I gained the wisdom and maturity to enter the world of Ultra running and sustain success.