July 2027 · Book tie-in: Saudi Arabia / The Courtroom · Psalm 138:8
Here’s how you become a better, stronger, smarter runner today — by understanding that losing running is not the end of running.
There are times in life when the thing you love most is the thing you have to let go of. Not by choice. Because something bigger forces your hand.
This is the most personal post I’ve written this year. If running has ever been taken from you — by injury, illness, or life — this one is for you.
The morning it stopped
Jeddah. An early run on my usual ten-kilometre rectangle. The legs were loose, the breathing steady, and I was on course for a personal best on that route. You know those mornings. The body is running above its baseline and you get greedy.
With two and a half kilometres to go I had to cross a busy road. A car was coming. I made the calculation — I’ll make it — and accelerated. I was looking at the car, not the ground. My left foot hit a big rock at the edge of the road.
I heard the snap before I understood it. Cold sweat in the rising heat. The street was empty. No phone. Nobody was coming to pick up the foreigner who had fallen. I had to get myself home.
The doctor who set the cast — a Saudi surgeon who, to my astonishment, spoke fluent German — joked with me, made me laugh, and then said something I wasn’t ready for: the working life I’d been living was over. He asked me, “Why do you think it happened?” I had no answer.
What I missed first
Not the fitness. Not the races. I missed the thinking.
For thirty years every big decision in my life — leaving a country, ending a partnership, starting again with nothing — had been made somewhere between the fifth and the fifteenth kilometre. Without the road, my thoughts had nowhere to go. They just went round and round in a chair.
That’s the part of losing running nobody warns you about.
The identity dimension — and the mental health dimension
When you run for decades, running stops being something you do and becomes part of who you are. So when it’s taken away, it doesn’t just feel like losing a hobby. It feels like losing yourself.
In my own head, the man in the chair was a lesser version of the athlete who had run 504 kilometres across Europe, finished Comrades back-to-back, and was training for Ironman Barcelona. That story hurt more than the ankle.
If you’re there now, please hear this: your mood dropping when you can’t run is not weakness. Running regulates a lot for a lot of us. Losing it is a real loss. If the low mood sticks around or gets heavy, talk to someone — a friend, your doctor, a counsellor. That’s not giving up. That’s training your recovery.
A season of waiting
My life has had other seasons where I couldn’t run my way out — one of them in a courtroom, where I had to sit still, say nothing, and let the other side have their say. There was no road to take it to. I had to wait.
“The Lord will vindicate me; your love, Lord, endures forever — do not abandon the works of your hands.”
— Psalm 138:8
I love this verse because it isn’t loud. It’s the quiet confidence of someone who has been through something. Not “I will win.” Rather: I’m not abandoned. This isn’t the end of the story.
Seasons of waiting end. The ankle healed slowly. And slowly, the chair became something else.
What running gave back
From that chair I wrote my first running book. Then my second. Then more. The podcast started. The coaching took shape. All the notes I’d collected on the road for years finally had somewhere to go.
Running gave back in a way I didn’t expect. It had taught me one thing I could use even without my legs: know the outcome you want before you start. In every race I ever ran, I knew the feeling I was running towards. In the chair, I knew what I was building before I had built it.
And then one day, the shoes went back on. The road was there, exactly where I’d left it, and my thoughts had somewhere to go again.
If running has been taken from you
- Grieve it honestly. It’s allowed to hurt.
- Keep the habit alive in another form. Rehab exercises, walking, upper-body work — whatever your doctor allows. A daily action keeps the identity alive until the running returns.
- Plan your return, not your date. See the first easy run. Feel it. Rehearse it.
- Start small when you’re back. A streak is the gentlest comeback there is. Make 365 Days Count is built around 5K a day — but after injury, start with walk-run days and build up. Count days, not kilometres.
- Once you’re healthy, build a second sport. So that the next time the road closes, you’re not left with nothing. From Runner to Efficient Swimmer is written for healthy runners who want a calm, efficient front crawl.
The message
Losing running is not the end of running. Sometimes it’s the start of a different kind of runner — one who knows exactly what the road is worth.
Your action step
If you’re running right now: go out this week and run one kilometre in silence, grateful for it. If you’re not able to run: write a letter to your future self, describing your first run back — where, what weather, how it feels.
Then answer:
What has running given me that I want to keep, even on the days I can’t run?
Take it easy, and God bless.
— Heiko
This post is not medical advice. If you are struggling with low mood, please reach out to your doctor or someone you trust.