Rich RollFrom Drinking Every Morning to Running 340 Miles
Rich Roll
Introducing Tommy Runs 0:00
The episode opens with a quick preview of Tommy Runs, a sober, vegan ultrarunner who once drank every morning and now completes extraordinary feats like the Speed Project, a 340 mile relay run from Los Angeles to Las Vegas. He has run six or seven marathons in a single year, including the Osaka Marathon just seven days before Tokyo. The hosts frame his story as one of addiction followed by recovery and, later, athletic achievement.
An Old Message Resurfaces 1:02
Rich Roll's producer Dan finds an old voice message Tommy sent the show back in 2021. In it, Tommy describes himself as a young Black guy from the Detroit area who went sober, then vegan, then became a runner, a combination he says is not common in the Black community. He explains that he found Rich's book and podcast, Finding Ultra, at a pivotal moment, and that it made him feel less alone as he searched for guidance without many examples around him. By the time of that message, his life had shifted from what he calls desperate to thriving, and he had started his own running brand, podcast, and interviews. Hearing the message again years later, Tommy says it feels surreal and a little cringey, but also makes him proud of how far he has come and how he now tries to help others the way the podcast helped him.
Childhood in Detroit 6:00
Tommy was born in New York, and his parents separated when he was five, after which the family moved to Detroit, where his mother's side of the family was from. His mother raised him and his sister largely on her own. His father died of a stroke at age 39 when Tommy was eight, and Tommy, who shares his father's name as the third in line, grew up feeling he could never live up to the man people described so highly. He describes his younger self as lost and unsure of his identity growing up in a diverse but socially stratified school environment.
Never Quite Fitting In 8:00
In school, Tommy was not part of the popular crowd defined by expensive brands like Iceberg sweaters, though he knew everyone and got along with them. He preferred a small circle of close friends rather than a large group, and he never applied himself academically even though he could pass tests. He started golfing in eighth grade during the Tiger Woods era, which gave him a sense of purpose through high school by requiring him to keep his grades up, though he felt limited by being short for the sport at the time. Outside of golf, his athletic outlet was informal neighborhood games rather than school sports.
The First Drink at Seventeen 12:00
At seventeen, during his senior year, a friend offered him small liquor bottles in the school hallway. The first drink gave him a feeling of fake clarity, a sudden sense that he no longer cared what others thought of him. Within two weeks he was drinking every day, escalating from sips to actively seeking out alcohol before and during school hours, not just after.
Passing Out at the Pep Rally 14:00
Two weeks into drinking, at a school pep rally, Tommy drank heavily after other students began asking him for sips, which pushed him to bring extra. He ran out of his classroom and passed out, waking up on the bathroom floor with his mother, the principal, and security standing over him. Rich Roll calls it one of the most accelerated cases of alcoholism he has heard of. Rather than being scared straight, Tommy simply adjusted, easing back into drinking beer instead of liquor so he could sustain the habit without repeating that scene.
His Grandmother's Words 21:00
After the incident, his mother, visibly hurt, still made him go to his job at a golf store and had his grandmother drive him. His grandmother, known for her quiet kindness, told him only one thing before he got out of the car: don't let them see you like this. Tommy says that moment stayed with him for years, and he only fully understood its meaning once he later found sobriety, at which point he tried to chase the redemption that moment represented.
Fifteen Years of Hidden Drinking 23:31
Tommy dates his first drink to 2002 and his sobriety to 2017, meaning he spent about fifteen years drinking after that first incident. Rather than stopping, he set unspoken rules for himself, such as never getting that visibly drunk in public again, which led him into an isolated pattern of drinking alone at home rather than going out. Morning drinking became standard by around age twelve or thirteen years into the pattern, a habit he partly justified by recalling an acquaintance who drank daily before going out to feel an edge. He closes this stretch by describing addiction's three phases as he understood them: fun at first, maintenance in the middle, and torture at the end, once there is no real chance of stopping the momentum.
Losing Every Morning 26:30
You describe waking up each day already defeated, unable to string together even a week of sobriety during failed attempts like dry Januaries. Every broken promise felt like another deposit into a growing sense of hopelessness and desperation, so heavy that you say you would have paid two weeks of sobriety with every dollar you had just to prove you could do it. You never had an adult figure who modeled recovery, no one in AA, nothing beyond a distant movie image of what getting help might look like.
Rising at Work, Hiding the Drinking 28:32
You worked your way up at an auto transport company starting in 2007, eventually reaching a VP-level role, all while secretly drinking, including hiding liquor in Red Bull bottles at your desk, believing the smell would mask it. Before that job, between high school and 2007, you drifted into street life, drawn less to the drugs themselves than to the confidence and family devotion the older men around you projected. You never sold hand to hand, staying at a safer distance, and you credit those men with unintentionally teaching you how to be a father once your daughter was born in 2007, since you had never seen a man care for children up close before.
Starting Over in Massachusetts 34:01
Becoming a father at 23 pushed you to quit the street-adjacent hustling and take a job at a church your mother had connected you to as a teenager. When your mother visited and saw you struggling to get by, she and your grandmother took you shopping and later invited you, your daughter, and her mother to move in with her in Newport, Massachusetts. You accepted immediately, moving in September 2007, working first at a doughnut shop, then Lowe's, before landing an entry-level job at Reload Trans Auto Relocation, where you steadily climbed for years while your drinking quietly worsened.
Deciding to Tell the Story Publicly 42:01
You spent nine years sober but stayed quiet about it for a long time, worried that speaking openly might reflect badly on the company you represented. A turning point came during a podcast appearance where the host set up a perfect opening to talk about sobriety and you deflected back to running instead, leaving you feeling like you had wasted a chance to help someone. After that you decided that any future opportunity to discuss sobriety, you would take, inspired partly by seeing others speak openly about their own recovery.
Walking Into the First Meeting 45:00
Your first AA meeting was in an affluent area, full of nice cars and people who looked nothing like you, and you initially assumed no one there could understand your life. That changed the moment people began sharing their stories, describing the same shame and self-loathing you carried, and you realized instantly these were your people. That experience shaped your later approach to sharing your own story publicly, not to tell people to follow your exact path, but to nudge them toward whatever their own next step might be.
The Night Before Getting Sober 47:30
The date was January 11, 2017, with your last drink on January 10. In the lead-up, your friend Donovan would join your failed sobriety attempts out of solidarity, though he needed it too. The lowest point came during a dry January attempt when you woke at 2:30 a.m. with everyone asleep, no social pressure at all, and still went to the kitchen to drink vodka alone, calling it the saddest and dumbest moment of your life. You believed you were heading toward death, either in a car accident or from high blood pressure that had already sent you to the hospital in your late twenties, echoing the way your father had died young.
Reaching Out and Getting Honest 51:00
After that night, your mother texted asking how you were, and for once you admitted "not good" instead of your usual deflection. She pointed you to your employee assistance program, and when a counselor asked how much you drank, you told the truth for the first time, describing daily drinking including morning drinks. That honesty led to an appointment on January 11 with a woman who turned out to be a substance abuse counselor, who told you plainly that you had a drinking problem and pointed you toward a Sunday meeting, which became the meeting where you found people who understood you.
Hiding Behind Success 54:01
You describe reaching a strange kind of peak while still drinking heavily, moving up the corporate ladder, staying present as a parent, and even turning down job offers because taking them would have put him at risk of being "found out." He explains that he never saw himself well, even during seventeen years at one company, and that his real skill during that period was staying hidden rather than thriving. The turning point came from finally telling the truth about his drinking to someone outside his usual circle, which loosened alcohol's grip just enough to create space between himself and the drink.
What The Meetings Gave Him 56:02
After that first meeting on January 11th, 2017, meetings became a place that felt more like home than home did. Hearing people with fifteen or twenty years of sobriety respond to his worries with simple, almost annoyingly obvious statements taught him perspective he couldn't get from people who could take or leave alcohol. He says he was lucky in one specific way: once he committed, the urge to drink largely disappeared, something he knows many others still struggle with daily. He still believes he'll die if he goes back to drinking.
Ego, Surrender, And Rock Bottom 59:01
Asked what separates people who build lasting sobriety from those who keep relapsing, he points to ego, the identity people build around who they think they are, which makes them resist change until they hit their own version of rock bottom. The real shift, he says, is surrendering to having no control, not over alcohol, not over life, only over how you respond to what happens. He compares this to Odysseus letting go on the raft in the film he and the host discuss, relinquishing the illusion of a master plan that alcoholics often cling to even while their lives are falling apart.
From The Gym To A Half Marathon 1:04:00
Sobriety led him to the gym six or seven days a week, where he got noticeably fit and rebranded his Instagram as Tommy Guns. In 2018, a client invited him to run the Chicago Rock and Roll Half Marathon for the charity Move for Hunger. Despite training only about six weeks and running through a metatarsal fracture, finishing among thousands of strangers felt like the meeting rooms of sobriety and became one of the proudest moments of his life, since running for fun was nothing he'd seen growing up.
Becoming Tommy Runs 1:07:02
A cousin's joke turned Tommy Guns into Tommy Runs once he checked that the handle was free. From there he built toward seventeen marathons, all six World Marathon Majors completed in 2024 within a single year, a personal record of 2:46:09, and a move into trail and ultra racing including Javelina 100, a 100k, the Speed Project, and Western States 100.
Building Tommy Runs As A Platform 1:08:30
Already comfortable making content from his corporate job, he began posting his sobriety and running progress and found people responded to seeing something far outside their everyday experience. During 2020, working from home and shaken by the killings of Ahmaud Arbery and George Floyd, he felt vulnerable as a Black man in America and wanted to leave his kids something more tangible than memories, so he started a shirt line called Run Sleep Eat and later a live show, the Run Eat Sleep Show, interviewing big names in running. Eventually Tommy Runs became his real voice, letting him share personal material directly, including being in Tokyo with his mother on the exact day he turned the same age his father was when he died.
Running And Representation 1:15:30
He talks about growing up believing jogging was "a white people thing," never seeing it modeled as a hobby in his neighborhood. Even as elite distance running is dominated by Black athletes, that doesn't translate into everyday participation, partly because top runners often come from Kenya or Ethiopia and don't feel connected to Black communities in Chicago or Detroit. The 2020 running boom and the rise of clubs like We Run 313 in Detroit gave Black runners space to claim road races as their own, and he sees his own visible journey as part of pulling more people into marathons. Moving into trail running, though, he finds a world that looks almost nothing like that road-running progress, disproportionately white in a way that feels intentional, and he's now thinking about how to open that space the way he helped open the marathon world.
Trails Reveal What Roads Hide 1:21:01
Tommy talks about how trail running offers something road running does not: constantly changing scenery that rewards you the longer you go. He references Oprah talking about hiking, how you keep your head down and only look up every so often to see how far you have come. On trail races, even a short stretch can open up views you never expected. He wants that experience available to more people, especially people of color who never imagined seeing themselves on a mountain, describing a four mile shakeout run near an escarpment where the view from the top was something no photo could capture.
Modeling Rather Than Preaching 1:22:30
He frames his approach as attraction rather than promotion, a recovery principle where you do not try to convince people to follow you but simply live the aspiration yourself so others are drawn to it. When asked about barriers to diversifying trail running, he points to economics, distance from trails, and the absence of people who look like you in the community. He also credits brands with real influence, saying that when a brand chooses who to invite on a trip or feature in a campaign, that choice is effectively a vote for what the sport should look like, and he points to how road running brands responded to pressure between 2019 and 2021 to diversify their marketing and events as a model trail could follow.
The Mindset Barrier Before the Trailhead 1:27:00
Beyond money and access, Tommy describes a psychological barrier: people raised in urban environments may not see themselves as belonging in nature at all, long before they even consider trail running specifically. He describes his own shift, noticing a mountain two years ago and not caring, but now instinctively checking an app to see if there is a trail nearby. He argues the goal is not funneling everyone toward marquee events like Western States or Trailcon, but making people aware that closer, cheaper trails exist near them, comparing it to how encouraging more Black and brown runners toward marathons often led people simply to join local run clubs or start running for their own health.
Counting the Room at Trailcon 1:29:00
Tommy recalls being the only Black speaker at Trailcon, with maybe four Black attendees total among thousands. He connects this to sponsorship, noting how heavily brands invest in events like Trailcon, bringing influencers and shaping the visible culture of the sport, and argues this is the real leverage point for change. He insists this isn't about diversity for its own sake or a DEI exercise, but about deciding what trail running should become, pointing to how the road running boom brought new run clubs, race formats, and apparel precisely because new kinds of people got involved.
Purists, Growth, and Shared Land 1:31:30
The conversation turns to tension within trail culture between those who romanticize its scrappy, pitch-your-tent origins and those chasing the sport's growing financial opportunity. Tommy argues the community is defined by whoever actually participates in it, not preserved from above, and that purists risk being left behind if they don't help shape the growth already happening through social media. He notes that some races, like the Barkley Marathons, will likely never change, but for the broader sport, gatekeeping just means new runners arrive without guidance, when they could instead be welcomed by people who care about respecting the land, since it is unceded, borrowed ground being run on.
The Speed Project and Being Fully Yourself 1:36:00
Tommy describes the Speed Project, an unsanctioned, ruleless relay-style race covering roughly 340 miles from the Santa Monica Pier to the Las Vegas sign, usually run in teams but occasionally solo. He credits Malcolm, only the second person to solo the original 340 mile route and a Black runner from New York, with encouraging him to show up fully as himself rather than blending into the race's tattooed, punk-rock aesthetic. Tommy documented the journey in a film called Hero, built around the idea that everyone eventually has to become the hero of their own story, whether that means getting sober, losing weight, or starting a company, and he made sure the film showed every painful, ugly moment rather than just the highlights.
Choosing Discomfort on Purpose 1:41:00
He explains that a young Boston runner named Mitchie Paul became the fourth person to complete the original 340 mile route after watching Tommy's film, and Tommy is proud the inspiration came from seeing the full struggle, not a polished highlight reel. He ties this directly to sobriety, describing how being physically shredded during the race mirrors the emotional wreckage of his final years of drinking, and how he reminds himself mid-race that he will never again be as low as he was then. He describes deliberately choosing the uncomfortable action over the comfortable one as the core practice he lacked for years, and says naming that choice, again and again, is what keeps him moving forward.
Comparing the Different Kinds of Awful 1:44:32
Asked whether the Speed Project or Western States was harder, Tommy says both are some version of awful, though the 340 mile race spread its pain across several days while Western States compressed it into a tight time goal, finishing in 24 hours and 55 minutes against a target of 22. He reflects that he essentially started at the deep end with ultra distances rather than working up through shorter races, and that he actually prefers the low-grade, sustained discomfort of 100 mile races, where there are constant opportunities to quit, over the shorter, more contained suffering of a marathon. He compares the 100 mile distance to his 42 years of life, describing it as a long negotiation with himself not to lean into every negative thought along the way.
Ultra Racing's Highs and Lows 1:48:02
You get a different kind of experience in an ultra than in a marathon, because a marathon ends fast while a hundred miler stretches over twenty four hours and lets you pass through different scenes and views. In a marathon, if you blow up, that is often the end of your race, but in an ultra you can feel like it is over and then suddenly something shifts and you feel good again, with the race moving through its own ebbs and flows.
Max Kalliff's Badwater Run 1:49:32
Max King's recent performance at Badwater comes up as a standout example, running consistent seven and eight minute miles in one hundred thirty degree heat, with a body temperature that climbed to around one hundred one degrees, essentially running a fever, while his heart rate stayed under one hundred thirty eight. He hit gut trouble as early as mile thirty five and thought the race was over, then found a second wind in the hills and kept going without walking, finishing while telling a friend afterward that the race took everything he had. This is treated as proof that ultrarunning is still a young sport, with the pace of improvement, including Western States finishing times now dipping under fourteen hours for three runners, suggesting the biggest performances are still ahead.
Why Trail Running Feels Different 1:52:00
Long distance racing is described as a journey where the lows stretch out and have to be managed, which resonates with someone who has spent much of his life in a low state of mind. Unlike road racing, a DNF in trail running carries little shame, since dropping out of a hundred miler is met with an easy next year attitude rather than the disappointment that follows an unfinished marathon. The plan going forward includes still running marathons for fun, including Berlin without racing it, while pushing further into trail distances to see what a hundred kilometer or hundred mile finish time might look like a few years from now.
Training With Coach Melissa 1:53:00
Training has been guided by coach Melissa Johnson Weiss since before his first marathon in 2019, and for the ultra buildup she shifted the approach away from chasing marathon pace and toward simply getting outside and moving for four hours at a time. Weekly mileage rose sharply, sometimes over one hundred miles in the lead up to Western States, while overall intensity dropped, with occasional turnover workouts added just to keep things from getting boring.
Sobriety Comes Before Running 1:55:01
When people message asking about both recovery and running, the response is to separate the two clearly, since sobriety came first and running followed a year later, so the honest phrasing is that running is how he got sober, not that running is used to stay sober. Sobriety is described as the priority that must be done for oneself, with running or any other activity always ranked second or third, because leaning on exercise alone as a substitute is unsustainable if injury or life gets in the way. Long races are also described as an exercise in humility and honesty that strips away denial, meeting you as your truest self and turning discomfort into a chance for growth, which is part of why so many people in recovery are drawn to endurance sports as something close to a spiritual practice.
Sunrise at Western States 2:00:00
During Western States, around nineteen or twenty hours in, it became clear the goal of finishing in twenty two or even twenty four hours was slipping away, and reframing that disappointment in the moment led to one of the most joyful parts of the race, watching the sun rise over the mountains, a moment he had not expected to see. The lesson drawn is that staying present rather than mourning a lost future reveals gratitude even inside the toughest stretches, a practice he hopes to carry home and pass on to his kids. Molly Seidel's Western States finish is offered as a parallel story, since finishing in a rough time that could look like failure for an Olympic marathoner instead reads as courage and authenticity, because her measure of success was finishing what she started rather than worrying about outside judgment.
Lightning Round on Running Culture 2:04:30
Asked what he is running toward and away from, he says he is running toward whatever the future holds and away from the version of himself that was scared of that future, noting that an alcoholic can hide behind praise for racing just as easily as behind anything else. On lighter questions, he says not waving back to a fellow runner is simply rude, that there are not too many run clubs and people should gather around whatever interests them, that carbon plated shoes are worth it because they are fun and easier on the legs, and that a real runner is simply anyone who runs, regardless of pace or frequency. On the fashion boom in running, he sees it as mostly positive and inviting, though he acknowledges it can create intimidation or clique like hierarchies similar to cycling culture, and that responsibility for keeping spaces welcoming falls on run club leaders themselves.
A New Face in Running 2:14:00
The conversation turns to a public figure whose enthusiastic embrace of running has caught attention on social media, someone the hosts admire so much they want as a future podcast guest. They note how running brands are chasing him in comment sections rather than direct messages, and that he has started wearing 247 Represent and sharing Choros graphics. They see his crossover from the hip-hop world into trail and road running as proof that the sport's growth is not a passing trend but something built to last and evolve over the next several years.
The Ludwig Göransson Score Joke 2:16:00
The hosts joke about Tommy's habit of using Ludwig Göransson's Odyssey score on nearly every Instagram reel, even for lighthearted topics like growing a mustache. Tommy admits he has watched the movie twice and plans a third viewing, calling it worth the nine hours. He agrees to keep using the score, even for a video tagging this conversation, while the host jokingly reserves the right to respond with a meme.
Closing and Where to Find Tommy 2:17:30
The host closes the conversation with warmth and encouragement for Tommy's ongoing journey. Tommy points people to his Instagram, T M I E R U N Z, his podcast PR Project with Gary and Aaron, his YouTube documentaries, and his website tommyruns.com, where his shirts are sold. He hopes his message becomes a lasting movement and thanks the host before heading off to UTMB.
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