RaceMob Rewind: How This Latin Star Overcame a Drug Addiction With Running with Leo Rosales

[00:00:00] **Leo Rosales:**
And then feeling that feeling of despair and of sadness that I had let, not only myself down, but my family, my kids. And then years later after my will in my life, over to the care of God, as I understood it there, I was standing at the Archway of the 2014 Boston marathon. And I was like, man, miracles do happen.

[00:00:21] **Kevin Chang:**
Hello and welcome to the RaceMob podcast. This is episode number 69. I'm Kevin entrepreneur technology and fitness nerd. And I'm joined by the head coach of RaceMob and master motivator, the incomparable Bertrand Newson.

Hey there RaceMob crew. We're celebrating Latinx Heritage Month with some incredible guests. So stay tuned for some amazing stories over the next few weeks, but we'd be remissed to kick off the month. If we didn't bring back one of our favorite episodes from this last year, and one of the most popular from all of you.

When Bertrand met Leo over 20 years ago, he had no idea that this unassuming handyman was dealing with a crippling back condition and a debilitating drug addiction. Nor could he imagine Leo's backstory a former Latin rock star and the percussionist for the group Malo at the age of 18, Leo was being whisked away via limo and private jet to famous venues like Carnegie hall, American Bandstands, Rolling on the River, and much more.

Leo's life is so fascinating that it was even documented in an ESPN Deportes feature. From the highest of highs to being so broken, he could barely function. It got so bad. His family staged an intervention and forced Leo into rehab. But it was here and shortly after at Skyline College, where Leo began to rekindle his passion for running. A passion. He almost completely threw away due to his addiction.

But was now ready to embrace. Leo and his wife, Virginia joined the Dolphins South End Running Club. And today have logged over 17,000 miles, attended hundreds of races, become Brazen Streakers, qualified for Boston and have been sober for over 16 years. But most importantly, Leo and Virginia have now become pillars of the running community.

Spreading their love and positive message to everyone they meet, especially those who are struggling with addiction.

And they've even become running coaches, inspiring the next generation of runners. Best of all, Leo never lost his passion for music and is performing with his new band Momo Tombo, and they are killing it.

You're going to love this story from the heartache, the perseverance and the triumphs. So here we go.

[00:02:37] **Bertrand Newsen:**
Welcome to the race mob podcast. And we're very fortunate today to have Mr. Leo Rosale is accomplished marathoner. Boston marathon, or that is, someone who discovered renting later in life. And his story is incredibly profound. We'll take a journey through his life, through his eyes, the ups and downs of life, much like a marathon.

There's always points of adversity. And we get to that emotional crossroads, whether it's to go to stop, to put one foot in front of the other and Leo's stories incredibly compelling. And he'll share with us Leo. So. Fortunate to have you with us. Welcome.

[00:03:16] **Leo Rosales:**
Nice to see both of you again,

[00:03:18] **Kevin Chang:**
Welcome to the podcast.

[00:03:19] **Leo Rosales:**
Yeah, thanks.

[00:03:20] **Kevin Chang:**
Before we even started here, we were listening to some music, some fantastic music. Tell us about this. I mean, accomplished musician that should have been in the intro, accomplished musician as well

[00:03:30] **Leo Rosales:**
Before I got into running many, many, many years ago, I was fortunate enough to be introduced to a group called Malo back in 1971,72, as we were growing up, we're starting to pick up instruments, we're starting to learn how to play.

And everybody started getting interested in , different instruments, because at that point in time, the summer of love was around the corner, you know, around 68, So we were watching all of this unfold. And so we all started getting interested in playing music and eventually I developed the ability to play percussion drums, conga as invalid.

And, um, there was a group in the Bay area called the Malibu's, who were playing at this club down off of silver Avenue in San Bruno, in San Francisco. And, uh, we used to go down there and a friend of mine, a brother wanted to expose us to some different kinds of music. Well, actually we would go there every weekend.

You know, we get a fake ID, you know, getting through the door. And then he would introduce us to the band members and say, Hey, can these guys play a song with you? And at first they were hesitant because, you know, they have their own thing going, but eventually because of he persuaded them, you know, please just give this guy a chance.

You know, he's young, he's from the Bay area. So they'd allow me to come up on stage and play.

So I learned some tricks up there and eventually that group went on to. Get a recording contract. A friend of a friend got ahold of this producer who brought in a person from Warner brothers. They came in and saw the band and loved the band and signed them to a five year contract. . They went on to record. And while they were in the studio, then you had some personnel changes.

The singer are Sileo Garcia, who just a couple of weeks ago, passed away. You know, after keeping the name all going for over 50 years, he gave me a call and said, Hey, everybody likes the way you play. You know, you've come down to the club and participated. He goes, how about coming over and auditioning with us?

We've got a record contract. We'll get ready to go out on the road. We've got a hit single coming out on the radio. And I was, you know, intimidated by all that. So I said, well, I think I want to make it on my own. I got my own band. And, uh, you know, we're gonna, you know, we're writing music. We want to go and he goes, but you know, we already got all that.

I'm saving you a lot of work. You can come into our band. We already got a contract. We're going out on the road. We got hit single, you know, it's going to be fantastic.

So I went down there, audition for the band. And, uh, got the gig. And from there on all of a sudden I was driving around hearing the Malo band of the radio stations that were , famous at that time, like AMK Y a K FRC, uh, K DIA K Sol, and then on FM KSAN.

But all of a sudden I was like super popular, still a senior in high school at Balbo high school. And all of a sudden I'm getting picked up in front of the school and a big old stretch Cadillac, you know, and , starting to get treated. In a special way, you know, taking the music stores, buying instruments, you know, rehearsing every, every day and then preparing to go out on the road.

So I spent a year and a half out on the road and it was an amazing one experience. We did the last days. It's the Fillmore album with bill Graham. We played at winter land with Tito, with black Oak Arkansas with, uh, black Sabbath with, uh, all these heavy hitters, 10 years after Quicksilver and playing in Carnegie hall.

We headlined Carnegie hall. We played central park. You open up for, I continue to Turner at the long beach arena, you know, uh, we were being whisked off in Lear jets from San Francisco to LA and I was only like 18 years old. All of this fame and fortune was just kind of spinning, uh, not out of control yet, but it was spinning pretty fast.

And so that's where my music career started, started very young. I kept staying in the music circles and you know, just like if, if you really have a desire for something special in your life and you have a dream, you got to follow the dream, following the roads that leads to it, you know?

By putting yourself with the right people in the right place at the right time and making all the sacrifices of playing as much as you can, wherever you can. And eventually you make connections here and there, and it takes a little bit of time, but I managed to follow my heart and follow the dream. And I managed to hook up with Malo and had a nice career with them for a year and a half.

And then, you know, life started taking it. Turns. And I started making choices that led me down different pathways. So I hope that conveys what my journey was in music. So I'm still playing now. They're still playing now, you know, years later, unfortunately under this COVID-19 semi sheltering in place that's going on right now.

We had 15 shows lined up in 2020, and unfortunately each and every one of them got canceled due to this situation that we find ourselves in. That's my little story of my musical journey,

[00:08:22] **Bertrand Newsen:**
A little story regarding the musical journey and being, let's look at your life as a, as a marathon and your love for music and the exposure you had, the life experience, it had, how the trajectory had put you on.

Let's look at it as a. A race of life and you got to an aid station and maybe start it out a little quick, you know, and needed to kind of catch your breath and kind of transition from that point. You know, Leo young man with some very talented musician towards the world, popular band, then you find yourself away from the group and doing your own thing and then kind of the, the life's adversities and where your pace started to.

Change a bit. And you're looking to find your rhythm,

[00:09:02] **Leo Rosales:**
speak to that. How do we get to the running is the beauty of the whole story. How running turns out to be like a spiritual advocate for you. You know, so during that period of time in Malo, when I was playing, I didn't have mentors. That were spiritual leaders that could guide an 18 year old through all of this fame and fortune through all of this, you know, this money and adulation and being on television and being on the radio and seeing your poster of your
record at tower of records, you know, and it's just a lot to take in.

And, um, without somebody guiding you through those experiences, You can have the tendency to connect with the wrong people, start making wrong choices, which will derail you from the path that you've been set upon life. Set me on this extra or this extra ordinary, uh, gift of music. And, um, you know, when I first I started to take off or to give, I really was trying to be positive and to be grateful for the opportunity that was given to me.

Playing it all these great places playing with these great musicians and, you know, so along that journey, you know, all of the other accesses that are available to you, like alcohol, drugs, uh, you know, uh, relationships with different people and which in the beginning, when you think that that's all good and all cool, you know, there are some people that can survive that, you know, they go through a lot of turmoil.

In their journey because you know, maybe they're still young and they got a lot of oats to show still. So they begin to, you know, really go off the rails and those, some of those people survive. They can wake up one morning and say, man, you know, I'm good with it. You know, I don't want to do that anymore.

You know, I'm going to get married. I'm going to have kids, you know, I'm going to put this money in the bank, I'm going to buy a house and I'm going to put my kids in college. There are those. Very select group that can do that. Unfortunately, I was in the group that I got consumed with the excesses, um, the line light, you know, the ability to smoke a little more weed, you know, snort a little bit more cocaine, drink a little bit more scotch and couldn't put all those things in the right cupboards, you know, so eventually.

Those became accesses. And unfortunately they started to consume my thinking. I started to become, uh, instead of being obsessed and compelled to practice the drums and to play music and to surround me, myself with people that would help me. To be a better musician and set me on a course, . So by the time I was into the music for a couple of years, that obsession, that compulsion started to become negative. And I found myself becoming consumed and obsessed with wanting to drink more.

Wanting to party more. And before I knew it, that became the most important thing. . And then that is what caused me to leave the band because I was so insecure about my behavior that I tried to find some redemption. And that scared me into going to another extreme route. And then I got involved in religion and I got involved in a situation with them group that ended up as far as I'm concerned, became a cult, you know, because it was a very.

Close minded, fanatic, indoctrinated, Bible teaching organization, that it was, you know, very, you know, and time apocalyptic thinking and preparing. I hung in that for 10 years. And in that period of time, I was, as I say, In the rooms of alcoholics anonymous, white knuckling, it, you know, , you're just like , you're keeping yourself from doing it.

You still have that obsession with it, but you have, you managed to have a little bit of strength to fight it off. and all of a sudden I found myself in this place and I wasn't happy there.

And then eventually that turned sour, you know, we were preparing for the end times and, you know, moving up into the mountains and preparing food and this, that, and the other. And before. For, I knew it. I was like completely disillusioned and left that all behind came back into trying to live a normal life, getting a normal job, but the music was always resounding in the back of my mind.

Cause that's what my true love was my first true love. Right. So when I came back into the scene, I had been out of it for 10 years and I tried to get back into where I had left off. And it was just impossible because everybody in 10 years. A new generation of musicians had grown and they had gone to college.

They had gone through degrees, they got their PhDs, they were in the recording studios. They were traveling the world. And that was this guy who had left the music scene, tried to get back into it. And all the doors were closed. Everybody had graduated into the college realm and I was still, I felt like I was still in elementary school, you know, so I tried to get an edge on it.

And I went back to those ideas that I thought were were helpful, which was. Negative behavior, which is, you know, what to the old places hooked up with the old friends and got back to the old behaviors. And before I knew it, I was full fledged back into doing drugs again. And that lasted for over 20 years.

And it escalated from, you know, smoking weed to hanging out with people that I knew had cocaine. So then I was doing that and before I knew it, I was completely crushed. Got divorced. My family moved. I was all alone. And you went into relationships that weren't working. And finally, you know, thank God I found the right person.

And, you know, just to say, we've been together now for over 34 years, but that journey until, so the running became something paramount in my life. Uh, there was a lot of, um, a lot of sadness, a lot of despair because that dream that I had brewing in my heart was crushed by all of my decisions in life that I had made.

[00:14:55] **Kevin Chang:**
Talk about running. Let's talk about how'd you get into running

[00:14:58] **Leo Rosales:**
I got into recovery. I ended up at skyline college and in that place, because I had had a great experience prior to that running the beta breakers.

So I remembered. That running was very fulfilling and that I really had a sense of accomplishment just for seven and a half miles.

[00:15:15] **Kevin Chang:**
When did you run the beta breakers?

[00:15:17] **Leo Rosales:**
I would say maybe the first time I did, it was maybe 19, maybe 1990. Yeah. Around 1990, exactly. Somewhere around there. I ran that one race.

And then I didn't run again. It's all about 2005, but what happens at with skyline college? I met a gentleman, uh, the teacher and, um, we signed up for the class because I remembered that I really enjoyed running. So by this time I'm in recovery and I'm clean and sober and my mind is clear and I have set goals.

So he told me that the class wasn't big enough. So we had to cancel the class. But we're going to do weight training, but you can still go out and run. So I did that. It followed her suggestion. And then I went online and I signed up for the next day of beta breakers. And I ran that. after that was such a great experience.

All the people, you know, sober and feeling like, wow, this is amazing. You know, uh, you know, the starting line and running and, and just, you know, being competitive with people that are out there and you're trying to, you know, do your best. And, you know, you got this attitude of not giving up and running your best.

So after that was over, I went home and I told my wife, I said, Hey, I want to do another race. I said, I heard of this thing called a marathon. I'd like to try it. And she goes, well, do you know how many miles that is? I said, no. I said, I could do it. She goes, well, it's 26.2 miles. I said, she goes, that's what a marathon is.

She goes, you just ran seven and a half miles. I said, no, I can do it. I think I can do it. She goes, don't you want to do like a half first? I said, no, because when I'm finished, there'll still be people running and I'll feel like I'm losing out somehow. So crazy. I signed up for the San Francisco marathon and.

I trained, I think for like maybe eight weeks, you know, I knew nothing about it. I didn't know any rules. I just put on my shoes. I lived in Pacifica and I just started running around Pacifica, you know, and I thought it was a big deal that I ran three miles, you know, four miles and five miles. And I tried to increase the mileage and eventually.

You know, I ran the San Francisco marathon and I did it in my first attempt. I did it in four hours in 25 minutes.

[00:17:20] **Bertrand Newsen:**
Congratulations.

[00:17:21] **Kevin Chang:**
Why don't we back up a little bit, because I think we glossed over the whole subject of you getting clean and that whole process. You know, you found your old friends, you went back to a old place.

You did the beta breakers. I'm assuming somewhere in that period of time,

[00:17:36] **Leo Rosales:**
what happened was I was using so much that I just was starting to feel out of control. So I thought I could do it on my own. So I stopped. I stopped hanging out and I stopped going places and I started to, um, try to get healthy. And then I read somewhere that there's this race coming to San Francisco and they have it every year.

And I had seen it when I worked at the hotel, you know, that the beta breakers was coming. So I decided to do it. So I signed up for it and I started training around South city running and, you know, it was short distance. So I really felt empowered by it and I, and it, and the preparation for it. And then showing up at the race was just an incredible sense of community.

And. I felt like I was really involved with something that was super powerful and positive. Everybody was friendly. Everybody seemed like they had, we had one goal in mind is to run this race and I read up on it. So I ran the race during the race. As I was coming to the finish line, I made a reservation in my mind that I was going to celebrate this accomplishment and what I did instead of going and doing something healthy, I went and celebrated by.

Visiting the drug dealer, you know, I thought that I could go there and celebrate, you know, just one night of celebrating. But as I say, I was the first to get to the party and the last one to leave while that was a wonderful experience that seared in my heart as something. Powerful to do the waking up the
gorilla in the cage again, by going and starting up with the drugs.

Again, me and from that from after running the beta breakers on Saturday or on Sunday that night I went okay and celebrated by consuming drugs again. And that stayed with me for over 20 years. That's how powerful the power of addiction is. Once you opened the door to it again, once you've closed it. Or you think you've closed it, uh, unless you have the proper experience, it's hard to shake it off.

So that lasted for 20 years until I ended up in covering at a facility in Oakland and they helped me by when I left there, I relapsed. And during that time of relapse, my mother passed away. I was at the crossroads, all the tools that I had learned at as a recovery facility, I put it in my spiritual tool bag and was encouraged to always know that that was there.

Even if I relapsed and found myself in a dark place. So after my mom passed away and I went back to work, I found myself there in that dark place and, uh, utilize the tools that they gave me. A spiritual tools of how to ask for help as spiritually first. So that's what I did. And I reached out to my higher power and I asked him to, you know, to relieve me of this obsession compulsion to use.

And that's what I did. And from that day forward, it's been, that was December 8th. And it's been 16 years that I've been clean and sober and free from all substance, very proud of that accomplishment 16 years ago. And in that process of being, you know, uh, in the meetings, people would tell me, you'll find out what you're going to do next.

Just keep going to the meetings. You know, don't use in between, sit in the front row, wait for the miracles happen. And that's what happened. I went to a meeting and a woman shared her extraordinary experience down through the life of addiction. And then she said how she went back to school because of the rooms of narcotics anonymous and the support that she received that is.

The message that I received. And from there, I started to go back to college. I went to skyline college that's where I met Sonny Diaz, who was the teacher for track and field. And, and he's the one that said, even if we don't have a running class, I want you to run.

You go out to that track and you run all your, you want you to just sign in, do a little bit of cardio, go outside. And then from there, there is the running. I started feeling empowered. Like I could do this, you know, running was something that felt innate in me that it was this little DNA. They needed to be turned on, you know, that it was there, but I didn't know it, you know, cause I enjoy, I enjoyed running in high school.

I never ran on the tracking cause we were all playing music. I remember getting on the track and running around and feeling like, man, this is cool. You know, I like this, you know, so I had running experiences throughout my life and then that beta breakers that I ran and then relapsed for 20 years. The power of running the power of that experience, seared in my brain and in my heart.

So one of the first things that I went through when I got sober and clean is I said, I want to run again. I want to run again, even if it's just like college, you know, joined the team there. And before, you know, it running became a saving grace for me because all of a sudden I was involved with running groups.

The DSC was dolphin, South end running group. That's been around since 1964 in San Francisco. And then somebody there told me about brazen racing, which was trail running, you know, five K, 10, K, half marathons, and all of a sudden, all of these things that were just all this positive, reinforcing and empowerment.

We're being like a gift. Like you can run with the GFC, you can run with brazen racing, you know, the Boston marathon. I was like, Oh my God, this is great. I substituted addictive behavior and negative behavior for positive behavior. And people say, Oh, you're addicted to running now. I said, no, you don't. I don't like to use that word addicted.

It's kind of like a negative connotation. You know, I substituted bad behavior for good behavior. You know, I've been running now for 16 years. I've done over 50 marathons. I've done probably the excess of over a hundred half marathons. I've run the San Francisco marathon. 13 times I've run the Boston marathon four times.

I've run ultra marathons, 12 hour endurance running. .

You know, I became a coach. So running. Has been like my best pal.