Running: The Autobiography

by Ronnie O'Sullivan

  We went to the presentation dinner, and I only stayed about half an hour. Ronnie was asleep in Damien’s car with Ross. I kept getting up to make sure he was alright. Then I got him back up to the room at the Hilton at 11.30 p.m. We had a McDonald’s – me, Damien, Sylvia, Sergio Pizzorno, the guitarist with Kasabian who is a good mate of Damien’s, just sat in the foyer of the hotel eating Big Macs and chips. I went upstairs to check on little Ronnie. He was asleep, and I had the world title trophy on the side, little Ronnie in bed. I went to bed, cuddled him, got up in the morning, and I just thought, this is the best thing I’ve ever had.

  8

  SELF-IMPOSED EXILE

  ‘Steady on the first lap, same on second, then picked it up on the last. Felt tired in the legs, hamstrings felt tired, lactic acid in the quads.’

  I announced I was going to take six months off straight after the World Championship. I couldn’t balance work, family and the custody battle, and work had to give.

  Sometimes I had to decide whether to go to a tournament or see my children because, if I didn’t see the kids on the days the court said I could have them, the next time I went to court I would worry they might well say, well you couldn’t make these visits, you couldn’t do this and that, so they wouldn’t give me any more than my two hours on a Wednesday and two hours on a Saturday. I didn’t want them to just look at my life and say, well, he’s away playing snooker on Saturdays, and for that to count against me. In the end I got so confused with it all that on one occasion I didn’t even know there was a tournament. All I knew was that I had Ronnie from 10 a.m. on Saturday till 5 p.m. and then I had to take him home. Meanwhile, that weekend I was supposed to be in Belgium, and I hadn’t turned up and hadn’t told them I wouldn’t be turning up. Not surprisingly, World Snooker and Barry got the hump. I just had so much going on in my head that I ended up missing 12 tournaments over a period of two years and that’s when they brought the new rules in.

  I pulled out of the German tournament and the Irish tournament in 2011 at the last minute, and then they brought up the other 10 events I hadn’t turned up for. In my head, I thought, well, they’re not that important because they’re not on telly, but that’s unfair on both World Snooker and the punters – when they’re selling tickets on the fact that I’m going to be there and I don’t turn up it doesn’t look good and fans are disappointed. The other 10 were minor PTC events, and I had the choice of going or risking the court telling me I couldn’t see my kids because I had missed the set days I was supposed to see them.

  At one point I went seven weeks without seeing Lily and Ronnie. I was in bits. I had no motivation, I had no incentive to want to play well, I felt I was missing out on seeing my children grow up. I felt sorry for myself, I was so down I couldn’t see the point in anything. The legal battle was so sapping and drawn out and pointless. One court dealt with access, the other dealt with money, and it felt as if the lawyers were just bleeding me dry. I got to the point where I said, I’ve had enough.

  There were rumours about Barry Hearn’s new contract. I thought that if I missed four tournaments, the first tournament was a £250 fine, the second £500, then a grand, then £5,000, then it was a ban from tournaments, and then it was a three-tournament ban. I was told there was a points system, like when you get points on your licence for speeding, and that the points stay there for ever. So in my mind I thought, there’s no way I’m not going to get banned. Because of the inflexibility of my home situation, there was no way I could continue playing.

  I’d had three shit years because of stuff going on off the table; I had World Snooker on my back for not turning up to events; I’d had Jo on my back for not turning up on Saturdays. I thought, fuck it, I’ve had enough.

  I’ve won the world title, shown everyone I’m still capable of doing what I’m doing: what better time to call it a day? World Snooker had put pressure on me to play in all these tournaments, and I couldn’t cope. They knew that I was bums on seats. World Snooker was sending me disciplinary letters every few weeks, and in the end I’d open up emails or letters from them and get panic attacks. I had to write to them and say, please don’t send me any more emails, send them to my manager because just seeing them does my head in. ‘You’re in breach of this, in breach of that, we need a letter from your doctor.’ Meanwhile, until my World Championship victory in 2012 I’d gone three years not earning much because my form was so bad and I’d missed so many tournaments, and what I was earning was just going on legal bills.

  Everything seemed so hopeless and vulgar. It was all about money and I’d had enough. Even though my decision came just after winning the world title, it was based on everything that had been happening in the years building up to it. I also knew I’d have to spend loads of time in court fighting for custody, and I wanted to be with the kids when I could, so there was really no time for snooker. I put myself into retirement, not because I wanted to, just because of the stress I was under.

  It wasn’t depression I had – depression’s a dark hole when you can’t go out of the front door and face the world. This was just pure stress. I had to go to court and listen to lawyers tell the judge that I wasn’t a good father. The things they said about me killed me. I was choking in court. It knocked the stuffing out of me.

  I’d go to bed and my mind would be racing. All I wanted was an end, but there was none in sight. I’d go to bed at 11 p.m., wake up at 1 a.m. and then I’d be awake all night, and then I’d go and practise early morning. For two and a half years I didn’t sleep properly. Even in 2012, when I did really well, I was still only getting two to three hours sleep a night. I’d wake up in the day and I’d be fucked. Sometimes I’d just have to sit down and rest all day between matches.

  I agreed to pay Jo the maintenance her lawyers demanded to draw a line under it. But I still couldn’t sleep because I’d got into a pattern and couldn’t get my life back in order. Straight after my victory in the final against Ali Carter I said that I’d spend my six-month sabbatical with the kids. After five months off, I decided to pull out in October and not go to China. Then in November it was announced I was taking the season off. It was Django who issued a statement to the press. He said I was finding it difficult to balance family and work, that I’d been sick with glandular fever and I thought it was unfair on the sport to withdraw from tournaments at the last moment.

  The press didn’t know what to make of it. Some papers said I was just having a laugh, and would be back by the next tournament. Others said I was gone for good. Barry Hearn was supportive. He told the media that I needed to sort my head out and I’d made the right decision in taking time out.

  I picked up the phone to Barry Hearn and said: ‘I’m out. You can pull me out, withdraw my membership, whatever’s easiest for you. I’m not interested in playing.’

  He talked me out of resigning my membership.

  ‘Just pull out of these tournaments, and see how you feel come February/March,’ he said. He talked a lot of common sense.

  ‘Do what you have to do,’ he said, ‘but don’t resign your membership. If you resign that you’ve got to go to qualifying school and that’s no good for you. You might change your mind in six months. You might sort yourself out.’

  ‘Alright, whatever, but pull me out of the rest of the tournaments because all this “Am I going, am I not going?” is destroying me.’

  If I’d talked to Barry Hearn earlier I would probably not have stopped playing at all. But I didn’t. I just assumed there were things in the contract that didn’t favour me. It wasn’t until I sat down with Barry who explained it to me, and I realised it was just a different interpretation of the contract. Once I talked to Barry I thought, well, that contract’s fair, I’m happy to sign it. He explained that I would only get banned if I missed four tournaments in one season. At least I knew then that I’ve got four strikes, and that next year it goes back to zero. I can deal with that. If I miss four tournaments in a season I deserve to be banned.

  Part of
me did think that a year away might turn into fully retiring from snooker. Soon enough I’d have to look for a career away from snooker and now was as good a time as any. And having just won the world title, at least I was marketable. I thought of doing some radio work, TV guest appearances, punditry.

  When I first made the decision I felt relieved. For the first few months it was one of the best things I’d done – I saw loads of the kids and Dad, and de-stressed myself.

  With my first child, Taylor, I never had any involvement in her life. Taylor is now 16, and I regret not having a relationship with her. About a year ago she got in touch with me, and hopefully we will develop a proper relationship over time. What happened between me and Taylor made me determined not to lose Lily and little Ronnie. I couldn’t let it happen again.

  Not playing made it easier to negotiate life on a day-to-day basis. It meant I didn’t have to look at my calendar five months in advance and work out if I could make this weekend to see the kids; and would it clash with that tournament? It simplified my life.

  My routine was transformed when I stopped playing. It became a non-routine. I got up when I wanted to get up, went for a run when I felt I had the time to do it; when I could be bothered. I went out for lunches, saw Dad, saw the kids. But even though it was great in a way, it did get boring pretty quick. I missed having something in my life; missed going to work. The media work wasn’t happening quickly enough and before long I didn’t know what to do with myself.

  By December I thought I couldn’t carry on like this. I was so bored, itching to do something. Snooker had dictated virtually all of my life for me. Up at 7.30 a.m., running gear on, glass of water, 8.30 out for a four- to five-mile run, a little bit in the gym, shower, breakfast (porridge, banana, raisins, boiled eggs, always tried to eat healthy) then I’d go down the club for 11 a.m., play for four to five hours. Come back, chill out, watch a bit of telly and just relax in the evening. That was my routine every day. By 10.30–11 every night I’d be in bed.

  When I stopped playing, the routine became get up 10–10.30 a.m., breakfast, run 1 p.m., shower, then just visiting friends, finding things to do, going for coffees, going for lunches, sitting down the bagel bar, no pressure, no stress. It was nice in a way, but it did my nut in. I became much less disciplined. I thought, right, I can pursue my running now, set myself a target of running a marathon in two hours 45 minutes, run twice a day and when I’ve got the kids I could use that as my rest days. It never happened like that.

  I got lazier and lazier – you’ve got all this time on your hands and you find yourself doing nothing with it. I became one of the world’s great putter-offers. Everything became ‘I’ll do it later’. I began to realise that snooker simplified my life; it didn’t give me time to veg. If I was to be as good and as successful as I wanted to be, I needed the discipline so that I could feel I deserved those victories. I had to feel I was doing all I could do to give myself the best possible chance of winning. The reality was that I would probably have been just as good, maybe better, with less practice, but that’s not what my head thought. I’m not good with guilt. If I think I’ve not given it my best it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

  I lost my confidence when I wasn’t working. I began to feel guilty about going out to dinner, about spending money, filling my car up. I was looking at bills for the first time in my life, and thinking, I’ve got nothing coming in but I’m still putting £100 of petrol in my car, I’m still spending £120 at Waitrose, still going out for a meal three or four times a week and that’s £60–£70. I know I have other bits and pieces like property to enable me to do that, but I did feel guilty. I was still paying Jo her money, still paying the school fees, and in the back of my mind I thought, this is eventually going to run out. So I was beginning to panic that I wouldn’t be able to support the children, or myself, like I wanted to, and it would get to the point where we’d all have to cut back.

  Yet at the same time, this was where I wanted to be. Money caused so many problems – but not having money caused even more.

  Before long, you realise the phone has stopped ringing, you’ve got no work coming in and reality kicks in – you’ve got two beautiful children you care about but you’ve had to go down to the school to explain you’ve got no money for the fees. All these things were happening and I thought, fuck, I’ve got to go to work, this isn’t sustainable.

  I felt my year off was forced on me by events. But it was also a test to see if I could cope without work, and to see what impact it would have on the family having nothing coming in. In the end, it was a test we failed. It was obvious that none of us would be happy unless I was working and supporting the family. More than ever, it made me realise that Jo and I needed to work through this together, support each other, make it work. We were never going to be a couple again, but that was no reason why we couldn’t bring up our kids happily. We’re lucky to have them, and we needed to realise that, before their childhood was gone, lost in pointless legal rumblings. If I didn’t go back to work properly, I wouldn’t have money, Jo and the kids wouldn’t either, and none of us would be able to enjoy the lives we had.

  I was also missing the snooker. It might not always seem like it, but I do actually enjoy travelling, getting away from home now and then, into the hotel, seeing a bit of the world, meeting up with local runners and getting a nice little run-in. Then, at the end of it, I’d enjoy coming home, see the family, get my bag unpacked, get everything cleaned and ready for the next event. Snooker was the discipline that gave me purpose.

  In my year off I became more reliant on Chigwell than ever. Between tournaments I’d always turn back to Chigwell, come home, to prepare for the next event. But now that there were no tournaments I barely moved out of the place. I had everything I wanted there – my running routes, the bagel bar, the park I took the kids to. And I could go wherever I wanted without being hassled. Savills, the estate agent, are also important to me because I move house so often! There’s also Macey’s, the convenience store, and the health food shop. If ever you’re ill she’ll sort you out.

  Essex has such a reputation. For decades people have been talking about Essex Girl and Essex Man. You know the clichés: the girls are dolled-up slags, the men are flash, thick bastards in sports cars. And it’s got even worse now with The Only Way Is Essex on TV. But when I watch that show I don’t recognise Essex from it. I don’t know people like that. You see some of the people in the show around locally, but they’ve always got their heads down or they’re on the phone because they’re celebrities now and have got fed up with people driving them mad. Typical story really – you crave celebrity and then, when you get it, it ain’t all it’s cracked up to be.

  Chigwell’s my manor, my life. I love this place, but even I can have too much of it. When I stopped playing and never set foot out of the place, it made me realise how much I miss getting away from home. Taking something away from you is a great way of showing you what you had. And it’s amazing how quickly your self-esteem can ebb away. Not that there was that much to ebb away in the first place! I’d take a 10-0 beating at Sheffield rather than feeling I was doing nothing with my life, just allowing it to vegetate.

  My self-imposed exile has also taught me something else too – that I’m lucky to be paid to do something I love. I hate calling snooker a job, but at the end of the day it is my job and I need to go to work. It’s what I do.

  The best thing I did in my year off was work on a farm, which was in the middle of Epping Forest, where I used to run. By December 2011, I realised all the things I’d planned on doing weren’t happening. The radio show hadn’t happened, nor had the punditry. Even the running had tailed off. I was getting out once or twice a week, which was rubbish. I thought the only way to get me out of bed was if I had some sort of a commitment, so I started doing voluntary work at the farm.

  A girl who worked at the pizza place I took the kids to told me about this little farm, about 40–50 acres, in the heart of the forest in Hain
ault. I went to check it out. I told them I didn’t want paid work, but I’d love to help out, put a shift in. Outside, fresh air, lovely. I thought if I could get myself out of bed, it would maybe start me off on the running again.

  So I turned up and the girl in the office said, you’ve got to fill this form out. I filled the form out and they said, we’ll be in contact with you in a couple of weeks. A couple of weeks went by and I got an email saying, can you come down Sunday morning, 9 a.m. So I turned up Sunday morning, old boy called Tony was there, lovely fella. He was a paid worker and he took me round, showed me all the little jobs that needed doing. He recognised me, but what I liked about him was he didn’t make a fuss: ‘We’re here, we need help, thanks for coming.’

  He didn’t talk to me about snooker. Not once did anybody talk about snooker. Nor did they want to know why I was there. They were just pleased to have help. There were six or seven full-time staff, and about 25 volunteers. I told them, I’m not interested in going on courses, all I want to do is turn up and if you’ve got something for me to do I’m happy to do it. So I didn’t have to commit to anything.

  It got me into the fresh air, and I felt I was doing something with my time. I did two days a week, sometimes three. I’d never done anything like that in my life before. I used to like fetching the bales of hay to feed the animals because you had to walk up the hill, over the mud, fill it up, come back down, again and again. I was pretty fit so I’d get a lot done. Green wellies, pure manual work, love it. I cleaned out stables and pigsties, removed the rubbish, took down fences. Lovely.