Running Brand's Social Media Manager Clearly Starting to Lose Mind

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The social media manager of a popular running brand is showing unmistakable signs of a mental breakdown, sources tell Dumb Runner. 

Blair Warner, 27, has worked at RunnerHub, a health and fitness website, since late 2015—but has only recently begun to crack.

"When she started here, Blair was perfectly normal," said one coworker, who gave her name only as Natalie. "Fun, nice, a hard worker."

In recent weeks, though, things began to change.

The first sign of trouble, the coworker said, was the sheer amount of time Warner would spend online, checking the brand's Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, and Instagram accounts.

"I mean, yeah, that was her job," said another coworker, Jo. "But still. She was always staring at her phone, posting stuff, tweeting. And I mean always. During meetings, in the bathroom, walking down the hall, you name it."

Gradually, Jo said, Warner's posts themselves became worrisome.

"The first time she used the word runcation in a tweet, I think, was the beginning of the end," she recalled. "After the runcation thing, something just snapped."

Runcation, a relatively recent coinage, is a portmanteau of the words run and vacation.

In subsequent tweets and Facebook posts, Warner would use not just runcation but also words like runtastic, rungry, and runderful—sometimes alone, absent any context.

And then came this one:

Shortly afterward, friends say, Warner's real-life conversations took a turn for the worse.

"She started talking, basically, in click-bait," said Natalie.

"One Monday morning I walked in to the office and asked Blair how her weekend was. She looked right at me and said, '7 ways you're sabotaging your workout! One weird trick! You won't believe what happened next!' She was smiling, but her eyes were dead. It was a little scary."

Reached for comment, Warner told Dumb Runner, "I ate lunch alone for a month—here's what happened!"

"Beat the heat!" she added. "4 treadmill mistakes you need to avoid! Do runners need dairy to lose weight?"