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Reaching
out from the inside
But that hasn’t stopped him from developing a Web site designed to give kids options that will keep them away from drugs. Faasthelp.com will provide a list of things for kids to do, things that he used to do, before he found cocaine in his late 20s. Faast is an acronym for finding addiction and abuse solutions together. The Web site — which is currently under construction — already features a message to parents and his own testimonial. Eventually, it will also include testimonials from others. Breithaupt has an addictive behavior. He was a workaholic all his life and admits that he was an addict long before drugs got into his system. He has never shunned responsibility for his actions. He knows that what he’s done, he’s done to himself and the choices he’s made were none other than his own. “ I stupidly, selfishly, chose to get loaded. I blame nobody for my usage and my addiction,” Breithaupt said. “I’m responsible for that. Justice through the penal system will be served. ”Since landing in jail for the third time, he is clean and has been through every ministry and class and support group offered multiple times. “ I hate to lose at anything, but cocaine beat me in every way,” Breithaupt said. “I know today I need help to win this fight. ”In talking with him, it seems he is putting the same workaholism he once put into BMX into his Web site and his driving desire not to see his choices in life repeated in other young people with promise. “ It’s just sad to see someone with as much potential as he has. The sky was always the limit with him,” said his longtime friend and fellow BMX racer David Gattis. “He just keeps falling out of the tree. ”Gattis maintains that Breithaupt has a disease. He says Breithaupt’s an addict, not a criminal. “ It’s a hard thing to deal with when it’s somebody you really like,” added Swarr. When Breithaupt gets out of jail, there’s no telling whether he will be able to maintain himself and not have something trigger his next drug binge. Be it his father’s death, which is when he started taking drugs, or his wife’s overspending, which he partly attributes to his last bust, Breithaupt, 50, is an addict. But he has already done so much to help kids while behind bars, the potential is limitless when he gets out. He just needs to control his own demons. Ryan Orr may be reached at 951-6277 or rorr@vvdailypress.com. |
Known
to the bicycle world as the “Old Man of BMX,” Scot
Breithaupt currently resides in the Adelanto Detention Center pending
the result of drug charges. It
is his third stint in jail, and a long way from the national champion,
successful business
owner and anti-drug promoter he once was. “
He had his hands in just about everything in the history of the sport,” said
John Swarr, co-producer and director of “Joe Kid On a Stingray,” a
documentary on the history of BMX. “The good thing about Scot is
he is always an entrepreneur and always wanted the sport to grow. He
has a son that refuses to talk to him, is divorced, broke and has been
diagnosed as
bi-polar and with obsessive compulsive disorder. “
I don’t care who you are, how much you make or have. If you do
drugs, you will lose it all, including all hope for life,” Breithaupt
said.