Hal's secret high: chemistry to run the athletic machine
a traditionally smaller and harder-core set tends to rely on personal chemistry to manage E.T.A.'s special demands—dexedrine or low-volt methedrine before matches and benzodiazapenes to come back down after matches [...] to basically short out the whole motherboard and blow out all the circuits and slowly recover and be almost neurologically reborn and start the gradual cycle all over again
Context
The hard-core chemical cadre is described in flat body-as-machine terms: uppers "before matches," downers "to come back down after matches," the whole regimen run like an electrical system you "short out," "blow out all the circuits," and reboot "neurologically reborn." The pharmacology is keyed entirely to the competitive schedule — a body engineered to meet "E.T.A.'s special demands," dosed the way you'd manage a machine under load. (The Disease/getting-high-in-secret and secrecy-obsession substance routes to addiction-recovery / communication-solipsism — see Routed.)