Project 4 W/kg: Strength Phase Complete

This year’s fitness goal is to reach a Functional Threshold Power (FTP) of 4 watts per kg. To be a fast cyclist, you need to be strong and my approach is taken from an interview with six times gold medal track sprint cyclist Jason Kenny; get strong, convert that strength into power, and then build the stamina to hold this power for longer. I have a decent level of cardiovascular fitness from my 2000 mile challenge last year and I want to try and reach the goal as quickly and as smartly as possible so getting strong first is the goal.

Phase 1: get strong

Jason Kenny has a one-rep max back squat of 180kg, between 2 and 2.5 times his bodyweight. Chris Hoy had a back squat max of around two times his bodyweight and a deadlift two and a half times his bodyweight. These numbers are for the best sprint track cyclists to have ever lived, focusing on events lasting up to 60 seconds. A two-times bodyweight squat and a two and a half times bodyweight deadlift represent the absolute maximum leg strength level needed to where strength is no longer an issue.

I am interested in my FTP or the power on a bike that I can hold for an hour. A two times bodyweight squat would be nice but is a serious level of strength that takes a long time to build; getting there would probably not represent the best use of my time. Any cycling event over 4 km (the record is just over four minutes) is classified as an endurance event and should require a lower level of absolute strength that the shorter events of the sprinters. I am also aiming for a decent amateur level rather than a world-class one, so what level of absolute strength represents a reasonable target?

Trainer road has strength standards for advanced cyclists they say represent the point at which the effort and extra muscle mass required to get stronger is not worth the benefit delivered:

Deadlift: 5 Reps 150% BW
Back Squat: 5 Reps 125% BW
Bench Press: 5 Reps 90% BW
Barbell Row: 5 Reps 90% BW
Pull/Chin-Ups: 15 Reps
Military Press: 5 Reps 55% BW
Trainer Road

Converting these numbers into a one-rep max for each exercise at my current weight of between 82 and 83 Kilograms, phase one requires a 142.5 kg deadlift and a 120kg back squat.

How I got strong

Before you read how I hit these two numbers I want to warn you that this is not the way I suggest anyone go about it. Heavy, low rep deadlifts and back squats can get you in trouble if you don’t know how to do them and you need to build up to it slowly with significant effort paid to mobility. The risk of injury is higher if you are also pushing your bike or running training. Learn to squat properly, work through the necessary progressions like goblet squats, and reduce your endurance training to avoid injury.

With that out of the way, I took a unique approach for three reasons:

I already have decent form and came to this project with reasonable strength levels from training under Jon Albon’s Coaching.
I have had strength levels higher than the target lifts in previous years (at a higher body weight) when I spent some time focusing on Olympic lifting.
I was using strength programs that I had carried out before and knew I could handle- I also know the difference between pain and injury.

If you want to get better at something you should do it every day. I already had a 142.5 kg deadlift from my half-marathon training so I just had to maintain this and get my squat max up. So I squatted heavy every day, taking advantage of working from home and sitting down all day. On the first day, I reached a max of 90kg before my legs started to shake in shock and defiance, giving me a baseline. I will talk about this programme in detail in another post but the basic layout is as follows:

I squatted every afternoon at some point between 16:00 and 18:00 working up to a heavy single rep.
I trained on the bike in the mornings five days per week with Monday and Friday off.
My bike programme included weights on Tuesday and Friday so I used these two sessions as my ‘heavy’ days with back squats, deadlifts, and heavy kettlebell swings.
On the other days, I worked up to a heavy single on my front squat as these are slightly lighter due to being limited by upper back strength.
Monday was a rest day so I did lighter sets of front squats.

I started this programme on the 29th of December and hit my 120kg max on the 18th of February. The last two weeks of this programme included working up to a 115kg back squat on Tuesdays and Friday and a 100kg Front squat on the other days.

Building consistency and volume on the bike

I needed a bike programme that would focus on power rather than longer efforts in keeping with my strength, power, then endurance strategy. I found a five-month Individual Pursuit (the 4km track event mentioned above) programme on Training Peaks by Phil Kilpatrick, the head coach of my local track in Derby. The first seven weeks of the programme focused on zone three ‘tempo’ rides with lots of 30-second spikes of power. After seven weeks in transitioned to weekly Tuesday night racing, giving me a nice amount of time to hit my strength target.

In hindsight, choosing an advanced programme as an intermediate rider (detraining intermediate rider) might not have been the fastest route to progress but it did not have a power test after the first day so I decided that if I waited till my first race to get a second power test then I could handle it. I only missed three sessions in the seven weeks so I think it was not the worst decision but there were a few Wednesday morning 7 am starts that I felt nervous about getting on the bike after looking at the training session planned and feeling my legs from the heavy squats and interval bike session the day before.

I committed to the five sessions lasting between 6-8 hour per week and built up my consistency and volume after my absence from the bike for the last 6 months. All the sessions were completed on my WattBike Atom using Zwift linked to Training peaks to automatically load that day’s workout. I aimed to wake up at 6 am each day and be on the bike for 7 am ready for the one and a half hour rides but some days these were moved to lunchtime if I slept in or if my legs were a little sore and I needed a few hours to wake them up.

On the whole, the mix of heavy squats and tempo rides worked well. There is something about training twice per day that makes your legs less sore and the squats and peddling seemed to help the other recover. The last time I did the squat everyday programme I remember hating stairs but I was saved this time around. Phase 1 complete, I now have the strength for a 4 W/kg FTP.

Phase 2: Convert this strength to power

Phase two is all about the bike. Tuesday evenings are now for Zwift racing and squatting is limited to twice per week, Tuesdays and Fridays. As I am aiming for power, and with the velodrome closed, I guess the next best thing is Crit racing. Check back on Tuesday evening for an update. For squats, I am going to use Chris Hoys suggested workout of using a weight you can lift ten times (90kg) and doing eight reps, adding 5% (95kg) to the bar and doing six rep, then adding another 5% (100kg) and doing 4 reps. I will stick to two sets of five reps with the deadlift and I have just got a 40kg kettlebell to continue with Andy Bolton’s swing ladder.

Let me know on Twitter if you are working towards increasing your FTP and what you find works.

Strength Standards and Assessments

I am currently reading Dan John’s excellent book Interventions. Dan John is one of the worlds top strength and conditioning coaches and presents his ideas in easy to understand and entertaining ways (think Yoda with dad jokes). The book lays out Dan’s approach when first working with a client, by first identifying a goal, then assessing where they are now, finally finding the shortest route between them.

A foundation for strength and conditioning, ideally developed at school and before 18 years old should contain the following:

The kettlebell foundation: Swing, Goblet Squat, Getup—
The Barbel foundation: Military Press, Front Squat, Power Clean, Bench Press
General Movement and mobility: Hurdle Walkovers, Farmer Walks, Cartwheels, Forward Rolls, Tumbling, Shoulder Rolls
Final stage: Deadlift, Back Squat, Sled Work, Prowlers and Car Pushes

Dan also recommends that everyone should learn to swim, ride a bike and tumble and play as many sports, games, and movements as possible. These are skills that you learn once should stay with you for life. If you cannot do anything listed so far, that is what you need to work on before moving on.

For most people, those who are not professional athletes or special forces soldiers, their focus needs to move to keep the body as young as possible for as long as possible. Building and maintaining lean body mass (less fat and more muscle) and joint mobility should be the focus. The challenge is to do what you need to do in the gym rather than what you want to do. You can use two tools to keep you focused on what you need to do; a coach and constant assessment. You should assess mobility via the Functional Movement Screen (FSM) or alternative once every six weeks and assess strength every two months.

Absolute strength is the glass. Everything else is the liquid inside the glass. The bigger the glass, the more of everything else you can do.
Brett Jones

Dan provides some strength standards for enough strength so that strength is never the limiting factor in any physical pursuit. The standards are relative to bodyweight and so are extremely relevant to endurance athletes like runners, cyclists, and triathletes. It is tough to get big and lean if endurance athletes eat intelligently and programming strength and conditioning on building strength rather than size, they will find that they end up leaner and faster than those that skip weights in fear of putting on size.

The book Interventions list the six fundamental human movements, push, pull, hinge, squat, loaded carry, and the sixth movement (everything else). A good strength and conditioning programme should include all six of these movements and target achieving the expected standards in each of the exercises first, and then working towards the gamechanger standards.

Dan John’s strength standards for men

Push
1. Expected = Bodyweight bench press
2. Game-changer = Bodyweight bench press for 15 reps
Pull
1. Expected = 8–10 pullups
2. Game-changer = 15 pullups
Squat
1. Expected = Bodyweight squat
2. Game-changer = Bodyweight squat for 15 reps
Hinge
1. Expected = Bodyweight to 150% bodyweight deadlift
2. Game-changer = Double-bodyweight deadlift
Loaded Carry
1. Expected = Farmer walk with total bodyweight (half per hand)
2. Game-changer = Bodyweight per hand
Getup: One left and right, done with a half-filled cup of water

For those of us who like to challenge ourselves with endurance events, the overwhelming message from top coaches including Dan John, Charles Poliquin, Percy Cerutty, and Pavel Tsatsouline, is a solid base of strength is essential to performance, health, and injury prevention. Start working towards the ‘expected’ standards for strength at a minimum and have a long term plan to reach the game-changer standards and you will find that strength is never the limiting factor in any physical activity you do.

Dan John has a weekly newsletter, a weekly youtube Q&A, many excellent books (I would start with 40 years with a whistle) and articles, and a workout generator website that allows you to enter the equipment you have available and the days per week you want to train, and it will provide you with a strength programme.

You can find the extended standards with regressions for additional milestones and the woman’s benchmarks on Dan’s website.

2021 daily routine.

My first blog set out my daily schedule, but since then, with all the writing and research I have done each day, I have updated my routine significantly. I have linked to the posts where I have written about any additional daily practice. This routine is the idea but is regularly altered based on the work I am doing that day. I have recently added several daily techniques to improve my sleep, making this list much longer than the original.

I put regular four-minute movement breaks throughout the day, including the 100-Up exercise, between meetings or after every 25-minute Pomodoro. My bike workouts are following a five-month programme to improve my four kilometres Individual pursuit power. My strength training is a mix between squatting everyday, heavy kettlebell swings, and the Rite of passage kettlebell programme.

6:00 Wake up

10-100 sit-ups
5-minute activity to wake up and get the heart rate going
Weigh myself
Protein shake
Granola

7:00 –

Bike on Zwift
30-second Deadhang from bar
All-in-one shake
Shower and get ready for work

8:00 – 9:00* – Get a coffee and start work

9:00 – Daily stand-up

9:30 – 12:30* – 2 hrs of deliberate practice (Work)

12:30 – Lunch

30-second Deadhang from bar
30 minute walk outside

15:00 – 18:00* – Strength session

30-45 minute weights or some tonic work (stretching or mobility)
30-seconds to 3 minute Deadhang from bar

18:00 – Cook, eat, and spend time with my wife

19:00 – Daily blog

20:00 No more food

21:00 – Bedtime

Clean the kitchen
10-100 sit-ups
Read in bed on the kindle Oasis
Take ZMA

21:30 – 11:00* Sleep

*Sometime within this period

Thirteen tips for getting better sleep

I go through stages of having issues sleeping. I usually find it easy to go to sleep, but either dance around like a fish out of water or wake up between 2 am and 4 am and then don’t get back to sleep. If you sleep like a baby, ignore these and keep doing what you are doing, but one or more might help if you have issues like me.

Have a sleep routine: go to bed and get up at the same time each day, even on weekends to take advantage of your natural circadian rhythm.
Sleep for between six and nine hours every night: The amount of sleep you need is dependent on several factors, set a fixed wake-up time and move around your sleep time depending on how you feel each morning until you find the duration you need.
Get as much sleep before midnight as possible: research suggests that this is when the best quality sleep happen. Set your bedtime between 9:30 and 11:00 pm.
Get light outside for at least 30-60 minutes per day: Getting out right after you get up will help anchor your master clock that controls your circadian rhythm. A lack of Vitamin D affects sleep, so supplement if you don’t get exposed to a lot of sunshine, particularly in Winter.
Don’t eat anything after 8 pm: Leaving time between eating and going to bed will allow your insulin levels to get back to normal.
Have a wind-down routine: have a hot bath, write a todo list to get things out of your head, do some light relaxation stretches, listen to relaxing music, read a book (use a Kindle Oasis with no blue light)
Avoid screens for at least an hour before you go to bed: blue light from screens will trick your brain into thinking it is daytime and make it harder to get to sleep.
Don’t drink coffee after 1 pm: Caffeine can affect people for up to six hours after a coffee. If you can, only use coffee for those times when you need a cognitive boost.
Make your bedroom a cave: keeping your bedroom dark, quiet, and at a cool temperature (between 18C and 24C) to help you get to sleep quicker.
Eat more protein during the day and carbs at night: Protein is a mild stimulant and carbs activate the orexin pathway that makes you sleepy.
Take a ZMA supplement 30 minutes before sleep: The magnesium specifically aids sleep but prepare for some strange dreams the first few nights.
Exercise but not too much: Staying active throughout the day is essential for your general health and insulin responsiveness, but training twice per day or long and intense cardio sessions will negatively affect sleep. Consider regular movement breaks if you work at a desk all day and strength training three times per week between 3 an 6 pm.
Track your sleep and monitor things that affect its quality: I wear my Garmin running watch at night to monitor my sleep duration and quality during periods where I don’t sleep well. I find I get good sleep duration but low quality with minutes of deep sleep in the single figures. Tracking your sleep will help you learn which of these tips you can ignore and which you need to follow.

Goal setting for inspiration

I have been reading Sir Chris Hoy’s ‘How to ride a bike’ over the last few days. The book is an excellent training manual that I highly recommend it for any cyclist. Hoy starts with the basics, including choosing a bike and road safety but quickly moves to training details. As one of the most successful British athletes of all time, winning Eleven World Championships and six Olympic gold medals, some training methods, such as the clown bike where Hoy would do short high cadence intervals at 320+ rpm are not for the faint of heart. There is no referenced research on the methods to satisfy the more geeky time trialist, but it makes it an easier read and Hoy was at the cutting edge for most of his career, and at the hight of British Cycling’s rise, so the methods have provenance.

Later in the book, Hoy writes about setting and managing goals. He suggests setting a massive goal that you would love to do, that is a bit beyond you, and is a little scary such as riding a tour du France mountain stage in l’Etape du Tour or targetting a national age-group title. You can then spend time analysing precisely what is needed to achieve the goal and compare them to where you are. You can then create a ‘recipe for success’ planning out exactly what you need to do in your training, recovery, nutrition, and equipment to bridge the gap. Finally, Hoy quotes advice given to him by Chis Boardman, if you are not excited when you read through the plan, then rip it up and start again.

The big goal acts as a motivation to carry out each day’s plan and develop discipline in your training. Hoy suggests you close your eyes, imagine doing something that excites and gives you goosebumps, then write it down, plan out how you can get there an, and then do it.

How to choose and manage your cycling goals

Choose a big scary goal so large that you are almost embarrassed to tell people.
Research and map out each aspect of what it will take to achieve the goal, such as a required power to weight ratio and equipment needs.
Map out where you are now against the requirements to identify what you need to do.
Create a long term plan to bridge the gap between where you are now and where you need to be.
Create a detailed plan for the next four weeks.
Execute the plan flawlessly, ‘controlling the controllable.’
Review at the end of the four weeks to assess if the plan achieved the intended outcomes.
Repeat steps 7-7 until the big scary goal is complete.

The Charles Poliquin carb test, Dave Brailsford, and what you really want from training

Chances are you eat too many carbs. I know I do. The late great Charles Poliquin had a test for males that want to be healthy; if you are above 10% body fat or can’t see each of your abs, you should be on a low carb diet. Most of the time, eating meat and vegetables, and using clean carbs to fuel and recover from intense training sessions. Once you are lean, you can then add more carbs, such as fruits.

Dave Brailsford, the mastermind behind the British Cycling and Team Sky’s takeover of cycling, did a recent interview talking about his current training. His recent riding focuses on maintaining muscle mass and strength and managing fat levels. He does this by eating low carb and high protein, restricting eating to between 11 am and 8 pm, and low intensity, high torque rides. The low-intensity rides and low carb intake aims to burn fat rather than glycogen for fuel. The low carb diet involves cutting out grains, bread, pasta, rice, and sugar.

At Team Sky and now Ineos, riders have adopted a carb cycling approach, eating low carb on low-intensity days and using carbs selectively pre and post high-intensity rides. The low carb days includes riding on coffee and protein or fully fasted for the first 1.5 to 2 hours of low to moderate intensity. Protein intake is kept at around the same level on both low and high carb days. Dr. Morton, the teams, published details of the approach in a research paper in which he sets the intensity level needing carbs as 85% of v02max.

A year ago, I bought some scales that measure weight, calculates BMI, and estimates your body fat based on a scan. I was 88kg and far above my health BMI of 25. My first target was to get below 83kg to be in the healthy BMI range. The next step was to deadlift 1.5x bodyweight and do ten strict pull-ups taken from the book Fat loss happens on Mondays. My focus then moved to become a faster distance runner.

With my current challenge of getting to a 4 Watts per kilo FTP in mind and reading the Dave Brailsford article has led me to think about what I want from my training. The easiest route would be to focus on losing weight rather than increasing power. If I lived in the mountains or were a competitive cyclist, this would make sense. If I am honest though, I want to be strong, powerful, and look good naked, so focusing on power makes more sense.

Body composition goals

If you want a blunt starting point, aim to get your BMI into the healthy range.
If you can measure body fat, a better approach is to get under 13%.
If you don’t care about these measures, aim for 1.5x deadlift and ten strict pull-ups. The deadlifts will require you to be strong, and you will need to be lean for the pull-ups.

Ultra-amateurism

I woke up tired this morning and scrolled through my phone under the covers rather than getting up. I missed my 7 am planned start time for a training session and then needed to help my wife testing some technology before a call. I had an hour and a half ride on the turbo planned, and the daily stand up with my team at 9:30 so the ride move to lunch.

I did not get back to my desk until 14:00 and then spent the next few hours catching up. After work, I had a trip to the supermarket, dinner with my wife, and then a later than planned weight session. I got to my daily blog at 20:30, clean the kitchen and sorted the recycling for bin day tomorrow. I will hopefully be in bed for 22:00 to hit my 7 am training ride in the morning.

While I was putting off the inevitable cold outside of the covers, phrases from sportsbooks I had read teased me. Schedules matter, as soon as one thing is late, the rest of the day is late too. If training starts at 7 am, you are ready at 6:50; you give yourself the leeway to fix it if you have a problem. You treat yourself as a professional in terms of preparation, attitude, and skills. You develop a personal regime and culture of professionalism. I am impressed by professional athletes who reach the top of their sport, but I am more impressed by the ultra-amateurs, like Roger Bannister. They achieve exceptional physical feats but are dedicated to their work in a profession and treat training as a secondary pursuit.

When your main focus is your profession, your training has to fit around your job. Training is put before everything else for professional athletes, but most of us do not have that life, and if we are honest, do not want it. So we wake up a 6:00 to training before work and then again after we finish, and save energy and time for our family and responsibilities. But in that hour or two when we train, we focus on nothing else.

I choose to ride and lift and write. I choose to focus on being great at my job. I choose to spend time with my wife. I choose to have a clean kitchen every night before I go to bed. Training is not a job for me, but it is more than a hobby. There is something deeper to the pain and the effort than getting a 6-pack and staying young for longer. The physical goals I set myself and the training I go through to achieve them become a part of me but when the next day comes around it is my role as a husband and an educator that matter. The pain is just a bonus.

My upgraded Zwift setup

My new setup for indoor bike training using the Zwift app:

I got the Wattbike Atom about a year and a half ago when the first generation was released. While it is more expensive than a premium Turbo trainer such as the Wahoo Kickr, it takes up less space and can be left set up all the time. I do not have to worry about the wear on my bike too. Replicating my road bike position was quick and easy as Wattbike provide a calculator to support this, but it has never really worked with my TT bike, and I am still struggling to get a position that feels similar. I was getting pain in my left glute when I was using it a lot, but a change of saddle fixed that. Other than that the Wattbike is excellent, I have never had an issue with it and works perfectly in erg mode.

The Apple TV device worked seamlessly on the first try, and the bigger screen does make a difference to the experience compared to using my older 13′ Macbook air. My laptop is relatively old and had struggled with Zwift in the last month, so I wanted a cheaper alternative than replacing my computer. The Zwift website suggests using an Apple TV device, so I follow the advice. I completed a two-hour ride, including climbing alpe du Zwift and following a session imported from my Training peaks programme and set on erg mode. I did not have any dropouts of the connection with the Wattbike even though there were over 10,000 people on the map, and many were doing the same climb. The Apple TV rendered Watopia and the other riders well, and I had no disappearing riders or glitches in the scenery.

I am currently riding on Zwift every day and wanted an easy set up that meant I only had to think about getting on the bike with no messing around. It is not a cheap set up, but it is worth the money and I get a lot of use. I am lucky to have space in the conservatory to have it up at all times. I would highly recommend the Apple TV 4K for Zwift if you need an alternative to your current devices. Now, I need to use it.

If you have any questions, contact me on Twitter.

Is your health worth 1% of your day?

Arnold Schwarzenegger ran a campaign in 2012 called ‘Come with me if you want to lift.’ The campaign aimed to get as many people as possible, spending an hour per day working on their health and fitness. When listing the rules for success in his book, Arnold wrote that taking one hour to focus on your health is just 4% of your day. Spending this time each day will compound and lead to exponential improvements in your quality of life over time. Most people cannot find an additional hour in their day straight away, so he suggests to start with just 15 minutes or 1% of your day and as you progress, the amount of time you can devote to your fitness will go up.

Whenever you hear someone you care about complain about time, ask them if a longer, better life is worth 1%.
Arnold

Percy Cerutty had a similar idea in his 1967 book Be fit or be damned. Percy lists the three most essential areas for health; Pedestrianism, a strong core, and regularly picking up heavy things. For pedestrianism (walking and running), Percy suggested running just 15 minutes per day on most days, starting with walking, then progressing to run/walks, with a long term goal of running 2 miles in this time (7:30 minute miles). He also suggested doing one longer run per week that you build up to 10 miles. For core strength, Percy suggested doing ten sit-ups as soon as you get out of bed and working towards a goal of 100 in a single set with a second set in the evening before bed. The deadlift is the king of exercises, and Percy believed that everyone should do it regularly. He wrote that you should start with half your body weight on the bar and have an eventual goal for health of lifting your bodyweight 5-10 times off the floor.

Dead-lifting, that is, heaving heavy articles whatever their nature may be off the earth, must be considered a primary physical function of homo sapiens.
In a society where most members can afford to have all or most of the modern amenities, the barbell should be considered an integral part of healthy living.
Percy Cerutty

Commit to spending just 15 minutes per day, every day on your health.

When asked by family and friends what they should do to get fit, I usually give two suggestions;

The couch to 5k programmes, such as the free one provided by the National Health Service, progressively takes someone from not running at all to running five kilometres without walking in nine weeks. The kettlebell swings ladder starts with 5 minutes of exercise and builds up to 10 minutes, giving you some time to warm up with some air squats and glute bridges. Doing the couch to 5k run/walks three days per week, the kettlebell swings on the three other days, some sit-ups each morning, and a day off should give you a good start towards health.

For January this year, I am giving the Yoga 15 challenge a go. If you are struggling to get a Kettlebell and it is too cold for you to start running, why not join me?

Once you are in a routine, have a go at some four minute movement breaks throughout your day to get you moving and deadhang from a bar for shoulder health. If you get a kettlebell and are doing the swings, add some overhead presses too. After completing your first 5k, have a look at what is next on your distance running progression.

Feel free to contact me on Twitter if you have any questions and let me know if you are committing to 1% of your day for your health.

The Stotan Creed by Percy Cerutty

‘Stotans, will, by virtue of their philosophy, be nature lovers, with a respect and appreciation of all evolved or created things. They will appreciate the sanctity of creative effort both in themselves and in others. They will strive to understand the significance implied by reality, will be able to discern the real from the spurious, and see no anomaly in nudity, either in body or mind. But neither will they cast pearls before swine. Stotans, for all the reasons that their philosophy stands for hardness, toughness, unswerving devotion to an ideal, and many more – will look upon the sea as their pristine element and endeavour to associate themselves with their primeval source of life by going into the sea at least once per month in all seasons of the year. No practice is more disposed to toughen both the body and the morale than this. Stotans believe that neither the body nor mind can be maintained at a high pitch of efficiency unless sufficient regular rest is obtained, and aim at a daily average of eight hours sleep (that is for young men-older men need only six hours). Stotans, also will not be found in social places after midnight. Stotans shall regulate their lives so that at the end of a period, varying with the intensity of the effort, each shall realize that he has attained, without conscious striving, to a state of knowledge and a position of leadership in the community. It is axiomatic that only the pure can understand purity, only the cultivated appreciate beauty, and only the strong measure their strength. Therefore, only the self-disciplined can command genuine respect.’
Percy Cerutty

Taken from The Golden Mile: Herb Elliott’s biography as told by Alan Trengove. The word Stotan was made up by Cerutty by joining stoic and spartan to describe his philosophy to life and athletics.