New Year’s health and fitness tests and goals

No party last night means I am fresh to test myself and set some health and fitness targets for the coming year.

The 1-2-3-4 assessments

In his book ‘Can you go,’ Dan John provides a simple 1-2-3-4 assessment he uses with all his clients. As I have just finished one fitness challenge, I thought it would be the perfect time to check in with these to see how I am doing and what I need to focus on for health and longevity. The book is excellent, and the kindle version is currently £3.99 so pick up a copy to learn the details for the assessments and what to do with the results.

Assessment 1: Stand on one foot

A simple test, stand on one foot for up to 30 seconds. Scoring above 30 seconds is the goal, holding for less than 10 seconds is a sign to visit a doctor for a check-up.

Result: I achieved 30 seconds on both legs without issue.

Assessment 2: Measurements

Next are two simple body measurements, the first is weight, with over 300lbs being a signal to visit the doctor and dentist for a check-up. The second measurement is the ratio between height and waistline with the target being the waistline at least half the size of height, if not, then body composition is the focus until it is.

Measurement 1 – weight: 82.5kg (182lb)
Measurement 2 – height and waistline: h: 183cm, w: 91 cm

Assessment 3: Questions

Question one is related to mobility, with being able to sleep with one pillow being the target. Question two and three are to help understand the results of the other assessments.

Question 1 – How many pillows does it take for you to be comfortable at night?: One
Question 2 – Do I eat colourful vegetables? I eat a lot of vegetables and a wide variety. I also eat a lot of everything else, particularly sugary treats which explains why I am not leaner.
Question 3 – Do you exercise for a least half an hour each day? I exercise for at least 30 minutes almost every day, for the last year I have run 5-6 days per week and then done mobility and strength on top of this. I choose to have a day off each week for recovery.

Assessment 4: Four tests

The final part of the 1-2-3-4 assessment is four tests. The first is a two-minute plank, with anything less signalling a weak core. The second is based on Claudio Gil Araujo’s sitting-rising test where you attempt to go from standing to sitting on the ground to standing again with no assistance from a hand or knee. The last two are the standing long jump, and a farmers walk. The broad jump’s expected standard is to jump as long as you are tall, so 183cm in my case, but then find your sport’s standards as an additional measure. Brian Mac has published some athletics standards on his website that I will use as a guide. Dan john suggests that you should carry half bodyweight in each hand for the farmer’s walk.

Test 1 – Plank: 2 minutes (only just)
Test 2 – To the floor and back up again: One knee assisted getting back up (9 out of 10)
Test 3 – Standing long jump: 175cm (I think I am limited by technique more than power – I will practice and retest)
Test 4 – Farmers walk: 160 meters with 2x 24 kg Kettlebells.

The strength tests

Next is a check-in with Dan John’s strength standards from his book Interventions. I will not list the steps or details in this post but look at them on Dan’s Strength Standards…Sleepless in Seattle post, to learn more, purchase the Intervention book currently £4.99 on kindle. The audiobook is £3.99, and as with all his books, Dan reads it himself.

The standards:

Squat movement: Level 5
- Front squat: 82.5kg (01/01/21)
- Squat: 100kg (01/01/21)
Press movement: Level 4
- Bench press: 100kg (01/12/20)
- One arm overhead press: 32kg Kettlebell (25/12/20)
Hip hinge movement Level 4
- Deadlift: 142.5kg (13/12/20)
Pull movement: Level 5
- Pullups: 13 (10/20)

Sport Specific test

I will split my year in half for endurance racing. I will use the first five months to raise my Functional Threshold Power (FTP) as high as possible in Project 4W/kg. I will use remaining seven months to get faster as a runner, with as much volume as possible to prepare for the Tromso Skyrun in early August and then targeting a fast 10k as the next step on my distance runners journey to end the year. These two goals will be the foundation for attempts at a sub 10-hour Ironman in 2022.

Tests

Bike – FTP via Ramp test: 242 watts at 82.5kg (28/12/20)
Run – Half Marathon: 1:35:09 (20/12/20)
Body composition (01/01/21)
- Weight: 82.5kg (01/01/21)
- BMI: 24.9
- Digital scales body fat: 17.9%

What to work on

Eat much less sugar to get down to a bodyweight of 80kg or lower. My height to waist ratio from the measurements section of the 1-2-3-4 assessments is close to the recommended maximum. Making sure that it does not get larger is essential, and reducing my waistline is suggested. I train a reasonable amount, so I know this is all about diet and reducing the sugar I consume. Getting my body fat down to reduce my weight will also help with all my other fitness goals. I was down to 80kgs during my most intense training period this year, so I know it is very achievable.
Work on a stronger core by completing the Gymfit level one planking series, ten daily ab wheel rollouts, and proper bracing during all lifts. I was not committed to my ab work during my running training this year. Regular ab work is something I need to commit to if I want to be a faster runner. I barely managed to reach two minutes on the plank test I am falling far short of Jon Albon’s five-minute goal from my running this year.
Practice my standing long jump a minimum of once per week until I can achieve a minimum jump of 216cm. I will be doing many power cleans, squats, and deadlifts over the next six months to help with my power on the bike. With an improvement in strength and power, weight loss, and regular practise to improve technique; I will aim to increase my standing long jump to the mark for an average athlete in the Brain Mac tables.
Purchase 2x 40 kg Kettlebells and work up to a 100m farmer walk with both, a one-arm overhead press with one, and ten double-handed swings every minute for ten minutes. I was limited on the farmer’s walk test by my available weight. Two other challenges I want to achieve this year require a 40kg kettlebell and a future challenge will need two, so I will get two now rather than any other alternative for farmer’s walks. Perhaps the money I save on all that sugar will cover it?
Squat 120kg for a single, 82.5kg of fifteen reps, Front squat 100kg for a single, and complete level two of the Gymfit single leg squat progression. My strategy to achieving a four Watts per Kilogram Functional Threshold Power this year is to get strong, then powerful, then work on holding power for a longer duration. The front squat target is to bring it in line with my bench press, and the Gymfit goal is as much for the mobility progressions and knee and hip health as it is for balancing the strength of each leg.
Achieve a double bodyweight deadlift. The second half of the year will be focused on running, and so the strength focus will move from squatting to the deadlift. To make this target, I will continue to work up Andy Bolton’s ladder of heavy kettlebell swings and bring my power clean up to 100kg in line with my bench press. I will also use farmer’s walks and upper back work, such as elevated feet ring rows and weighted pullups to support this goal.
Complete a Ramp test with a calculated FTP of 4 watts per kilogram. I detailed this in a recent post.
Complete a 10k race with a target time of sub 40 minutes. This is the next step in my distance running progression.

Some thoughts

Eight fitness goals is a lot, and some of them are challenging but not out of reach. Some targets will support others, such as getting a strong squat and deadlift will form a solid base to be fast on the bike and run. The year is in two halves, each with their own goals. The first six months focused on the squat and bike FTP and the second half focused on a double bodyweight deadlift and a sub 40 minute 10k run.

Am I too ambitious? If I achieve all eight targets by this time next year, I will know I did not set the bar high enough for myself. At 37, I am currently a fitter, more rounded, and smarter athlete than I have ever been, and I have used 2020 to achieve a level of strength and endurance that I am proud of. 2021 is a chance to build on this fitness and see what I can do.

Ready, set, go.

10 things I learned running 2000 miles in a year

You don’t become a runner by winning a morning workout. The only true way is to marshal the ferocity of your ambition over the course of many days, weeks, months, and (if you could finally come to accept it) years. The Trial of Miles; Miles of Trials
John L. Parker

I was not really a runner. I had done some ultra-distance stuff on trails including a few Skyruns, but at 85kg+, I had survived on pure grit, and I was far more comfortable going long on a bike. The tipping point was during the 2019 Outlaw X, an end of season middle-distance triathlon in the English Midlands. Training had gone well. I treated the 1.2-mile swim as a warm-up for the bike, I controlled the cycle, keeping to my conservative heart rate target and flew along the rolling hills that resembled my training routes just 40 miles south of the race location. As I pulled into the transition area at Thoresby Park, a lean and sinewed cyclist pulled alongside me and thanked me for the 56 miles of pacing and disappeared into a sea of bike rack. The relatively flat and familiar roads were much faster than the hills around Marbella from my first 70.3 Ironman earlier in the year, I had completed the first 57.2 miles in under three and a half hours, and I was on for a much faster time. The question in my head was ‘Can I get below five and a half hours?’

In short, the answer was no. What followed was two hours and five minutes of leaner fitter, and more prepared athletes passing me as I shuffled along. I finished in under 5:35 which I would have been thrilled with at the start of the race and my half marathon time was not any slower than my training had suggested, but mentally the race took a toll. If I was going to commit time, money, and annual leave from work to travel around Europe for endurance races, I needed to take them seriously; I needed to make myself a runner.

The most exciting thing for me about endurance races is the challenge of not knowing when I start if I can complete it. The Tromso Skyrun in the very North of Norway, at 57km long and with 4800 meters of elevation across some of the wildest mountains in Europe was a race that I knew I would need to commit to fully. In the Hamperokken Skyrace, I had a challenge that would force to become a runner. I set myself the target of running 1500 miles by the start of August before I lined up on the start line and a further 500 miles for the remainder of the year for 2000 miles in total, and signed up for six months coaching with the Skyrunning and obstacle course legend Jon Albon.

The Tromso Skyrun and all the other races I had signed up for were cancelled, but on Christmas Day, I completed the 2000 mile challenge. My final run was the seven miles and 500 meters of accent up to my local hill and back to my house in under an hour, cutting my best time from the previous year by over 12 minutes. I also completed a solo half marathon time trial on the 20th December in one hour, thirty-five minutes, and nine seconds, cutting down my PB from the start of the year by over 20 minutes. But more importantly, I am now a runner.

10 things I learned running 2000 miles in a year

samueljtannerblog.wordpress.com/2020/12/13/very-short-very-steep-very-fast-hill-sprints/(opens in a new tab)

To run high mileage, you need to run at least six days per week every week. Know your daily target average and get it done.
Spend time every day taking care of your hotspots – the niggles, pains, and tight areas you get while you run. If it starts to hurt, deal with it.
Have a big scary audacious goal, then have a plan to achieve it. If you can afford to get a coach, they will accelerate your progress and help you avoid injury (Jon Albon is fantastic). If not, pick a programme and follow it, trying to execute each workout perfectly.
Train all your running muscles to get faster, even if you are training for an Ultra. Train very short, very steep, very fast hill sprints, tempo runs, durations over 90 minutes and everything in between.
Run your quality sessions on the road and for everything else explore the trails. Use the Strava Explore Routes function to find new and exciting trails every time you go out.
Only buy premium running gear, your body will thank you. Premium stuff lasts, I have a Helly Hansen Lifa from over ten years ago, and it is still going strong. Focus on running shoes, running shorts, and a great watch (headphones too if you run with podcasts or music), the quality of the rest is less variable.
Fuel to recover. Drink lots of water each day, get consistent amounts of protein, and eat more carbs on heavy training days. Drink a recovery shake and eat a piece of fruit straight after hard sessions.
Running is a full-body activity so get your whole body strong. Do sit-ups when you wake up, then another set before bed, practice the deadlift and overhead press, and work towards a 1.5x bodyweight deadlift and ten pull-ups. It might not make you much faster, but it will make you healthier, less prone to injury, and much more confident in your body.
Read books by and about runners for motivation and make to make it part of your life. I recommend everything by Percy Cerutty including his biography Why Die, The Golden Mile by the legend Herb Elliot, From last to first by London Marathon winner and Olympic bronze medalist Charlie Spedding, and the novel Once a Runner by John L. Parker.
Be a part of a running community or have a few running friends to do some group training runs and races. Create a Whatsapp group with some runners to keep you motivated and suggest a yearly run streak.

I have transformed my running this year, not only am I faster (not yet fast), but I look and feel far more fluid when I run. I do still, however, have several things I need to work on. I am terrible at doing my core strength exercises, and the community element has been challenging this year, two things that should be easy fixes. Fast runners are lean, and I love sugar, I will have to start eating like an adult if I want to be fast. Finally, I can make myself suffer in an effort on a bike, but I don’t feel I can push myself as hard when running. Developing more mental strength when running, losing some excess weight, doing my core work, and running with others can get me to the next level on my distance running journey.

You can find out about Jon Albon’s coaching on his website. There are cheaper coaches, but Jon is a world-class athlete and self-coached, so you are getting a lot for your money.

Let me know on Twitter if you have any questions on anything in this post.

A basic home bike fit

The perfect position varies depending on what you are looking for: power, comfort, aerodynamics or injury avoidance.
Phil Burt

Finding your optimum position on the bike is an essential factor in being fast. A good position is different for each individual based on their goals, body shape, and flexibility level. However, according to Phil Burt, author of Bike Fit, and Head Physiotherapist of British cycling and former consultant for Team Sky, there is a bike fit window.

There are three contact points with the bike; the saddle, the handlebars, and the pedals (five if you count both hands and feet). You can adjust each of the contact points based on your body proportions, flexibility, and needs. A proper bike fit is probably the best money you can spend to improve your riding experience and speed, but some basics can get you started.

Start with the saddle

Saddle height: heel to pedal method

Saddle height is the holy grail for power. It is often argued that it is the most important cycle-position setting, and I have to agree – many other positioning recommendations (say of the handlebars or pedals) are actually trying to correct a suboptimal seat height. So it makes sense to start here.
Phil Burt

The optimum saddle height is a goal to work towards as it is often restricted by your hamstrings’ flexibility, if it is too high for your level of flexibility, you will get pain in the back of your knee. If it is too low, you will not be able to get power through the pedals. A simple way to set your saddle height is to adjust it, so your heel touches the pedal with your leg straight the pedal at the bottom dead centre.

Saddle setback: knee over toe

Once you have your saddle height, you need to adjust the saddle’s setback. The KOPs method involves dropping a plumb line or using a straight edge down from your knee when the crank is in the 3 o’clock position. The verticle line from your knee should be in front of the peddle axle but not beyond the toe. If the saddle is too far forward, you will get pain in the front of your knee below the kneecap.

Handlebars

To get a sufficient reach length for handlebars, put your elbow against the saddle front, your extended arm and open hand should fall about an inch short of the handlebars.

The handlebars should be between three and eleven inches (2.5 – 8 cms) lower than the saddle. Where you set yourself in this range will have to be by feel, making sure that your hands can sit comfortably and relaxed on the hoods with your elbows slightly bent for the duration of your rides. Start conservative and gradually lower your bars to a more aggressive position over time as your flexibility improves.

Pedals

To set up the pedals, align the foot of the foot with the pedal axle’s centre line and replicate your food’s turn out to match the way you walk. Aim to move both your walking and pedal position towards a foot straight-ahead style over time.

Improve your flexibility for a better bike fit

Burt suggests working on your flexibility directly after getting off the bike or after your shower. Starting with 30-second stretches, three times on each side and build up to 90 seconds as it becomes more comfortable and your form improves. Foam rolling should be done for ten repetitions each lasting 3 seconds up and 3 seconds down, pausing on any tight or sore areas.

Stretches you should perform are the Bulgarian squat (I prefer the couch stretch for quads), the Indian Knot. You should foam roll your ITBs, your glutes, and thoracic spine. Google these for demos.

Pick up Phil Burt’s Bike Fit: Optimise Your Bike Position for High Performance and Injury Avoidance. If you are interested in speed, get a bike fit from former National Time Trial champion Matt Bottrill.

A new year needs a new challenge: Introducing project 4W/kg

My challenge to become a better endurance athlete by running 2000 miles in a year is now complete. I want to take what I have learned and apply it to road cycling. I am not a beginner on a bike and based on my two Ironman 70.3 performances, I am more suited to cycling than I am running, but running has taken over this year, and I have never been a great cyclist. My choice of an arbitrary annual distance as a performance goal was to produce consistency in my training; I want to take this consistency and use it to achieve an outcome goal and get fast.

So, I have an incomplete problem: I want to get fast on the bike. But what is fast, and how can I measure it to create a plan to get there?

In planning and policy, a wicked problem is a problem that is difficult or impossible to solve because of incomplete, contradictory, and changing requirements that are often difficult to recognize. It refers to an idea or problem that cannot be fixed, where there is no single solution to the problem; and “wicked” denotes resistance to resolution, rather than evil. Another definition is “a problem whose social complexity means that it has no determinable stopping point”. Moreover, because of complex interdependencies, the effort to solve one aspect of a wicked problem may reveal or create other problems.
Wikipedia

An effective way of addressing an incomplete problem is to use the principles of Problem-Based Learning (PBL). PBL is a team-based teaching practice, so I will create a team using friends who ride bikes or have useful knowledge for collaborative research. Inspired by the Change through challenge course, I will time-bound this project to a common university module’s size of 200 hours (20 credits) and give myself five months. Problem-Based Learning begins with trigger material, such as a case study or journal article and has four steps:

Step 1: Define the problem
Step 2: Draw up the plan
Step 3: Implement the plan
Step 4: Evaluate the plan

Trigger material

The following is an article by Dr Andrew Coggan, the co-author and scientist behind the book Training and Racing with a Power Meter. The post defines fast based on a scientific approach to an average joe’s natural potential.

If the average Joe works their ass off how far can they get?: 3.9 W/kg
The average healthy but sedentary, college-aged male has a VO2max of approximately 45 mL/min/kg. However, I have seen it argued based on studies of, e.g., aboriginal tribes (and there are population data from Europe as well as military inductees here in the US to support the conclusion) that the “default” VO2max of the average human male is closer to 50 mL/min/kg, and the only way to get below this is to assume a couch-potato lifestyle, gain excess weight, etc. (and/or grow old, of course). So, I’ll go with that latter number.
With short-term training, VO2max increases by 15-25% on average, with another perhaps 5-10% possible (on average, anyway) with more prolonged and/or intense training. That gives a total increase of 20-35%, so I’ll go with 30% just for argument’s sake.
So, if VO2max is, on average, 50 mL/min/kg and increases by, on average, 30%, that means that the average Joe ought to be able to raise their VO2max to about 65 mL/min/kg with training. Indeed, there are many, many, many, MANY amateur endurance athletes with VO2max values of around that number (not to mention the fact that athletes in team sports with an endurance component – e.g., soccer – often have a VO2max of around 60 mL/min/kg, something that is also true in other sports that you don’t normally consider to be of an endurance nature, e.g., downhill skiing or motocross – i.e., motorcycle – racing).
The question then becomes, how high might functional threshold power fall as a percentage of VO2max (again, on average), and what does this translate to in terms of a power output? The answer to the former is about 80% (LT, on average, being about 75% of VO2max in trained cyclists), which means that in terms of O2 consumption, a functional threshold power corresponding to a VO2 of 65 mL/min/kg * 0.80 = 52 mL/min/kg could be considered average. If you then assume an average cycling economy of 0.075 W/min/kg per mL/min/kg, this equates to… 3.9 W/kg.
Dr Andrew Coggan

Defining terms

V02Max or maximum oxygen uptake is the oxygen uptake attained during maximal exercise intensity that could not be increased despite further increases in exercise workload, thereby defining the limits of the cardiorespiratory system
Hill and Lupton (1923)

Functional Threshold Power (FTP) represents your ability to sustain the highest possible power output over 45 to 60 minutes, depending on whether you’re a trained athlete or not. As a result 95% of the 20 minute average power is used to determine FTP.
Wattbike

The cycling economy (CE, W·LO2 –1·min–1) was defined as the ratio of the power output to the oxygen consumption (LO2·min–1)
Faria et al. (2005)

Simply put, your watts per kilo (w/kg) is your power to weight ratio. Watts per Kilo is your max power output, in watts, divided by your weight in kilos. For example, someone with a weight or mass of 80kg with a sustainable power output of 280 watts will have a power to weight ratio of 3.5 watts per kilo (3.5W/kg).
Wattbike

Based on the trigger material, to achieve ‘fast’ as considered possible by an average person, I need to maximise my V02Max, maximise the percentage of my V02Max I can hold for 40-60 minutes, maximise the percentage of that power I can translate to moving a bike forward, all while minimise my bodyweight.

The Challenge

Over the next five months, I will spend 200 hours getting to a cycling Functional Threshold Power (FTP) of 4 W/kg.

This is an ambitious goal, and even with my endurance and cycling background, it is likely to be a far stretch within the timeframe I have set myself. But the idea is to create a mark that requires more than just following a training plan but a lifestyle shift and total commitment. Plus, if it were easy, it would not be fun. If you have ideas on achieving this challenge or want to join in, get in touch on Twitter.

The greatest miler in history

I finished the biography The Golden Mile: The Herb Elliott Story today. His mental and physical training would best be described as character building. If you like to run, think that modern methods are a little tame and want to read about how the best athletes trained in the ultra-amateur era of athletics, this book is a must-read. Once you are finished with this book, pick up a copy of Why Die: The Extraordinary Percy Cerutty ‘Maker of Champions’ to learn more about the famous Portsea camp and Cerutty’s coaching methods.

Camp activities followed a fairly regular pattern. A typical day went like this: 7 a.m.: A five mile run before breakfast in any direction our whim took us, followed by a dip in the ocean. 8 a.m.: Breakfast of uncooked rolled oats (without milk) sprinkled with wheat germ, walnuts, sultanas, raisins and sliced banana. Perhaps a few potato chips to follow. 9 a.m.: Swimming and surfing or outdoor chores like chopping wood, painting and carpentry. Noon: Training and lectures at Portsea Oval, followed by another swim. 2 p.m.: Lunch – fish and fresh fruit. 3 p.m.: Siesta. 4 p.m.: Weight lifting. 5 p.m.: Ten mile run along dirt roads ending once more at the beach. 7 p.m.: Tea and a general discussion led by Percy on a wide variety of subjects. 11 p.m.: Lights out.
Herb Elliott

Herb Elliott, the 1500m gold medalist at the 1960 Olympics, is regarded as one of the greatest middle-distance runners of all time. The Percy Cerutty athlete saw running as the ultimate expression of the human body and embraced his coaches methods of natural eating, long runs in the mountains, sprints up dunes, sea swims, and weightlifting to develop extreme levels of strength and conditioning. Besides his physical abilities, mentally Elliot was a highly intelligent savage who through reading philosophy and embracing suffering, cultivated both unwavering confidence in his running performance and a will to win that saw him unbeaten in the mile and 1500m in his short adult career.

Most athletes imagine themselves at the end of their tether before they’re even seventy-five per cent exhausted. I was so determined to avoid this pitfall that if at any time I thought I was surrendering too soon to superficial pain I’d deliberately try to hurt myself more. In apparent conflict with this self-inflicted scourging was Percy’s theory that running should be a free expression of the body; that my body in motion, in the words of the song, ought to be doing what comes naturally. I trusted that my intelligence and enthusiasm would produce a happy compromise between this theory and my striving for perfection through pain.
Herb Elliott

While reading this book, I found my mindset changing towards heavy training. I started to see my quality sessions as an opportunity to push hard and embrace the pain a little more, driving with my arms and lengthening my stride when it started to hurt. I have begun heavy deadlifting and overhead pressing again on the journey to a double bodyweight deadlift and bodyweight overhead press, the standard that Percy Cerutty set his runners. And I have picked up my old copies of Stoic philosophy books and started to listen to Classical music from time to time including Beethoven’s Tempest III Allegretto when I need some inspiration.

A Christmas to remember

Traditions are funny things. Christmas has been celebrated across the Christian world since the forth century, taking the place of winter solstice celebrations on the 25th of December. The winter solstice in the northern hemisphere is the point in the year when the North Pole is at its maximum tilt away from the sun producing the shortest day and the longest night of the year.

I started the day with a run to the top of the highest hill near my house and back, a distance of seven miles and around 800meters of climbing. This run was special for three reasons, we had glorious weather, I managed the run in under 60 minutes for the first time ever, and it marked the completion of my 2000 miles of running challenge for the year.

The rest of the day was spent with my wife, cooking and eating great food, video calls with family, and a cheeky few glasses of champagne with the couple next door over the fence in the front garden. It was not the Christmas we had planned but it was a day to remember.

In England, we have some tough months ahead. The rate of infections are up and increasing, the cold winter will come, and we are likely to enter a heavier lockdown in the next few days. But just as the winter solstice marks the turning point towards longer days and shorter nights, there is a vaccine, a trade deal has been agreed with the EU, and the winter will give way to the spring in a few short months.

Merry Christmas! I hope you and your family and safe, have full bellies and warm homes.

Change through challenge: the university course in running a marathon

Bobby Maximus, a strength coach and author, says it takes 130 hours to build a base level of fitness. He developed this idea through training high-performance individuals to achieve impressive feats of strength and conditioning. In his book, The Maximus body, he provides two examples of how one hundred thirty hours can be completed; through one meaningful hour per day, five days per week for six months or over twelve weeks, two hours per day Monday to Friday and one hour on Saturday. The vital part is 130 meaningful hours of training, and some attention paid to quality nutrition and recovery. Budget your time, set your schedule, and do the work.

A college business module learning to run a marathon

Andrew Johnston, a GRIT and Business faculty member at RRCC and marathon runner, developed a similar idea but with a different target audience. Johnston created Change through Challenge, a 22 Week course for students that had never run before, with a final exam of running the Arizona Rock n Roll marathon. With a classroom session, a group run, and three individual runs per week; the training commitment probably came close to 130 hours.

In Johnson’s introduction to business class, his students asked local business owners for their keys to success; the most frequent answer was developing character and life-skills including a passion for work, work ethic, persistence, determination, and grit. According to Angela Duckworth, who wrote the book by the same name, grit is passion and perseverance for long-term and meaningful goals. As a keen distance runner, Johnston decided that his students’ best way to develop grit was to train for and then complete a Marathon, a challenge that, if you do not put in the necessary work and training, you are not going to finish.

Starting a business is a big goal that often requires the creation of a detailed, written, and time-denominated business plan that breaks it down into small weekly tasks to achieve the goal… That’s identical to a marathon-training plan.
Andrew Johnston

Each of the 22 weeks has a Monday classroom seminar, a Saturday morning group trail run, and three runs per week that students do independently to achieve the weeks running goal. The Monday night seminar covers three elements; Diet, training, and the discipline of the week. The twenty-two disciplines include goal setting, the power of consistency, and dealing with setbacks. Each is then related to the students’ schoolwork, business, and life. The Premiss of the course; all the life-skills needed to succeed in education and business can be acquired and mastered through training for a marathon.

My Change through challenge module

These two examples of time-based courses have me thinking about my next challenge. Can I package a physical challenge into a module? In my work, we typically package modules into 200 hours of learning, and I like the idea of going beyond the base level that 130 hours suggests and achieving something more significant. As I will be teaching myself, it makes sense to make this a problem-based learning module where I start with an open-ended problem and work through a series of steps, with other people to solve it. As an endurance athlete, I will set myself a training target of at least 10 hours per week, giving me around 20 weeks to complete the challenge I set myself—more on this to come.

You can learn more about Change through challenge through Andrew Johnston’s Tedx talk. Let me know on Twitter if you want to start your 200-hour Change through challenge module, and we can all create a group.

How Charlie Spedding helped me run a faster half marathon time trial

Today I ran the half marathon distance as a solo time trial. This run was the final test at the end of a year where I had committed to getting better at running, setting a target of running 2000 miles to force consistency and improve my times. I had planned to do a race, but with all possible events cancelled, I drove to Nottingham and ran the ‘Big track’, the council provided tarmac and gravel route down the canal and back along the river. My goal was a sub-one hour and thirty five-minute half-marathon. I missed by 9 seconds but beat my previous best time by over four minutes and my february time by fifteen minutes.

…the council had provided hundreds of miles of tarmac for us to run on, and in the winter they even made it floodlit.
Charlie Spedding

I got a Kindle a few months ago to help increase my reading volume and chose a running book on sale to be my first read. I had not heard of Charlie Spedding, despite him being a successful English distance runner, London Marathon winner, and Olympic medalist. The book is an honest account of Spedding’s career, and it has transformed the way I think about my training.

There are some running gems in the book. Spedding states that running well depends on physical fitness and your ability to perform. Their natural ability will determine each individuals peak level of fitness, but the aim is to get as close to that peak as possible with training. That individual’s ability to perform is determined by their confidence, determination, and motivation.

Spedding also writes about his self-image. He needed to move from a place where his subconscious self-image of ‘running quite well but not winning’ became one of someone that achieved great things. He went through a process where we changed his attitude towards what he was capable of and moved from just training hard to expecting more from himself and so doing things in a ‘better and different way’. He began to think of himself as a champion, and so his actions began changed to mirror this mindset.

But if I could get this right, when I thought about the big race I would say to myself, ‘this is a huge test for me, it will be very difficult, in fact, to do well I will have to run the perfect race.’ To this my subconscious mind would respond, ‘the perfect race? No problem, I do that all the time.’
Charlie Spedding

He began to focus on optimum training rather than hard training; ‘to do enough but not more.’ The word ‘optimum’ did not fit with his new mindset, so he changed it to ‘perfect’ training and set about perfecting his physical fitness and ability to perform. He would measure his improvements based on his previous performances, and broke his progress into stages by setting lots of goals.

…on my pad I wrote ‘I am going to think like a caterpillar.’ The caterpillar spends its time surviving. It hides from birds and eats leaves, but it is one of the most ambitious creatures on the planet because all the time it is thinking, ‘one day I am going to grow beautiful wings and I am going to fly.’ Charlie Spedding
Charlie Spedding

The most memorable part of the book for me was when the author finds himself in a pub with a notepad and a pint of beer and decides to make a plan. He writes three headings on the page; What do I want? Why do I want it? And How much do I want it? He then writes a list of what he needed to do; ‘Change my vocabulary. Aim for perfection, Know what I want, why I want it, and how much I want it. Use my imagination. Try to feel fantastic, and think like a caterpillar.’

Success is measured by how much I fulfil the talent I was born with.
Charlie Spedding

This book found me after my time with a coach had just ended and with no races on the horizon. I was struggling to keep up the motivation to run six miles a day to keep my annual milage target on track. After reading the parts about focusing on improving times based on previous performances and striving to fulfil personal talent, I created a set of goals to work towards as stepping stones towards being a better distance runner. I found a plan in Brad Hudson’s book to reach the next step on my journey – a 1:35 half marathon and focused on performing each workout perfectly.

Today was the day of my test. I had a quiet morning, I avoided any negativity (my newsfeeds), and I drove quietly to where I was to start running. I told myself that to run my goal time, I would have to run a perfect time trial, but that was ok because I had been practising perfect for months. I narrowly missed my goal today, but if it were easy, it would not be fun. The search for the perfect run continues.

Pick up a copy of From last to first by Charlie Spedding; you will not be disappointed. Let me know what you are up with your training on Twitter and connect with me on Strava.

How not to get fat

The great thing about physical training is that if you show up consistently and do the work, you get stronger. Today was the first test day for my deadlift in years. I was successful with my target of 142.5kgs, the total amount of weight I currently have in my gym. This is not the heaviest I have ever lifted, but probably one of the most satisfying. I am older, lighter by at least 12kgs, and running higher mileage than ever but still able to move a ‘reasonable’ amount of weight. I am stronger in the bench and pull-ups than ever before too. More importantly, my body feels good.

At the start of the year, I set myself a challenge to take my training seriously. I do not have kids or other heavy commitments outside of work other than being a responsible adult and husband. I have taken advantage of working from home and no commute to train two times per day for much of the year, adding rest where needed. I have used this time to work on ticking off some strength standards as well as running faster. These include 100kg bench press, 13 strict pull-ups, I can perform solid reps of dips, press double 24kg kettlebells overhead for ten reps, and many others.

Despite two good training sessions per day, usually a 6+ mile run, in the morning or since the weather turned, at lunch, and a strength and mobility session in the evening, I have looked fit and healthy but not great. Part of this is my insanely sweet tooth, lack of discipline in my eating, and ready access to my kitchen at all times. Still, part of it is something most people working from home since march will be familiar with, I spend the rest of the day sitting down. About six weeks ago, I wanted to make some changes to what I do outside of this 60-90 minutes per day of exercise to try and look as good as I feel.

James A Levine defines Non-exercise activity thermogenesis (NEAT) as ‘the energy expended for everything we do that is not sleeping, eating or sports-like exercise.’ NEAT is your general level of activity; the walking from your car to the office, taking stairs over the lift, and walking to someone’s desk instead of sending an email. If you are a knowledge worker and have been working from home for the last nine months, your NEAT has probably taken a swan dive, and your body has suffered for it.

I have been artificially adding back into my life this general activity. I started with an idea from Percy Cerutty; set of 10 sit-ups or more when I first wake up and then 5 minutes of activity to get my heart rate up after sleep. This 5 minute has been anything from some push-ups and squats to light kettlebell work, some stretches, or my latest choice of a few upper body movements with an exercise band.

Next, I started hanging from a pull-up bar for 30 seconds three times during the day. Once these were habit, I took an idea from the Gymfit newsletter and started to add short 4-minute movement breaks between meetings or after a couple of hours of intense work. The movements might be a few stretches, some bodyweight movements like 20 press-ups, some planks, or even a little sing and dance to Hey Jude by the Beatles. GymFit suggests setting a timer every 45 minutes and adding one of these breaks, but I have started to put my meetings to 50 minutes instead of an hour and use the few minutes between to do some movement.

Tomorrow, wake up and do a set of 10 sit-ups. Repeat every day for 200 days. After the first few days add one 30-60 second plank after your shower and before you work. Commit to adding movement breaks randomly and without planning. Your body will thank you.

Let me know how it goes on Twitter.

Rite of passage

According to the Oxford reference website, a rite of passage is ‘A ceremony or event marking an important stage in someone’s life, especially birth, initiation, marriage, and death.’ In Pavel’s book Enter the Kettlebell, he writes about a Russian rite of passage; a boy becomes a man when he can one-arm strict press a 32kg kettlebell over his head.

The book provides a simple programme to prepare you for this initiation; performing clean and press ladders three days per week with a heavy, light, and medium day. The book suggests to use Saturday as your heavy day, Monday as the light day, and Wednesday as your medium day. Start with a Kettlebell you can strict press 5-8 times with your weaker arm. For better progress and balance, do pull-ups in between each rung of each ladder matching the number of presses.

Heavy day

Week 1: 3 sets of a 1,2,3 ladder
Week 2: 4 sets of a 1,2,3 ladder
Week 3: 5 sets of a 1,2,3 ladder
Week 4: 5 sets of a 1,2,3,4 ladder
Week 5: 5 sets of a 1,2,3,4,5 ladder
Week 6: move to a heavier Kettlebell and start again on week 1

For the light day do five sets, but two rungs less than the heavy day. For the medium day do five sets, but one rung less than the heavy day.

So week one you would do a clean and press with the left arm, then a clean and press with the right arm and then one pull up to complete the first rung on the ladder. Then two clean and presses with the left arm and two clean and presses with the right arm, then two pull-ups to complete the second run. Then three clean and presses with the left arm and three clean and presses with the right arm, then three pull-ups to complete the first ladder. Rest before starting the second set.

Each rep is one clean and one press. The aim is to practice the clean and press as a pair to prepare you for heavier Kettlebells.

I can do eight presses with a 24kg Kettlebell, and so I am using that for the next five weeks before moving up to the 32kg. I am continuing with the swings from my earlier post and including five sets of five goblet squats with the 32kg kettlebell. The combination of heavy swings, goblet squats, clean and presses, and pull-ups is an excellent strength and conditioning routine on top of my running.

The ultimate goal described in Enter the Kettlebell is to press the Kettlebell closest to 1/2 your body weight (40kg Kettlebell for me) and do 200 kettlebell snatches in 10 minutes with 24kg. This book will provide a good six months of training to get me to that benchmark.

So, if you haven’t already, buy at least a decent 24kg kettlebell (cheaper bells can have uneven and rough handles) and work through the progression of the swings, training most days based on feel. From there, get a 32kg and then a 40kg kettlebell and build your ‘Courage corner’.

I aim to test the 32kg press on new years eve. Let me know on Twitter what training you are up to at the moment, and any rites of passage you think are worth achieving.