So I licked my wounds, healed my blisters and had two weeks R&R in the Sunny beaches of the South of France. This gave me a chance to think on what I discussed in my last post.
For those too lazy to read it, I talked briefly about taking a year off from Ultra Marathon challenges and spending the next year getting back to my roots - Strength, speed and mobility.
For the last 5 years I have been on a very intense journey with all of the odds stacked against me as a very heavy runner, starting very injured and considerably overweight. My physical background was in high speed and highly anaerobic sport - martial arts, sprinting, rugby and power lifting - very intense, very explosive and very anaerobic.
When I was in shape (a VERY long time ago) these made me lean, they made me strong and they made me fast (as well as fit). I was the ideal build for this stuff. They also made me considerably leaner than I am today.
Now back then I had very high natural testosterone levels, and a few weeks ago I decided to get my blood work done to see what could be making it so difficult to lose weight. I eat pretty clean, I've done low carb, intermittent fasting, extended fasting and all the while training 9+ hours a week running. Any normal human would expect weight to fly off. I was eating typically 14,000 calories a week (200 a day), and apparently burning 21000 to 28000 calories. (I tracked it all). I can tell you now... calories in vs calories out is utter bullshit
It is absolutely not that simple. Genetics have to play a part in all this as well as hormones, stress, etc. So when my blood work came back (the week before my last Ultra) almost everything looked good... almost. Cholesterol, thyroid, insulin, etc all in normal range; however, My testosterone levels were through the floor. Way lower than they should be at my age (50). So I started doing what I do and sought to understand. It turns out that high inflammation (ultra long distance running, injuries, soreness, etc) and high stress (physical and mental) lead to massive amounts of cortisol (stress hormone)... which over time hits your natural testosterone levels hard.
This makes much sense. Cortisol leads to poor sleep, poor recovery, injury and weight gain, and low testosterone. Over time it can create a vicious cycle. More weight, more stress, more cortisol, more running, more stress, more cortisol, and so on. Not only this, I also learned that very long distance running can wreak havoc with your testosterone production! So what's the approach?
I thought long about this while I was on holiday. And have begun the next stage in this journey. Take a year out (still keeping in some running but nothing more than 10-15km on a long run), but focusing my training around:
Sprinting 1x a week
callisthenics
one long run (because I love my weekend trail runs as they are good for the soul)
This leaves me running only 1 distance run a week (just to keep aerobic engine ticking over. The sprinting is excellent for speed, strength and power (and one of the best exercises to generate a big testosterone spike). The callisthenics are superb for body composition, strength and mobility.
This means having to love long term favourites once again such as full military burpees, One arm split planks, superman holds, box jumps and jump squats. Brilliant...
So, while on holiday I started a callisthenics program. In 40C heat... Epic.
A bunch of 30 minute callisthenic superset sessions every other day. They were hard. I felt cumbersome, but after a couple of sessions I could already feel some small changes. I felt 'springier', I felt joints just move a bit easier. So far so good.
I've had a month now of zero running, and I'm glad of it as I needed some time out from what has been an insane amount of running the last 18 months for someone that is built like I am. I feel fresher for it.
The next part is addressing my diet. I basically said 'fuck it' while on holiday. It's a holiday. But now I've just got back, I've gone for my protein granola for breakfast, Huel black shakes for lunch and clean whole food for dinner focusing on High protein, low GI carbs and plenty of fibre.
Overall, I'm keeping it real simple. I'll know more about this over the coming weeks but will let you know. I got back from France exactly the same weight I went out there - 105.7kg. Considering I ate crap for a fortnight that's not so bad (but the water retention I had in the heat was shocking!).
Now it's on to test my hypothesis of training the way i was physically built to train and see how much my body embraces or resists it. Will i feel so much better, I won't know for a while, but my instincts tell me this is the right move. Time will reveal all.
This is where I am. We all start from where we are at any given point of time. I have a pathway forward. I'll keep updating you all on where I am. You never know, next year I might just decide to chuck in a cheeky 50km Ultra, but I won't even think about it until early next year as this is the way for now. Let's see where this point on the long road takes me.
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