Fitness – Page 6 – Serenity Through Sweat

Tangible

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. Today I want to talk about something I struggle with both personally and professionally, the nature of a tangible finished product.

I think all of us feel a sense of pride and purpose from a completed project. There is something about our own creation, something new where before there was something old, or even nothing, that fills a hole inside all of us.

Even the simplest of tasks can produce a spectrum of emotion inside and generate the momentum necessary for a positive day. But it is easy to overlook so many of our tasks because the world we live in has moved away from the tangible.

An early birthday celebration for Speedy

As a pilot I struggle with this concept. On a given three or four day trip I will fly hundreds if not a few thousand people. Each of them have a story, a reason for traveling, and connecting them from point A to point B is an important and fulfilling endeavor.

But, at the end of a long day of flying sometimes it is hard to remember where I even went. There is nothing to show for my day’s work, just another hotel room and another day’s worth of missions ahead. The service I provide is very real and valuable, but it lacks a tangible nature that serves as a validation and a reminder of worth.

Fitness has a lot of the same characteristics. Miles run or biked, kettlebells swung, pull-ups rep’d, they are all valuable and worthy endeavors. Oftentimes though we are left only with a puddle of sweat and delayed onset muscle soreness as our only reminder of the work that was done.

I think that is why I feel a special sense of fulfillment when I complete a project around the house. To build, to create, to progress through a planned project, producing something new, scratches an itch that is left unattended by my other endeavors.

My wife requested a new bench for our kitchen table. The project was a relatively simple one, and we were able to involve the whole family in one way or another. The result is nothing special, but it is functional, matches the existing table, and is more resilient than it’s predecessor.

Beyond that it is a tangible creation, a useful household item shaped by family hands, and a reminder of the fruits of our labor. The bench project has been a nice change of pace from a expiration based service job and a a fitness journey that is mostly solo (especially during covid).

I hope that we are all able to find serenity in both the tangible and the intangible as they ebb and flow through our lives.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

Grind

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. This week I want to talk about an article from trail runner magazine I recently came across, and it’s scientifically backed message to embrace the grind.

The article (found here) references a 2019 study (found here) published in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research on the training predictors of success in elite long distance runners. The cliff notes version, is that there is no magic workout, the greatest predictor of success is volume of easy runs.

As with any scientific experiment, it is important to understand what was being measured and tested, and what the limitations of the study were, in order to draw any reasonable conclusions about the results and what they mean for our own training.

The study only looked at male elite athletes, and categorized their training as: short intervals, long intervals, tempo running, easy running, and racing. The intervals and the tempo categories were differentiated by distance and percentage of max heart rate.

The athletes reported their training regimens as well as their results at events and the data was analyzed at the three, five, and seven year mark.

As David Roche from trail runner points out, every athlete is an N=1 experiment. For those of you not academically or scientifically inclined, N is the sample size in a controlled study. Roche makes the important distinction that even though 85 male athletes from the same sport were in the study, each one has his own biodiversity and variables which are important to acknowledge.

With all that annoying science and reading stuff out of the way, what this study really means for average joe athletes, is embrace the grind. The most significantly correlated predictor of success is volume of easy runs. In other words… Just go run.

It’s not the maximum effort, is not tabata or HIIT, it’s not a new pair of shoes or an altitude mask, it’s repetition of the most basic and fundamental motion that will ultimately predict success.

I think that is true of almost all endeavors, grind out the repetitive volume of the fundamentals, and the results will follow. SerenityThroughSweat is an ultra, and serenity is found in the grind.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

Dependance

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. This week I want to talk about an interesting theory on exercise I came across in my reading, and why fitness becomes habit forming and can become

We talked a few weeks back about Breath, the book covering the science behind the lost art if breathing by James Nestor. After finishing his work, I followed the path to that of his research partner, Anderson Olsson and his book Conscious Breathing, and continued my own journey towards breathing better.

There is a lot of overlap in their respective work, and there is only so much innovation to be had in a bodily function that literally everyone does unconsciously. Olsson, differentiates himself in his obsession with CO², carbon dioxide.

heavy bag hangar and pull-up bar with my helper Bob the builder

Carbon dioxide is a simple gas that is the waste product of aerobic respiration. Olsson’s work is filled with all sorts of fun facts about the gas, that are interesting, enlightening, and perception altering.

For example, for those of you who haven’t abandoned your new year’s resolutions yet, weight loss is mostly in the form of CO². As your cells burn fat and carbohydrates for energy, you might lose some water weight in sweat, but the primary waste is your breath. (If you really want to nerd out, CO² is heavier than H²O).

Now try holding your breath. That hunger for air, those alarm bells blaring in your mind urging you to breathe, are controlled not by a lack of oxygen, but rather by an excess of CO². As CO² builds up in the bloodstream it alters the pH of the blood. Chemoreceptors in the brain measure these changes and regulate your breath to maintain appropriate levels of both gases.

First time on the heavy bag in over a year, felt good after seven 3 min rounds

The chemoreceptors, sensing an increased level of CO², will dilate blood vessels, and increase oxygen absorption, in order to regain balance. Exposure to higher levels of CO², will result in higher levels of oxygenation. Higher levels of oxygenation result in feelings of calm, content, and euphoria. This has been commonly referred to as a runners high, or in the case of this blog, SerenityThroughSweat

This is where Olsson’s theories become interesting. Exercise increases our metabolic rate, increasing the relative amount of CO². Olsson theorizes that many athletes have subpar breathing habits both during workouts, and in their everyday life. This leads to a condition where the athlete becomes dependent on the workout, as a means to increase CO², thereby increasing oxygenation potential afterwards, and the beneficial feelings that come with it.

Athletes become addicted to working out because it makes them feel better in a way that is possible by just breathing better. We become dependant, on our own waste byproduct.

All nasal breathing, and trying to consciously lengthen my exhale

This blog has been a forum for me to explore the many ways in which routinely increasing my own metabolic processes brings about a certain level headedness that then permeates to all the other facets of my life. The idea that this makes me an addict, chasing my next fix of CO², is a bit simplistic for my taste, but that doesn’t make it any less interesting.

It also means, that there are other ways to achieve that same sense of serenity, if Olsson is to be believed. Breath work, if done properly, can produce the same CO² imbalance, without all that pesky running and lifting heavy things getting in the way.

The lungs, intercostal muscles, and the diaphragm, can all be trained just like anything else. Just like you wouldn’t train your chest muscles while running in order to improve your bench press, you should train your breathing independent from your cardio. Breath work done on it’s own is important, and can help fill that gnawing ever present dependence we feel as athletes for a good CO² imbalance.

Breath work has provided me with a welcome new challenge, and an extra dose of CO² especially on those days when I can’t fit training in or I need some recovery. We all have our dependence on something, here’s to finding constructive ways to satiate the habit.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

I’ve been doing this with the boys in the stroller and it is a doozy

Tradition

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. With Christmas behind us, I was thinking about all of the things I did growing up with my family, and the things I want to do with my family now. I started to wonder, what makes a tradition?

By definition, a tradition is “an inherited, established, or customary pattern of thought, action, or behavior”. Basically anything we pass on to the next generation is a tradition.

Upper thigh parade in the new shorts for the 2020 Christmas Half Marathon

The creation of, and passing on of tradition is a powerful responsibility. I think it is important to not only explore the actions and behaviors that we are passing down themselves, but also the why behind them.

This year marked the ninth annual Christmas half marathon. What started out as an excursion in masochism and mindfulness to combat being alone on Christmas, has turned into something more.

Speedy and El Duderino ready to get the festivities started.

In 2012, after signing up for Ironman Florida to take place the following November, I ran 14.5 miles on Christmas day. While keeping my training volume up after a recent half iron triathlon and a century ride, the run was really about being on call over Christmas and not being able to see family.

As a charter pilot and particularly one junior at the company, I spent the next several years running half marathons on or around Christmas, either in different cities or on hotel treadmills. Finding solace in street, and comfort on the concrete, I pounded the pavement to combat the rising tide of frustration, emotion, and solitude that went hand in hand with professions that work through holidays, especially away from home.

Milk, cookies, carrots, and our letter to Santa

This pattern continued from 2012-2016. Five years, five half marathons, mostly a steam pipe venting pent up holiday emotions while working away from home. Then in 2017, El Duderino was born at the beginning of December. In addition, my grandmother passed right around Christmas in 2017.

I was planning on being home for Christmas 2017 one way or the other. But that year I was home with my wife and newborn son. I was in-between jobs on a sick time paid paternity leave from my prior charter job, and getting ready to start at a new airline that would be my career dream job. With a three week old baby, a well accumulated sleep debt, and the emotional toll of a lost family member very fresh, the pavement was calling for a whole host of new reasons.

2 is 1, and 1 is none, has never been truer than when your toddler takes your roller after you’re done running 13 miles. Thank God for backups

What started as an escape from solitude and an outlet for frustration, had changed with my growing family. There is a clarity that endurance challenges offer in a way nothing else can quite match. Whatever stresses or anxieties you lay on the alter of repetitive cardiovascular motion can be alleviated with the proper offering.

Over the past few years, managing my holiday schedule has become as much about being home with my growing family, as it is about making time to log those miles. My physical, mental, and emotional state has been different each year, and what I needed to get out of the run has been a little different as well.

A bold strategy for the days preceding the half marathon.

One aspect of SerenityThroughSweat is the process of working through those demons out on the pavement, in search of being a better person. The tradition of a Christmas half marathon, has helped me in what can be, despite it’s many joys, a stressful season.

Long distance running during the holidays has become an established pattern of behavior for me. While I would love to see my boys pick up and ultimately pass on that tradition, the run is just the mechanism and the reasons behind it, serenity, clarity, solace, relief, are what is truly important. I hope that those are the thoughts, behaviors, and actions, that are passed down through generations. In the end, I hope that I can raise young men who are capable of finding their own path to serenity, and making their own traditions

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

Escape

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. I spent the last few days in a tree stand in the woods behind my dad’s house. With all of the craziness of election day I was very glad to have an escape.

This was my first real experience hunting. I think I had followed along as a youngster but never actively participated. The idea of sharing a meal with my family from an animal I harvested has been increasingly appealing to me. Not only as a more reliable means of obtaining and knowing where my food comes from, but also as a connection with our most base self and a new challenge.

Like a lot of things discussed in this blog, (endurance events and parenting) the romanticized idea is much easier to digest than the actual event itself. My ideas of parenting before hand was helping with homework, or teaching the boys to wrestle. A lot of my parenting time is really spent keeping El Duderino from reaching things on the counter and washing out Speedy’s cloth diapers. Hunting followed very much along the same lines.

There is a lot of ground to cover between suiting up and walking to the tree stand and pulling that tenderloin of the grill. The romanticized ideas ask to often omitt the grind, but there is beauty to be found in that grind.

There is a very distinct beauty to sitting still and silent anywhere, but especially out in nature. Appreciating that beauty is not automatic, but rather requires mindfulness. The requirement for mindfulness is only accentuated by those things that would otherwise distract you; cold weather and wind, restlessness, first world problems communicated by an electronic device in your pocket.

My experience hunting in the woods was magical. One of the things I’m most appreciative of when it comes to my fitness and well-being routine, is the place those activities take me to. I can get out of my head and out of my own way finding a place of serenity, if only for the briefest of moments. Sitting in a tree stand watching the sun rise, the multicolor leaves fall, and the animals of the woods come alive took me to a very similar place.

Helping my dad drag his deer up a ravine and back to the house, cleaning, butchering and eating it all in the same night was a very powerful and fortunate experience. I felt transported to that same place of serenity I so often seek, but also felt a sense that others have been there before.

Running, grappling, and triathlon are largely solo pursuits, and while there is surely serenity to be found, it is largely a lonely endeavor. Hunting, cleaning, butchering, and learning from my father, who learned from his father, gave me the same escape but with a greater sense of all those others who seek serenity through that path.

Speedy’s first taste of meat, and El Duderino days go get some more

I couldn’t have asked for a better hunt, or hunting partner. I will be forever grateful for the knowledge passed on, as well as the experience and the escape it provided. I hope that you reader, can find your own much needed escape in this chaotic time, and the serenity that comes with it.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe, (warm if you are in the stand), and stay sweaty my friends.

Managed to get 3 runs in this week too with the travel and the hunting

Demons

Happy Halloween! Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. I’m writing this after a nice 10 mile sunrise run while enjoying my first beer in a month. Halloween, sober October, and my post run afterglow have me thinking about demons.

Cheers to the final workout and Sober October celebration

This October I abstained from alcohol and sugar as well as completed the 10,000 kettlebell swing challenge. This proved to be a interesting combination in regards to how I typically quell my inner demons.

I am very fortunate to lead a life where most if not all of my demons are personal and internal. I’m not struggling to eat or find shelter, my family and I are healthy and secure. Most of my demons are the result of my own weaknesses; insecurity, jealousy, self doubt, self pity. SerenityThroughSweat is in large part, my journey of exorcising demons through exercise.

My personal weaknesses often lead to the creation of mountains out of molehills in otherwise benign human interactions. These have only been amplified by reduced social contact and the other stresses that come with Covid.

For me, alcohol often becomes a crutch to either dull, avoid, or replace addressing those personal inadequacies and interactions. Some demons are more or less benign and good to let go of, in college I was fond of the phrase ” nothing a shower beer can’t fix”. Others are more insidious, especially when left to fester when covered up with alcohol.

another sunrise smoke on the Z grill, brisket pork butt sweet potatoes broccoli and corn

Physical exertion and later on formal exercise has always been a tool I’ve used to exorcise those same personal demons. I remember one particular instance when I was probably around 10 years old. I have no recollection of what I was mad at my step brother about, but I remember that my solution was putting on my snow gear, and marching circles in the snow around the cabin we were staying in for hours.

I’m not advocating for exercise as an alternative to dealing with your problems. Rather, literally running from them (and then back) can be a means to clear your head and face them with a fresh perspective.

This month’s challenge was particularly interesting because neither of those options were available. Without alcohol those small things that I would otherwise shirk off with a beer at the end of the night were nagging until they were attended to. The kettlebell swing workouts, despite their intensity and benefits, coming in most days at just over 30 minutes failed to squash my more stubborn personal demons the way endurance cardio sessions have.

I didn’t realize how much I had been holding on to until finishing my run and then later sitting down to write with a beer (and a doughnut). This month was less a challenge of abstaining and swinging, and more a challenge of managing stress without my favorite tools. I have never lacked for discipline and perseverance in the face of a challenge, but I struggle constantly with my inherent character flaws.

15 in the final cluster on the way to 10,000

Sweating, in all of its various forms, and then being able to analyze and share my thoughts has been and continues to be extremely therapeutic. This platform has been a tool I can use to hold myself accountable and exorcise my demons, and for that I’m a grateful to you my reader. I’m also very happy to be done with Sober October and the 10,000 kettlebell swing challenge, so that I have my full arsenal of tools available to exorcise my demons.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

Better Humans

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. As I draw to the close of my Sober October physical challenge, I’m reminded of a pro cyclist interview I read from the 2019 Tour de France.

The article was published here in Business Insider on July 9th, 2019 and is an interview of Canadian professional cyclist Michael Woods. Woods, at the time was competing in his first TDF and is now the only person to have ever completed the race and also have run a sub 4 minute mile.

The point in the article that stuck out to me is the prioritization required to get through the tour. A grueling 21 day event, the tour demands all of your energy and focus.

“When you finish a three-week race, you’re a better bike racer but a worse human being. Over this Tour I’m probably going to walk 5 kilometers over the course of the month — that’s it. And that’s not healthy. That’s not healthy from an impact-adaptation perspective. Humans are meant to walk — they’re meant to move around.”

I’m not trying to imply that swinging a 54lb kettlebell is in anyway the same as riding Le Tour, but I empathize with the singular focus and lack of fitness diversity in this challenge.

There have been a number of benefits to be sure. My core looks and feels stronger, my grip has gotten some much needed and often ignored attention, my posterior chain is firing better and stronger, and my posture seems improved and more natural, rather than something I am fixating on to keep correct.

All of those things are tangible, but my running has definitely suffered, and despite twice daily mobility sessions, there is a tightness that I can’t seem to escape because the challenge presses on in monotony. Beyond that, this challenge has not been particularly stimulating, but rather more of a trudge through the reps.

In addition to the sheer volume of reps, part of the challenge is maintaining focus and determination throughout a task that is mundane and monotonous.

Just as Woods said, and despite the benefits I have experienced, as I approach the end of 4 weeks and 10,000 kettlebell swings, I feel like I’m better at swinging a kettlebell but a worse human. I miss the diversity of jui jitsu, triathlon, archery, and other kettlebell and sandbag lifting. The combination of these activities together serve to be both mentally and physically challenging and invigorating.

I appreciate the 10,000 kettlebell swing challenge and it’s likeness to other monotonous and mundane life tasks, but I am excited to be done and get back to work on being a more diverse and better human.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

Questions

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. Election season is upon us, my work group is in the middle of a contract amendment vote, and all of us are analyzing how we adjust to COVID-19 measures in our day to day life. To be successful in any of these or many another endeavors requires asking questions, specifically, asking the right questions.

I just finished reading Freakonomics, the book by Stephen Dubner and Steven Levitt. For a book that claims to have no underlying theme, it is really a book about asking the right questions before accepting information that is provided.

The various topics themselves (while interesting) are really the backdrop for the true value in the book, which illuminates why we act the way we do. Most topics start with some assumption of the outcome, and then examine the incentives in place that help shape human behavior. The authors write, “Incentive is a tiny object with astonishing power to change a situation”.

As the book goes on, the questions asked generally challenge the conventional wisdom on a particular topic. After positing a question that challenges a typically held belief, the authors then go in search of data, that is run through unemotional regression analysis to isolate variables that are correlated. The results often clash head on with the conventional wisdom

There are several examples in the book that studied early learning test scores (K-5) and various parenting statistics both active and passive (age before kids were born, education level, spanking, screen time, one parent home between age 0-5). As a parent I was very interested to find out that the most highly correlated factors affecting test scores were either genetic or socio-economic, prior to your child’s birth. In other words, your life prior to becoming a parent has more impact on your child’s early test scores, than any of the at home pre-K educational work you can do. (Not that it hurts at all, it just isn’t statistically significant)

While this information is both fascinating and relieving (my boys aren’t doomed because I travel for work), it is the question that is far more valuable. The question being, what can I do as a parent to help my children be successful?

El Duderino helping out with the post workout shake, “Ma, where’s the protein?”

The answer is well beyond the scope of this blog, (although I believe being a role model for general well-being is a great start). Asking the right questions and searching for answers, not accepting what is thrust forth against the data, is another great place to start.

The same applies to the personal well-being, diet and exercise world. There are plenty of conventional wisdom trends that have recently been upended, from high fat low carb eating, to high intensity interval training, to intermittent fasting and fat adapted endurance athletes, the data show a myriad of possibilities that were shunned just a few years ago. Again, for the scope of this blog the individual programs are less important than the questions, what am I doing to be a better version of myself? Does the data support those decisions/programs?

For all of my colleagues voting on the contract amendment, I urge you to ask yourself, what is my incentive, and have I examined the data, rather than the popular narrative?

For all of us approaching election season I urge you to ask yourself, have I researched the issues and the positions rather than the popular sound bytes?

For your own personal growth are you doing the things you can to be better than you were yesterday? I hope you will join me on the path of asking ourselves the tough questions, and maybe even getting a little sweaty along the way.

Thanks for joining me, start safe and stay sweaty my friends.

Show Up and Put In

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. Today I want to talk about this year’s Sober October challenge.

I debated at first about my participation in Sober October this year. Eventually I realized that as much as I didn’t want to do it, that all of the reasons I could think of not to participate, were really just as compelling reasons that I needed to.

“Oh Hi there, I’m 6 months old” (*Speedy said as he popped out from his hiding place)

So this year’s Sober October challenge is no alcohol, no added sugar, and 10,000 kettlebell swings.

There are plenty of things written about the 10,000 kettlebell swing program and nothing I can say will add to it, especially before I have even completed it. You can find the original program here.

Kettlebell swings in and of themselves are not especially challenging. As a triathlete and an Ironman, I can certainly find beauty and serenity in suffering through repetitive motion. That said, I’m 3 days and 1,500 swings in and my forearms are shot and my glutes are on fire.

My Garmin watch died and is being replaced, so rocking the 2013 Suunto Ambit for this week’s running in-between kettlebell days.

I think the biggest hurdle when it comes to taking on a challenge of this kind, or any kind for that matter, is first just to show up, and then put in the work.

500 swings a day, 2 days on followed by 1 day off, for the month, until you reach 10,000. The beauty of the challenge is that it is binary, you either show up and put in the work, or you don’t, there isn’t really an in-between.

On day two of the challenge, speedy decided to wake up at 3:50, and El Duderino followed suit some time after 5 am. My wife was in desperate need of catching up on sleep, so it was on me to show up and put in the work as a dad. Not the ideal prelude to my 1:00pm cast iron rendezvous, but again, this month’s challenge is about showing up and putting in the work, regardless of what circumstances might arise.

Often times fatherhood feels eerily similar to these physical, mental, and emotional challenges we are faced with. Suffering through repetitive motion, with beauty and serenity to be found for those who can appreciate the struggle.

Beautiful FL fall day for some smoked picanaha and veggies on the Z grill

After all the excuses and the doubt, what Sober October is really about, is showing up and putting in the work through the repetitive motions of the day. Showing up for your spouse, showing up for your kids, and showing up for yourself. Putting in the work to be a better husband, father, and person, and maybe find some serenity along the way.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

My new best friend for the month, a 54lb cannonball

Galanin to the Rescue

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. Today I want to talk about galanin, what it is and some of the many ways it helps us.

Galanin is a neuropeptide, which is fancy word for a protein produced by neurons. (don’t worry I had to look it up because it sounded more like one of king arthur’s knights to me). Galanin is found in many different parts of our brain as well as our GI tract.

A recent article in the Journal of Neuroscience, shows an increased galanin level (derived from unfettered access to cardiovascular exercise) was correlated with a conferred resilience to stress in mice.

Two groups of mice were observed after a stressful event (foot shock). The respective galanin levels were measured in each group, with the experimental group having access to a running wheel in their cage and the control group having none. After three weeks there was a correlation between the elevated galanin levels, the amount of time exercising, and the degree of stress resilience, in the group of mice who used the running wheel. (After building in the first week they were averaging 10-16km per day, if you needed some motivation for your own running)

The test then went on to elevate galanin levels in otherwise sedentary mice and the observed the same stress resilience effects. It is obvious but worth stating that people are not mice, but we do have very similar galanin receptors. This experiment shows that repeated cardiovascular exercise increases galanin, and increased galanin helps us deal with stress.

Doing further research on galanin, I found this article in Nature, which shows that increased galanin levels are responsible for regulating aggression toward pups in male mice, and increasing their tendency towards parental behavior.

I’ve always felt that I’m a better father, husband, and overall person after a good sweat session. There are obviously multiple chemicals in play there, but galanin has a big role to play. This is especially true as stress levels have been elevated these past few months, as has time with my sons without daycare.

Increasing galanin levels seems like a great thing to do no matter what, but an especially great thing with all the stresses of Covid life, and the best way to do that is some good old fashioned SerenityThroughSweat.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.