75 Easy – An Ultrarunner’s Take on 75 Hard

There’s a popular challenge on YouTube called 75 Hard. It looks something like this:

75 Hard requires six commitments you must complete every day for 75 days.

1. Two workouts of at least 45 minutes. One must be outside.
2. Follow a diet. You can pick the diet, but you can’t cheat.
3. Reading 10 pages of a non-fiction book. (That you think will improve something about you.)
4. Drinking a gallon of water. (Do not add flavouring to your water.)
5. Taking a progress picture.
6. No alcohol.

There are various other versions of 75 Soft or 75 Medium which look more like this:

1. Incorporate healthy foods into what you eat, and, if you imbibe, only drink alcohol on social occasions.
2. Drop the number of workouts to one 45-minute session, with one day a week for active recovery.
3. Drink three litres of water each day.
4. Read 10 pages of any book each day.

Now, I like my liquid refreshments, but I’ll take tea and beer over a gallon of water any day. It’s hard to gauge 10 pages on a Kindle – depending on the font size they aren’t standard pages. And I’m not a big fan of progress pictures. I’m not doing this because of what I look like. So here are the 7 rules of my 75 Easy:

1. One easy run a day. (Zone 2.)
2. One other workout a day. (e.g. another run, strength training or yoga.)
3. Fuel better. (make an effort to eat healthier, and fuel training more effectively.)
4. Read a book. (aim for at least 20 minutes.)
5. Just sit. (aim for at least 20 minutes.)
6. Connect with a friend each day.
7. Relax. (have an optional a pint, but not two.)

This is called 75 Easy because of the easy run. I think it’s actually going to be a bit tricky. 

I’m not specifying how long for the workouts. If I end up doing a 120-minute easy run, my second workout might be 20 minutes of yoga. The next day might be a 30-minute recovery run for the easy run. I suspect I will end up with a minimum for either workout will be 20 minutes, and at least 1 hour overall.

Some points for 4 and 5. I’m aiming for 20 minutes for each of these because it seems achievable in my circumstances. But if you decide to adapt this, even just 10 minutes is better than nothing. Also, to be clear, these are things I want to be doing in my life. All I’m doing here is forcing myself to make the time to do what I enjoy.

With the book, I want to read things I feel add some sort of value to my life. They will probably be non-fiction, but if I pick up some fiction it should be something good. 

For just sitting. I’ll mostly be sitting zazen. But sometimes I may just sit somewhere quiet with a cup of tea and watch the world go by. The main thing here is to be away from electronic devices, TV, music, people chatting, and all the noises in the head, sit somewhere nice and just be for a while. 

I don’t expect to have a beer every day, or even most days. But it’s nice to have one sometimes, especially when out socially. I once stayed in a zen temple where the monk often had a beer with his main meal. While the guests could help themselves to a 2nd or 3rd beer, the monk would always stop at one. I really respect that approach to alcohol, and besides, the first beer is always the one that tastes the best. 

Anyway, now that I’ve thought of this challenge to give myself, it’s time to get started. I’ll report back with how I get on in 75 days!