20 Miles in Hell, and a Black Belt
Savage / Zen Newsletter | No. 77
“I choose to live and to lie, kill and give and to die, learn and love and to do what it takes to step through.”
In the fall of 2022 I completed a 12-week endurance program (review part 1, part 2). The capstone was supposed to be the 30-mile Art Loeb trail in North Carolina. However, that plan was canceled due to injury.
I rescheduled for the New Year’s Eve Space Race — a 6-Hour AMRAP of alternating 40 calories on a bike erg and a 400m run / walk. However, I was again struck with injury and illness. Fortunately, a newly anointed summer edition of The Space Race was announced for the summer solstice. This time, I had family visiting from out of state and again needed to reschedule.
Not to be deterred, I committed to this “marathon” on the 4th of July. Perdition — not quite “hell”, but the older sense of the word, “complete destruction.”
One provocative quip from Mark Twight’s “Poison” essays is:
“Show me yourself after 12 hours of continuous effort, and I won’t need to tell you who you are.”
I’ll settle for 6 (hours) in 100+ degree weather and hope for a little insight at least.
I declined the pleasant distraction of music or podcasts during the effort. Why go through 6-hours of punishment only to deprive yourself of the full experience?
Of course, I kept notes of my process and psycho-physiological state. The short version is:
Hours 1 - 2: I was pretty strong and confident, my watch estimating a 12-minute pace (per mile).
Hour 2.5 - 3: This was the first major “wall”; where I wanted to quit, where I could still tell folks I had done enough. But I changed socks, dumped Gold Bond in my shoes, took a few slugs of honey and pressed on.
Hour 4.5: This was the second major wall. I was in the “home stretch”, but was ground down to almost a walking pace, though I managed a few meters of trotting each round.
Endurance begins when you want to quit. With each hour that passed it was easier and easier to quit. I don’t know what would have been different if the effort was measured in distance (e.g. a “real marathon” of 26.2 miles) versus time. Regarding the later, you simply have to keep going — though that is not to be understated or assumed as “easy.”
Ironically, Robb Wolf published a piece on “fueling for a half marathon” today. The piece confirmed that I had been pretty accurate with my fuel / hydration strategy during the race.
1/2 scoop of Redmond Re-Lyte per liter of water.
Take a sip every round after tallying on the white board.
About 1-2 TB of honey (20-40g carbohydrates) every hour or so.
There is some confirmation bias in agreeing with Robb because his points align with my prior comments on carbohydrate consumption on a carnivore diet.
Pundits, normies in the comments, will bring up Anthony Chaffe, Shawn Baker, or Zach Bitter. All of those gentlemen are tremendous athletes and there’s a lot to learn from them.
As Robb points out though, one of the key factors in “the crossover effect” is an athlete’s efficiency at a given movement. Zach is obviously much more efficient at running than I am. Inefficiency causes an uptick in metabolic substrate use and is also indicated by one’s breathing pattern and sympathetic arousal (mouth / shortened breathing).
Baker and Chaffe can speak for themselves. I’d love to see heart rate logs and discuss with them directly how much glycogen is stored in their 100+ Kg frames (compared to my 77 Kg). I say this with love and curiosity.
Of the pundits though, they lack courage. None of them have read the “proof-of-work” discourse I wrote on utilizing carbs for recovery. Many will snub their nose at Robb’s article on principle alone.
Yet, they will never touch a 6-Hour AMRAP. They can’t even tolerate someone with a different opinion in a comments section online, let alone risk perdition in the real world.
They can only speculate — reciting influencer talking points and study abstracts — because they themselves have accomplished nothing. They lack the clarity that comes with recognizing there is always someone smarter, faster, stronger, better.
Confrontation eradicates speculation. These people fear confrontation because it implies risk of failure. In order to grow, we must intentionally and intelligently engage with our limits. To know your limit, is to set one.
The the things you tell yourself “just are”:
I just don’t believe / buy…
That’s not who I am…
I can’t…
I’m not good at X…
Y is always right…
Z is always bad…
These non-negotiables are where you have the most room to grow and are almost certainly what’s holding you back from the next level of happiness and excellence in your life.
What’s New:
Surprise, “egg consumption has no significant effects on systolic and diastolic blood pressure in adults.”
The scapegoating of sun exposure is a prime example of manipulating statistics via user bias. Similar to cohorts of “meat eaters” shopping at a warehouse grocery store in a low SES neighborhood versus “plant-based eaters” shopping at an uptown Whole Foods; there are numerous confounding variables such as:
lower income,
lower health literacy,
smoking,
processed food consumption,
chemical exposure, etc.
These create bias in most “studies” that try to make a case against sun exposure. Most ironically, Vitamin D has a significant role in preventing and recovering from cancers and various pathogens.
Odds & Ends:
Telegram:
Once again I’m in the mood for downsizing social media outlets. For quite a while now, the telegram group I created has served only as a relay to the RSS feed for this site. In spite of it’s innumerable useful bots and features, Telegram doesn’t offer the reach-per-content-effort compared to what I’m already covering on YouTube, Instagram, and Substack.
What this means is that I’ll let that channel and my account there self destruct after 365 days.
Substack: No more paywalls!
Rather than mess with memberships, tiered pricing, etc. I’ve decided to remove the paywall for this site’s archive as well as comments on posts — anyone can now comment (including on previous posts).
Buy me a (coffee, steak, beer):
A lot of “monetization” focus gets put on ad revenue (particularly in the YouTube space). More direct support of “creators” is often preferred both by the consumer and the producer. To keep this site free from the clutches of Google AdSense, check out the products and services I carefully endorse or mash the tip button below! There will also be a tip / donate button added to the top menu of the website.
