Roots: Grounding your running, mindfulness, health and wellness

ISSUE 3

Every once in a while you come across something that just makes you take a step back and think for a bit. Recently for me there was an instagram post showing a man who was climbing an epic mountain for his 80th birthday. Or when you see a 70 year old woman become the oldest finisher of the Western States 100 mile ultra (shown here ) I cant help but pause for a minute or two and think that’s what I want to aspire to do.

More specifically I want a body and a mind that I can thoroughly enjoy right up until the end. I don’t know what your end game is, and why you exercise and take care of yourself… but this is mine. I’m going to be climbing mountains until the end.So what can I do to make sure that I can do this? Issue 3 dives in right here.

FIND YOUR TRIBE

Research into the in to the communities that live the longest and are the happiest on the planet conducted by Dan Beuttner shows that one of the largest contributors to a long and healthy life is community. How strong are your ties to your community, and how much do you feel like you belong. Being an active member in a community keeps you engaged and it helps give you purpose and makes you feel appreciated.For me this couldn’t be truer. The more I surround myself with like minded supportive people the more drive I have for life and I guess that’s the secret!I used to be intimidated by social running groups and I chase to do all of my training on my own, but incorporating social group runs once a week has made a huge difference for me.

YOU NEED TO KEEP YOU BODY MOVING

So you runner and you think that you do get out and move you body pretty good a few times a week and this should be enough right?I used to think so too… but then I had a light bulb moment. I was at the SONOFA GUNOFA race this year and I was just astounded by how well the cross fitters we doing. How was this possible that their bodies were allowing them to continue in this race for so long? Well they had durable bodies.So decided that I needed to look into this some more… so I reached out to some friends that I used to coach at Mayo Brothers Calisthenics and got them to get me started out with a strength and mobility plan. What I found was that the results came quickly and were fairly notable and I was only doing these workouts 2-3 times a week. Return on investment here was huge! (We have since partnered together to offer running specific strength and mobility programs)So incorporating strength and mobility work outside of running helps you move your body into positions that you wouldn’t get into running, helping you maintain a full range of motion in all of your joints while giving them strength to make your body as a whole more durable and ready to take on any challenge.This one is a no brainer for me… Strength and mobility work started now will help me reach my goal of doing epic adventures when I am 80.

BE MINDFUL OF WHAT YOU EAT

Anyone who knows me, knows that I am a plant based athlete and I am very passionate about eating a whole foods diet. I choose to eat this way for 80 year old me.I am not here to try and convert you to my ways…. but more of just challenging you to start being more mindful about what you put in your mouth, because it matters.If it helps try to think of it this way… you are eating today so that 80 year old you can be out having fun and climbing mountains and enjoying life to the fullest. Don’t wait until you are 80 for life to decide for you that you need to eat better…. because by then you have all ready lost.Its sounds intimidating I know… but when you boil it down it’s a real simple act. Just think about what you are eating. A simple way to start is to write down each day what you ate and how you felt about it… openly an honestly. I know this is after the fact… but it forces you to think about it and confront it. Doing so you will eventually change your thought process and your relationship with food. Give it a shot!

IN CLOSING

It helps sometimes to think about your end game. Not always thinking about what is going to make you a better person or athlete in the short term, but to stretch a bit and think how can you set 80 year old you up for success so you can still be enjoying the things that you love to the fullest.So that’s a rap for ISSUE 3. If you enjoyed it please let us know in the comments. Share this with someone you think could find this useful and Subscribe so you can get our next News Letter. Also let us know if there are topics which you would like to see discussed in future issues.

Roots: Issue 3