NY Times Bestselling book “Younger Next Year”
Just in time as I turn 70.

I read this book about 5 years ago. I loved it. The basic premise is that our body is a product of evolution. We were designed for hunting, foraging, and later farming. In cultures where the population adheres to this lifestyle there is much less decay and dysfunction. The principle author Henry S. Lodge , MD noticed how so many of his elderly patients were becoming increasingly unhealthy and unfit. This was manifest in back pain,, neck pain, depression, obesity, and other ailments. They required prescription drugs to control blood pressure, anxiety, cholesterol and a host of lifestyle related problems.

With his medical background he knew the research supported the fact that it was possible to reverse the effects of a sedentary lifestyle by returning to our ancestral ways. We evolved to move. The famous fish called the Sea Squirt spends the first part of his life as a fish. When it attaches itself to a reef and stops moving, it digests its own brain. It essentially becomes a plant. It is a clear case of ” use it or lose it “.

He and one of his patients Chris Crowley, a 70 plus year old retired lawyer wrote this NY Times best seller. It is both a factual and an inspirational book. I loved it because it was optimistic and had the facts to support it. Just like a diet will get one to lose weight, sustained exercise will create a system wide effect that returns many of our health markers to match those of younger folks

I am a regular exercise fan. I have done many endurance races, including 18 short distance triathlons, a couple of marathons and a few 10 mile swims. Despite this I was nowhere near the level of exercise that was recommended in the book. They recommend 4 days of 1 hour of cardio and 2 days of intense weight strength training. Like so many people I found that I lacked the motivation and discipline to workout at this level consistently.

I trained just hard enough to finish my races.. I did notice that my times were getting slower and I was doing more run /walk. My heart rate was too high. Despite my regular exercise I could see that I was getting slower as well as older and less able, just like everyone else at 69. I just started at a little higher level of fitness.

We all know of people who don’t look or act their age. Some are just genetically fortunate. They chose the right parents. Others have to compensate for average and poor genetics by improving their diet and exercise. I have a colleague who at 79 is still hiking through the Dolomites in Italy and trekking across the El Camino a multi week retracing of a famous pilgrimage from Spain to the coast of Portugal. It is hundreds of miles. His brother has heart disease and is basically sedentary. Same genetics, different lifestyle.

There is term used in the book called “Kedging”. It refers to the tactic of olden time sailors who set out their anchor several hundred yards from their becalmed ship. The sailors would then pull the ship towards the anchor. This was a metaphor for setting a goal. I needed something that would motivate me to do a daily program that would enable me to achieve the goal and incidentally require rigorous daily exercise.

I already was concerned that my yearly triathlon times were getting slower and the effort was greater. Indeed I was feeling older and at this regression I would probably do what most people do. I would throw in the towel and accept that I was getting older. How many 69-year-olds do triathlons? Even short ones.

In the tri world your age category is determined by your age at the end of the year. So in Sept 2018 I would be 70 so the whole year I would be the youngest in my age category. At 69 I would compete in the 70-74 age group. This would be the best chance to do better than I had done. With a little extra effort I could perhaps be in the top three and get on the podium.

I started getting juiced. I joined a triathlon club, the Bay State Triathlon Team and did a second sprint triathlon with that group. I was like a fish being reeled in. The more I talked with other triathletes, the more interested and excited I got. The club has a yearly party where I did nothing but talk about gear and upcoming triathlons. I met Rich Hatch who is an endurance distance trainer. We hit it off well. It was all coming together.

What event should I choose? It needed to be challenging so I would have to work harder than I had been. I looked at the longer triathlons. The next level up from a short distance sprint was an Olympic triathlon. This is a .9 mile swim, a 26 mile bike, and a 6 mile run. This is longer than I had ever done but it had no panache, no excitement. There is a long distance endurance race that I was amazed could be done at all. It’s a 2.4 mile swim, 112 mile, bike, and a marathon to finish. It has to be done under 20 hours. This is called the Ironman. This was a good Kedge. Did I have the time and fitness to train for such a drastic increase in swim, bike and run?

If I was retired I might consider it, but it was totally beyond me. Who has an extra 20 hours a week for the challenge working full time? Not me. There is a half Ironman which is exactly half the distance. This means a 1.1 mile open water swim in the ocean, a 56 mile bike ride, and a half marathon at the end. My new coach said it would require about 10-12 hours training for 6-8 months to have a reasonable race. This was about 3 times my current workout level. It was a scary but exciting challenge. I would have to commit several thousands of dollars as well as most of my spare time to get in this level of training. I was already committed to a professional Feldenkrais training that required 40 days of training each year. I was enticed by the fact that It would be another 5 years to be the youngest in my age group. How bad can it be? I hired the coach signed up for the Maine 70.3 mile Half Ironman. and started training on Jan 2, 2018.

The training was 7 days a week, with a day off every other week. I had to get up around 5 AM, and sometimes earlier, to get the workouts done. Some days I had to do them after work. It is real test of one’s grit. I had to overcome multiple body issues as I ran, biked, and swam more than I ever had done before. There were times that I was exhausted and questioned my sanity at setting such a difficult goal.

As you can guess I did complete the race in August of 2018, one month before my 70th birthday. I experienced a peak moment, I will always remember. It was all gain and no pain. Well maybe a little pain. In the process I got to resolve, knee, back, neck, and shoulder issues. Resting heart rate went down, fitness , and endurance went way up. Having achieved this challenging goal was a great way to face my seventh decade. Indeed I felt the most fit in my whole life. I now have 5 years to be the youngest in my age category again. The next goal at age 75 is to complete the full Ironman distance of 140.6 miles. The quest for “Younger Next Year” continues.

About 10 years ago I tore the meniscus in my right knee. The meniscus is cartilage that keeps your thigh bone from grinding against the lower leg bone. It helps cushion your walk and stabilizes the knee. The symptoms are swelling, pain, clicking, and instability. It was no longer trustworthy. I had an MRI which showed 2 tears in the outside of the meniscus. The orthopedic surgeon recommended a procedure where they cut out some of the cartilage. He described it as a minimal procedure. I would be on crutches for two weeks and I would have a better knee. Recent studies have disputed this approach. In this article they conclude that in the long run it doesn’t really help at all.

Being in the massage and movement education profession, I thought this was a great opportunity to learn how to rehabilitate my own knee. I could always have the surgery, but once done I couldn’t undo it. A colleague of mine had this surgery and he regrets it. The knee became unlevel and caused problems in the ankle, hip, and spine. Just to make it interesting I signed up for the Marine Corps Marathon so I would have to solve my knee issue. It was 26.2 miles or bust! This may not be good advice for the average person.

It was an advantage to have the knee injury, as it gave me good feedback as to the effectiveness of my running. If I landed too hard or at the wrong angle it hurt and swelled up. Over the course of several months I increased my mileage up to 20 miles. I had many learning experiences. I took lessons in Chi Running. This combines the whole body movements of tai chi with running. It is described as “legless” running. There are books, DVDs and coaches in this method all around the country. It is a very doable method. The author, Danny Dreyer keeps the lessons simple.

Another approach I tried was called Pose running. Nicholas Romanov a Russian running coach put this method together. It emphasizes the lifting leg as driving the run versus the one on the ground. This also sounded good. Again I bought the book, watched the DVD, and took a lesson. My knee liked this approach. You can’t hurt your knee when it is in the air. It emphasized a number of strength drills to support his method.

 

I even tried barefoot running. For several years I was a member of the Bare Foot Running Club, and ran a couple of races unshod. I took a class with Chris McDougal the author of Born to Run, a major best seller and great read. The book is about a 50 mile race in Mexico between ultra marathoners and a tribe of Indians called the Tarahumara who were known for their long distance running. My very first step changed my running. I quickly discovered that it was very painful to run and land on my heel without the thick padding of running shoes. One of the running experts in the book is Irene Davis, PhD, PT She specialized in running injuries. I did a 2 hour evaluation with her. She videoed my run and tested my core strength. Although interesting, this information didn’t lead to any real change. She did confirm that barefoot running was good for knees.

By running barefoot I learned to run softer and strengthen my feet and lower legs. There are several books on the subject. Micheal Sandler and Ken Bob Saxton have very readable ones. I have to warn you that there is a long learning curve. It is very easy to go too fast or too far in the beginning. Until you have improved your mechanics and developed stronger ligaments you risk a variety of injuries.

This past year I took an advanced Feldenkrais training called IOPS, Ideal Organization Profound Strength as well as 5 days just on the mechanics of the foot. This took 18 months, multiple trips to NYC for 4 day seminars, many on line classes, and one on one lessons from very good teachers. With all this education I dramatically refined my body mechanics. I added many details to all of the above approaches.

I like to think that every cubic inch of your body runs. The more the whole body acts in a congruent way, the less damage to the joints and the more fun it is to run. The tissue that connects the muscles and bones is called fascia. I confirmed this idea by manually releasing the fascia of the feet, legs, thigh and pelvis so that it was all going in the same direction at foot strike. After doing one leg I ran and the feeling was like I had one shoe on and the other barefoot. I went up on the treated side and down on the untreated side. It was only by creating this contrast that I realized how light one can run. It was an exciting revelation.

Currently I am doing an on line running camp with Jae Gruenke, a Feldenkrais Practitioner specializing in running. I took her class when she came to Boston to work with elite runners training for the Boston Marathon. From her I learned 2 important things. The angle of your head and the position of your hands changes where you land on your feet. Recently I demonstrated this to a person running on a treadmill. By simply increasing the distance from the chin to the chest she sped up and landed more in her mid foot. The reverse is also true. Pull your head back and you feel heavier and run slower. Try it for yourself.

At this point in time I feel that running is now good for my joints. There is no longer any swelling of the knee. I can now work on my speed without fear of knee damage. There is no strain. I wonder what a follow up MRI would show? Since that diagnosis of multiple torn menisci I have run many 5ks, about 10 sprint triathlons, and 2 full marathons. My knee is better now than when I started. I can touch any part of it without eliciting any soreness. Indeed we have a miraculous body. It can heal itself if we apply some kindness and sensitivity as to how we use it without abusing it. I will be writing more about this in future blogs.