TN50#139, Adventure Ready, pt 2, 14 November 2023

Hi Team,

We’re back to Adventure Ready.  If you didn’t read part 1, start here, it’ll only take 3 minutes.

A well thought-out plan to be “Adventure Ready” can be messy, please read on.

Happy Tuesday and welcome to The Next 50 #139.  I like to think of personal performance in 3 components: physical, mental and emotional.  My frameworks focus on 4 Buckets: Eat, Sleep, Move and Think.  This blog is my sandbox for sharing information that you might find useful for your personal performance.

Here’s where we ended last time, what does “Adventure Ready” mean to you?

Still not sure?  Here are some Adventure Ready examples:

  • To a 30-year-old CrossFit athlete it may mean placing in the top 20% for her age group in the CrossFit Open.
  • To a 40-year-old marathoner it might mean finally qualifying for Boston.
  • To the 50-year-old hunter it may mean being able to hang in there at altitude on a week-long back country elk hunt.
  • To a 65-year-old it may mean doing whatever her 4-year-old granddaughter wants to do.

And, if you prefer, I can tell you what NOT being Adventure Ready looks like:

  • You are a life-long skier, current age 45, your buddy calls to invite you on a heliskiing adventure of a life time in 6 months; you would love to go but you decline because you are out of shape and even with 6 months of runway you don’t feel like you will be ready.
  • You are a loving Granddad, current age 75, your 5-year-old grandson just asked you to go to the park with him and his mom (your daughter) so he can swing. You make up an excuse why you can’t take him, but the real reason is you are scared you’ll have trouble walking and moving around the playground.

As you process examples of what Adventure Ready is and what it isn’t.  You might be realizing that Adventure Ready in your 30’s looks different than in your 40’s, 50’s, 60’s and 70’s.

Here are some of my personal examples and thoughts:

  • In October of 2021 getting Adventure Ready for me, meant being able to run 7 marathons in 7 days, that train-up lasted till February 2023 when we executed the expedition.
  • I followed that up with a 50-mile trail run in June of 2023. These were near term adventures for sure but both fit into my multi-decade Adventure Ready plan to maintain my VO2 Max in the top 20% for my age group, I want to be the most fun granddad ever if I have the opportunity!
  • This next year’s adventure won’t be as distance heavy. I plan to get some days in on the slopes with my kids, 5 or 6 14er’s with my kids, some mountain biking, shorter hikes, more strength focused training and I’m sure I’ll tackle a couple marathon distance runs as well.
  • At some point in the next few years, I plan to complete a 100 miler and an Olympic Distance Triathlon. If someone asked me to do either of those in 2 weeks, I would have to turn them down and I’m willing to accept that for now based on the specialized nature of those events; just like running the 7 marathons.

At this point your most likely thinking, “Dude, you are all over the place with this, is there a point?”  Hey I started this with, “it can be messy”, but my bigger answer would be, “Yes and the point is that being adventure ready for me is going to continually change as my short-term interests change AND along the way I will be intentional about maintaining a high level of physical and mental capacity in order to age well in general.”

If my multi-decade, multi-interest concept of Adventure Ready is too vague for you and you need a cleaner more engineering brain version please google the following:  Peter Attia, Marginal Decade.  Dr. Attia’s Marginal Decade concept is very linear and easier to understand if this is a new mental exercise for you.

I’ll leave you with this: if your vision of Adventure Ready at 70 is playing tennis 2 times a week, 2 rounds of golf a week and an all-day hike with the grandkids on the weekend, and you can barely handle that now at 50 (from a physical output standpoint) you won’t be Adventure Ready at 70.  The good news: you have time to fix it.

As always share the post with your team and anyone who might find it useful and let me know what you think!

Have a good one, Alex

PS. I have a professional relationship with Thorne, my primary supplement provider.  I would love to talk to you about your supplement requirements, how Thorne can meet those needs and the SWEET discount I can provide you as a Thorne Client.  Please reach out:  alex@fpp.llc