So I did the 75 Hard Challenge.

Why did I do the 75 Hard? And What is the 75 Hard?

I first heard of the 75 Hard on an episode of the Mind Muscle Project, the two hosts of the show were both doing the challenge. This grabbed my attention and from this interest, I looked into it more.

I found the creator of the 75 Hard, Andy Frisella, on the web first, read a bit on the challenge then listened to Episode 14 of the REAL AF podcast which discussed the 75 hard in detail. I could see merit in doing it, and for me, it wasn’t much of an extension of what I was doing already, I was reading daily, exercising daily (in January I committed to running to work every day).

For me, the main attraction was the discipline of the commitment to do the tasks in the challenge every day for 75 days. This is very doable, I’ve written before on the concept of the 90 Day World, a concept that the longest we can stay on task is 90 days, at this point, we need to reflect and re-commit to the things we want to achieve over the next 90 days. In 90 days you can make some really positive progress, at 90 days though our commitment starts to drop if we don’t stop and revisit and reevaluate the processes needed to reach the goals we are wanting to achieve.

The 75 Hard represented something similar, I could see great benefits in committing to 75 days of actions aimed at self-improvement and self-development. Pretty much after listening to the podcast, I was in, the next day I started.

The challenge requires:

• Two 45 minute workouts per day. (One of these must be outdoors).
• Follow some sort of diet.
• No alcohol or cheat meals.
• Drink 4 litres of water.
• Read 10 pages of non-fiction.
• Take a daily progress pic

These 7 things every day without fail for 75 days.

I added a bit more to the challenge.

In addition to the 75 hard challenges I also included making my bed every day, this was important to me, it is something I was poor at, really poor at, getting out of bed at 4:00 am every morning makes it very easy to not bother with making one’s bed. The second thing I added in was to write a minimum of 750 words a day every day, (in my case to continue to write 750 words as I have been doing this every day without fail for the last 710 days). I use these words for personal journaling and also to write a blog post every day, most of which I have published on localhost:8003. These added things were more for me to have the discipline and routine, starting the day with positive action and writing content to help others, although at this point these writings remain pretty much unknown.

How did the challenge go?

I found it really good. A tip I’d suggest for anyone doing the 75 Hard is to pay the $7 and download the app, the app makes it so easy to keep track of as it is a checklist you tick off on every day as well as to keep all of the daily progress pics. Made adherence much easier for me. You can also make your own checklist, I found the app well worthwhile though.

For my diet I used time-restricted eating, I could only eat between 8:00 a.m – 6:00 p.m and obviously, I had no cheat meals, no alcohol. For the two 45 minute workouts, I was doing some sort of run or walk outside, the runs were a mix of steady-state and sprints, with a fair few walks thrown in. I really enjoyed the walks. I have found walking is great for clearing the mind and idea conceptions. The second exercise block was always a strength session or a Hybrid Class.

The biggest challenge?

Early on it was the water, I learned pretty early I wasn’t drinking enough water, by the end though the four litres were easy to get in, personally, the water was one of the biggest benefits of the program. The only other challenge was finding the time to get everything in on some days, which comes back to committing and establishing a routine. Which to me having a routine is a key ingredient to success.

Going into the program I wasn’t aiming at losing weight or establishing any other performance metrics. My commitment was to complete the 75 Hard tasks plus my extra 3 tasks every day without fail. That full commitment was the goal, to get it done first go, no excuses. In saying this I did weigh myself at the start of the challenge and then every Monday morning during the 75 Hard period. I started out at 95.1kg and on the last day I weighed in at 90.8kg, a total loss of 4.3kg. The majority of this would have been fat, this I can see in the daily pics, there was a pleasing change over the 75 days in my body. As my volume of running was up around 130-150km/month there would have been some muscle loss. I didn’t do a scan before or after the challenge though, something I would recommend for anyone doing it.

Would I recommend it?

Yes absolutely with a few bits of advice. Frisella states that 75 Hard is not a fitness challenge it is a discipline challenge. I’d say it is both, due to the diet and two workouts each day it is very much fitness-related. It takes committed discipline though to achieve the 75 days. The concept could be very flexible and individually prescribed. Frisella says it is a discipline challenge, if this is the main concept and objective then making the daily tasks individually significant could bring even greater results and significance to a participant. For example, two workouts may not be possible for some, one workout could be replaced with journaling or meditation, or even a cold shower, whatever it is it needs to be an action that will help with self-development. A meaningful and purposeful action that will garner great benefits over the 75 days.

I really enjoyed the challenge, it dials in a solid routine and helps develop some really important habits. You either win the day, finding a way on the days that don’t go to plan or you fail. I liked the ownious of finding a way no matter what the day presented you with, excuses are not negotaible. I plan on doing it in some form again for sure, a few changes on the actions to make it more personally impactful for my circumstance, which will be decided through personal reflection and review. I would recommend it for most of our clients here at HFT. If you are seeking more info then I would suggest you head on over and listen to episode 14 on the Hard AF podcast.