In Jim Collins’ book Good to Great we hear the story of one ultra athlete by the name of Dave Scott won the Hawaiian Ironman Triathlon six times.
In training, Scott would ride his bike 75 miles, swim 20,000 meters, and run 17 miles – on average, every single day. Dave Scott did not have a weight problem!
Yet he believed that a low-fat, high-carbohydrate diet would give him an extra edge. So, Dave Scott – a man who burned at least 5,000 calories a day in training – would literally rinse his cottage cheese to get the extra fat off.
Sounds a bit extreme, doesn’t it? If you ask me it is one step short of neurotic lunacy. However, to take this at face value as ‘madness’ would be missing the point as there is a valuable lesson in this when it comes to making change in your health and fitness.
You see, Dave Scott would rinse his cottage cheese because he would do whatever it took to reach his goal of winning the Ironman. Did this fanatical, unwavering devotion to the end result work? Of course.
Did he trample over his love ones to achieve this? No of course not.
You have to find out what it is you will do to go the extra mile, to take that step and to sacrifice the not-so-good habits that you have developed over the years.
It could be anything from do no exercise to taking a walk during your lunch hour, from drinking no water and 12 cups of coffee to ditching the coffee and taking in 4 litres of water every single day. All of these steps add up in a big way.
It takes me back to watching the swimmers at college. They would rise at 4am to train, hit the weights room at 8am and then attend lectures during the day. Oh…and they would hit the pool for a ‘easy 40 lengths’ in the evening, 6 days a week.
Was this necessary? Probably not. But they did it because they understood that this is what it took to get them to the top. This was their cottage cheese. Could you imagine if they were to add in nights on the beer into this? Let’s just say that my college had a running club that met on a Friday night. The proof was in the pudding. Most, if not all won a Gold Medal at the last European Championships.
Your journey needn’t be a medal winning approach. Maybe you need to lose some body fat or peak for a sport. My question to you would be what are you willing to do to achieve your goal. When I ask people to find a substitute for bread or coffee the eyes flit around the room.
‘But what do you mean? I can’t possibly do that?’
‘Why would that be? Isn’t the definition of madness doing something the same as you did before and expecting a different result?’
‘Oh…but what about x, y and z?..what about this…what about that?’
I normally shut off at this point. My tolerance for excuses ranks right up there between fascism and crooked politicians.
Another great habit that may seem uncomfortable at first is bringing food around with you.
‘But I can’t possibly do that’
‘Why not?
There really isn’t a logical reason ‘why not’ apart from the sheer inconvenience of it AT FIRST.
You need to step out of your comfort zone if you want to change something. Most of the time the comfort zone lies in your kitchen, or in your lifestyle. How well do you handle stress, is there a constant black cloud over your mood, do you eat in a hurry or skip breakfast or do you think that being hydrated consists of the 4 diet sodas that you drank this morning?
The beauty is that the rinsing of your cottage cheese actually begins with something a lot less extreme than this. It can be something as simple as joining a walking club or ensuring that you build up a sweat every day for 15-20 minutes.
So take that first step. Right now.
