This week will mark a year of looking like a right banana…
That’s because I’ve been walking around smart activity tracker akimbo, COROS PACE 2 run watch on the left and WHOOP on the right.
Impracticalities aside though, has it been worth subscribing to WHOOP with their strange model of a free device, but pay a monthly/annual fee for the service?
I think so. But I won’t go into it here because the full-on review I made six months ago says near enough what I still think.
Instead, there are three common lessons that traverse any decisions to buy or not. And they’re overlooked by most athletes:
Understand and accept negative impacts, instead of going cold turkey.
In 2024, getting your nutrition advice from social media is a dangerous game. It’s being told that 80% of your favourite foods will melt your microbiome within the next week. In reality, we can be grown-up and practical about it.
If you’re serious about performance but ALSO want to live a life, test things out to understand their impacts, and accept it for what it is. I still drink every week, but mainly 1 to 2 on a Wednesday after run club because that’s when I see my friends.
Find the unexpected trends. The kinda stuff you WON’T find in textbooks.
What separates pro athletes from others is how wacky their pre-workout nutrition is. Take Leicester City footballer, Jamie Vardy. He said: “Three Red Bulls, a double espresso and a cheese and ham omelette is what makes me run around like a nut-job on a match day.”
Extreme example, I know. But he tinkered and slowly found what works. For me, WHOOP has shown me that late meals close to bed don’t work, two coffees is optimal, and super-rich foods shock my body.
The more you can influence recovery, the better your performance.
WHOOP is heavily geared towards promoting recovery. Unconsciously, I now do stuff to bump up recovery like go to bed on time to achieve 100% sleep need, not eat too close to bed, drink less, eat a bigger variety of foods, etc.
In a weird way, I’ve sleepwalked into my best performance levels. It’s not surprising because our bodies can only train as hard as we recover. Train a bit harder for longer, and naturally you need to sleep and eat more. The best thing is that this works both ways.
Workout of the Week
Bored of running at tempo for ages? Here’s a little switch-up!
Bringing the floor and ceiling closer together does magical things for stamina.
10 mins warm up
5 mins 10-20s OVER threshold pace
5 mins 10-20s UNDER threshold pace
repeat x2
10 mins cool down
