Is 75Hard the Ultimate Health Challenge? We Compare Alternatives!
In this video, I wanted to talk about the differences between the Earthy30 Challenge and the 75Hard Challenge.
I am someone who enjoys a challenge. I've done 100 days no drinking three times, 75Hard twice, and I'm currently doing the Earthy30 Challenge. What I thought I'd do is point out some of the differences between the challenges.
What is the 75Hard Challenge?
75Hard, as the name suggests, is 75 days long. And during this 75 days, you need to do:
Do 2x 45 minute workouts (you need to do one of those workouts outdoors come rain or shine)
You need to follow a diet
You need to take a photo of yourself
You need to drink a gallon of water
You're not allowed any alcohol or cheat meals
And then you have to read 10 pages of non-fiction
They've got a nice app where you can go in and you can post an image to social media. And that's something actually I really like because there's this idea of accountability—when you say you're going to do something, you're encouraged to do it if you make it public.
So what does this challenge look like? It's a health and fitness challenge, with a bit of diet... But I would say the main thing is mental resilience because you have to work hard to complete this challenge. The 2x 45 minute workouts is definitely demanding. It's difficult to fit in 90 minutes of exercise in a day. If it's wet outside, then it's not always fun.
The good thing is that a workout is whatever you want it to be: A 45 minute walk could be a workout, yoga can be a workout, so you can scale it to your needs.
I have to say that I felt good on 75Hard, but the difficult bit was from the middle… Sort of day 32 until about day 50. That's the no man's land, where you're kind of over halfway, but you're not in the home straight yet.
The benefits of 75Hard
I lost a tonne of weight when I did 75Hard. My watch does an approximation of my VO2 max. And it went from 50 milliliters per kilogramme per minute to 53 milliliters per kilogramme per minute. So I had a marked increase in that, which is very promising.
What is the Earthy30 Challenge?
So now let's talk about Earthy30. Earthy30 is a three level challenge.
Earthy30 Level 1:
Level 1 is you just need to eat 30 different plant based foods each week for four weeks, and then you have completed level 1.
Earthy30 Level 2:
Level 2 is you need to add in some lifestyle hacks as well. So you do your 30 different plant-based foods a week for a month. But then also every day, you have to get 10 minutes of sunlight in your eyes before 9am. And then you have to do 30 minutes of exercise or 10,000 steps each day. I can tell you that sometimes it's actually easier to do 30 minutes of exercise than it is to do 10,000 steps because 10,000 steps is about 75 minutes walking depending on how fast you walk.
Earthy30 Level 3:
Level 3 is everything in level two. But you're not allowed any caffeine after 2pm, you're not allowed any booze at all, and you can't have any food two hours before bedtime. There are some commonalities with 75Hard but the base of Earthy30 is very much nutrition and gut health and overall well being… But then we're stacking in these lifestyle hacks as well.
WHAT ARE THE BENEfits of the Earthy30 Challenge?
The sunlight is about actually setting your body clock so you can get a good night's sleep. Exercise is great for longevity and building fitness, whether that’s aerobic capacity or muscle mass, depending on the type of exercise you're doing.
The no caffeine after 2pm each day, the no booze at all, and the no eating two hours before bedtime is actually about promoting a better night's sleep… And a better night’s sleep has knock on effects to wellbeing.
Which challenge is right for you?
I enjoy Earthy30 challenge because it's a little bit less demanding than 75Hard. And actually you can stay at a level. So if you're not quite ready to move from Level 1 to Level 2, maybe you've had a cold or something and you're not quite ready to exercise every day, stay at Level 1.
If you're at Level 2, but you've got some weddings coming up and you know that you'd rather be drinking, then wait until you've got a really good month to do Level 3. I would also say that the habits you build in Earthy30 are a little bit easier to hang on to in everyday life…
Once you get into the habit of eating 30 different plant based foods a week, it's actually very easy to keep that habit. Once you get into the habit of walking 10,000 steps or doing exercise every day, that's also a good habit to get into. And then viewing morning sunlight and not having coffee after two are also pretty easy habits to adhere to.
I really like counting up my foods, but I don't like tracking my foods per se, which is going into a calorie counter or My Fitness Pal and adding how many grams of meat I've had… That's quite boring. But literally just ticking off a new plant based thing every time you eat it is pretty straightforward—it's not too much of a hardship.
A few war stories from the challenges!
When I did the 100 days no drinking, I did it every time for charity. So having a cause that you can support gives you some accountability and gives you some staying power and helps you do it. I also made posts on Instagram, charting my progress so that I felt very accountable to my goal.
Exactly the same thing for 75Hard: I would post my 75Hard status on IG and also did it at a similar time to some friends. So we had that social support as well. We could go out together and share healthy meals.
The times when I felt any of these challenges have been important have been times when alcohol was turning into a crutch. I'm definitely not someone who would classify themselves as a big drinker. But there is a difference between having a glass of wine a couple of nights a week, and having a glass of wine every night a week, because then in your mind, it can turn into something that you look forward to as a means of decompression. In actual fact, if you look at the data, and I can tell you from my EightSleep mattress, if I have a glass of wine, I might relax in the moment, but I sleep less well as a result of that wine.
I love the diet component of Earthy30. I actually quite like getting to Thursday and seeing that I've had 20 foods. And then you go to the supermarket and you consider which novel food can I pick out this week? What didn't I get in my food delivery? What can I add? Is there some exotic vegetable that I can add in and make sure that I get to these 30 different plant based foods?
I also found is that Earthy30 is more sustainable. It shifted my eating behaviour to having fewer takeaway meals, fewer fast food meals and actually going out and identifying ingredients that I feel I really need to have to make sure that I reached those 30 different plant based foods a week. And then I'd also say religiously, no matter if I'm doing Earthy30 or not, I do get my morning sunlight every single day. Thanks to Andrew Huberman drumming that one into me.
Andrew Huberman says:
You do want cortisol to reach its peak early in the day right about the time you wake up. One way that you can ensure that that cortisol peak occurs early in the day right about the time that you wake up is to view bright light ideally from sunlight within the first 30 to 60 minutes after waking.
I do try to eat dinner early as well… Especially if it's fatty meat, then it does take me a bit longer to digest that. That's something I learned from my Zoe test, that my fat metabolism is a bit slower. And again, I see this in the sleep data… If I have something fatty like a burger, or like a fatty steak, I do tend to sleep less well when it comes to bedtime.
Conclusion: Try the Earthy30 Challenge!
I hope that goes some way to explaining the differences between those challenges. And if you want to do Earthy30, then enjoy establishing those three levels. And if you want to stay at Level 1 and just eat 30 different plant based foods a week, great. If you want to level up with some exercise and some daylight, that's Level 2. And if you want to go detox, that's Level 3.
Start the challenge today and get your scorecard here.
