The 75 Hard Challenge fitness is everywhere at the moment, from popular YouTube personalities completing it and showing their results, to nearly 1.5 million people using #75hard on Instagram. But what is the 75 Hard Challenge, why would you want to do it, and how hard is it really?
“If you do 75 Hard for one full year of your life,” says Andy Frisella (pictured above), the author and YouTuber who developed the 75 Hard Challenge. “It will change you to the point where you can flip that switch back on and off at will.”
The 75 Hard Challenge isn’t another “30 Minute Abs” DVD. It’s about consistent, habit-forming behaviours, and lifestyle changes that are designed to make you feel better, both physically and mentally.
Why the 70 Hard Challenge was created
The challenge was originally developed by Frisella after being inspired by the Iron Cowboy, James Lawrence (an inspiration to our very own Nedd Brockmann). Lawrence’s claim to fame is completing 50 consecutive Ironman triathlons in 50 days, across 50 states in America, and shared a nugget of wisdom with Frisella that to build mental fortitude you needed to regularly and deliberately put yourself in challenging and uncomfortable situations.
Inspired by this remarkable feat of endurance and impressed by the lessons Lawrence had learned during his 50 Ironmans, Frisella created the 75 Hard Challenge in March of 2019 as a way for normal working people to develop similar mental fortitude. The 75 Hard Challenge only has five rules, but every rule must be followed for 75 days.
The rules of the 75 Hard Challenge:
- Follow a diet: This one sounds simple enough, but for every meal of the 75 days you must follow a diet or structured eating plan of your choosing. You are also not allowed to drink alcohol at all.
- Two 45-minute workouts: Every day you need to complete two separate 45-minute workouts, and one of them must be completed outdoors.
- Drink 3.5L of water: Another straightforward task, but one that requires a surprising amount of thoughtfulness.
- Read 10 pages of a book: The book must be non-fiction and is ideally focused on self-improvement and education. Audiobooks don’t count.
- Take a progress picture: You’re unlikely to see changes in the photos from day to day, but over 75 days these pictures will become inspiring.
On the face of it, there aren’t any rules that are particularly hard to complete by themselves. Apart from the small amount of planning that two 45-minute workouts in a single day might require, every other rule can be actioned almost immediately.
The point of the 70 Hard Challenge
However, the real challenge isn’t following any specific rule on any given day. The real challenge is following all five rules every single day for 75 days – a little more than 10 weeks. If you skip even one of the daily challenges for the 75 days, you must start again from day one. No ifs or buts about it.
The point of the 75 Hard Challenge isn’t just to get in good shape physically — what most diets promise only for you to lapse as soon as the program is over — it’s to help you develop the mental toolkit that allows for consistency. Frisella suffered from the same consistency challenges for much of his life before he started to try to understand the psychological elements that make up the ability to do something every single day.
“I realized that the root cause of all of my problems was not addressed by any existing program, because the real problem I had was a lack of mental toughness & discipline,” explains Frisella. “I spent the last 20 years figuring out how to master mental toughness and develop the skills needed to take complete control of your life & be successful in anything you do.”
For those who decide to undertake the 75 Hard Challenge, the benefits can be significant. Not only will you have gained a set of serious new habits that have improved your physical health (exercising, and eating/drinking clean), but also your mental health and knowledge (you’re likely to have learned a lot from the reading, as well as gaining confidence and perseverance).
By the end of the 75 Hard Challenge, you will have:
- Followed a consistent diet and stayed off the booze,
- Completed at least 150 workouts and spent more than 56 hours exercising outdoors (more than 10% of the time you will have worked during the same period),
- Drunk at least 262L of water,
- Read at least 750 pages of books filled with lessons on topics you are personally interested in,
- Have a gallery of 75 images of yourself, which will serve as permanent evidence of what physical changes you can achieve in yourself through consistency.
Cons:
There are a couple of potential downsides to the 75 Hard Challenge that are worth keeping in mind before you get started. It is an inflexible program, so some experts have warned that it doesn’t teach how to get started again if you slip up at any point, which is a challenge many of us will face while attempting the 75 Hard Challenge. It’s also virtually impossible for anyone who travels internationally, frequently.
Additionally, the 75 Hard Challenge doesn’t offer any specific guidance about what a consistent diet might look like (apart from avoiding alcohol), or what kind of workouts are sustainable to complete twice a day for 45 minutes. If you’re unsure what a diet or workout regime might look like, it’s worth consulting a dietician and a personal trainer for professionally qualified advice before starting the 75 Hard Challenge.
Pros:
One of the best things about doing the 75 Hard Challenge is that it shouldn’t cost you much at all. You don’t need to join a specific gym to participate and you don’t need to pay for home-delivery meal kits to get involved — there are no specific financial barriers to entry.
“Most people self-sabotage themselves without even knowing it every single day of their lives,” says Frisella. “It’s with the language they use when they approach an obstacle.
“When they approach an obstacle or they approach something hard, they tell themselves a story as if being brave enough to take on the challenge is some sort of win. This [challenge] is to reprogram your level of discipline so that later, not just now, but later at any point in time in the future when you need discipline you can make that decision.”
So if you’re keen to make a change in 2024 and you’re unsure of where to start, the 75 Hard Challenge is ideal for forming healthy new habits and pushing yourself both mentally and physically. If you’re keen to learn more about the 75 Hard Challenge from the source, check out Andy Frisella’s site below.
Feature via andyfrisella.com.
