Subtraction Over Addition

How many times have you been told to slow down?

How many times has someone told you to "slow down a little and take it easy"?

And how many times have you seen red?

But instead of going full Will Smith at the Oscars, you just nod your head, smile and mutter back "of course."

Actually, maybe it stings and you turn full 1990s John Grisham novel defence attorney, and state your case in a wonderful monologue of how you are doing things differently this time.

The glove clearly does not fit and the people who know you best are, quite frankly, delusional.

Or, like my wife whenever she says exactly what I do not want to hear, they have a point.

All gas pedal, very little brake

Let me make mine quick and sharp today.

Because as my new coaching client Lee has said to me every week for the past 3 weeks whenever I have asked if he wants the real feedback, "That's why I'm here."

It stings, because you know it is true.

You are all gas pedal and very little brake. At least until your body forces you to emergency stop.

Maybe that currently looks like weekends where you are unable to muster the energy to be present with loved ones (see Burnt Ends).

Or maybe at some point in the future it will look like another episode of burnout, where mind and body are suffering from the big push to get that promotion, build that business, show up for everyone or run that marathon. Or even all four at once (you know who you are).

I speak from experience

I speak from experience.

10 years ago I had to build a coaching business. I burned out.

8 years ago I spent 6 months being a coach on a British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) documentary. I burned out.

7 years ago, I travelled the world with ASICS. My ASICS designation was Former ASICS Global Ambassador. I burned out.

6 years ago. COVID. I burned out. Twice.

I just went back 10 years. Could have gone further, but we would be here all day.

You wonder why I now specialise in energy management for runners. It is because I have a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in it.

And here is one of the most important lessons I have learned whenever I have felt like I am falling behind with either work or life.

"Subtraction, Over Addition."

Simon, all in or nothing

Let's take Simon, whom I have been coaching for 2 years.

Simon is a Managing Director (MD) at a Bank. Hours are punchy, responsibility to get it all right is high and stress is as bad as I have seen it get.

Running for Simon is his pressure valve, but for the few years leading up to working with me, that valve kept getting stuck every time he tried opening it to relieve some of the stress.

The result was sporadic training. Nothing for months, a few weeks of intense training activity, then a couple more weeks of the odd run and then back to nothing.

All in or nothing at all.

Simon is happy for me to share that he is the same at work. He is either all in, or complete collapse. Or should I say he was, as we have now spent a couple of years learning to tap the brakes when needed, while also having his foot on the accelerator.

The unnatural state

But before we learned that, we had to lean into a very unnatural state for Simon, and that was doing less.

You see, Simon built a career on showing up and doing more whenever it was asked of him. More hours, more meetings, more clients, more lunches at the desk, more working on the weekends.

The same with his training. More runs, more speed, more miles, more effort, more discipline.

And for a while "the more approach" worked, until it did not.

Age, marriage, mortgage, kids, promotions, team size, cost of living, life. These things do not happen in a vacuum away from training.

They are the invisible load of life that must be accounted for when approaching training.

How Simon trained 5 years ago, even 6 months ago, is a different world to the context of his life now.

Therefore Simon cannot just add in 4 or 5 runs a week. Even 3 at times has been too much for his body to recover from.

What we subtracted

• We subtracted 2 runs from 4.
• We subtracted pace from 1 of those runs and made it a brisk walk with a weighted vest.
• We subtracted weights (and training to failure) from the gym and made his programme bodyweight.
• We subtracted 1 gym session from 2 and changed his warm-up to cover the deficit.

Subtraction is not doing nothing

Going back to my original point.

Yes, Simon needed to learn to "take it easy," but there was no way that meant just doing less in the sense of nothing.

That is an unnatural state for someone whose mind is constantly active.

I needed to meet Simon where he is at, not where I put pressure on him to be.

Subtraction over addition is not about doing nothing. It is about tweaking parameters such as pace, mileage, effort, and load.

Take the run I switched out for a walk with a weighted vest. Simon loves this workout, and even though we are back up to 4 runs a week, he often switches out 1 of his runs during stressful weeks for this.

Why? Because he knows he is getting a workout that builds strength and aerobic capacity without a huge cost to his energy the next day.

Baseline first, then build

Training is only effective if the parameters you set are sustainable over the long term with recovery being optimised wherever possible.

To establish what the right dosage of training is, you have to first establish a baseline of what the "minimum effective dose" is.

Once you understand this, you can add new training stimulus back in. One thing at a time. Slowly.

Listen to your loved one

While you are learning, the signal you are pushing too hard often comes from someone you love saying it out loud before you do. They see you. They have your best interests at heart. Trust that.

When it happens, step over the uncomfortable emotion it triggers, and see it as data to reflect on.

If you are willing to listen to your Whoop, why not your loved one?

Coach.

Work is Load // Train Accordingly