Hi Reader,
I want to share something I mentioned in this week's podcast that I haven't talked about publicly very much.
A few weeks ago I went back and looked at an interval session I did in 2011. Five times three minutes at 330 watts. When I did the same session recently I was holding 280 watts. Fifty watts lower. As a percentage that's somewhere between 15 and 20% of what I was producing at my best.
My first reaction was disappointment. I'm not going to pretend otherwise.
And then I got a dose of reality.
I'm 62. I hadn't done that specific session in years. I've spent more time riding hills than doing structured intervals. And when I looked honestly at what I'm still capable of - the swimming I'm still doing three times a week, the weights that keep going up, the riding I'm doing with a group of people in their 50s, 60s and 70s who are all still showing up - the picture looked very different.
Beth said something in our conversation that I keep coming back to. There's a difference between someone who ages well and someone who just ages by default. Most of us assume the people who seem to age well are just lucky - good genes, good circumstances. In reality most of them are making deliberate choices, consistently, over a long period of time.
That's the physical pension idea in its simplest form. Every good decision you make about how you sleep, how you move, how you eat, how you recover is a deposit. Every poor decision is a withdrawal. And just like the financial version, the pension looks very different depending on whether you've been making regular deposits for years or whether you've been spending everything you earned and hoping it would sort itself out.
The good news is it's never too late to start. The 105-year-old French cyclist who improved his aerobic capacity at 102 is proof enough of that. But the earlier you start making consistent deposits, the better that pension looks when you really need to draw on it.
This week I want you doing one simple thing. Look at your training honestly - not optimistically - and ask which pillar of your physical pension needs the most attention right now. Sleep, strength, mobility, nutrition, recovery. Pick the one with the biggest gap and make one deliberate deposit this week.
Not a heroic effort. One deposit. Consistently made is worth far more than occasionally made perfectly.
Train smart,
Wardy
P.S. SWAT members are getting access to a series of winter training videos this month that cover exactly the kind of practical deposit-making we've been discussing. If that sounds like the kind of support you've been looking for, New members join at £65 a month, no minimum term. Find out more https://www.simonward.co.uk/swat-inner-circle
P.P.S. Beth and I go deep on the full physical pension concept in this week's episode - the deposits, the withdrawals, the compounding effect of good decisions made consistently over years. Worth your time.
Listen here: The Physical Pension: The Investment You Cannot Afford to Miss
Read the full article here: The Physical Pension: Why the Decisions You Make Now Determine the Life You Get to Live Later
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Simon Ward
Performance coach for endurance athletes over 50
Helping you train smarter, race stronger, and stay in the sport for the long haul.
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