Human Performance
Human performance, adaptation, and survival fascinates me.
I am always inquiring about the extremes and the “what if’s”. “What do you need to eat to be healthy?” is one question, but what if we took it to the other extreme? What if we say, “I know what a healthy diet is, but how much of an unhealthy diet can a person adapt to?”
What if there was a famine and all the “healthy” fresh food was non-existent? What measures can you take to make your situation such that you can be a strong survivor on potato chips? What about training? Everyone stresses the optimal training volume, frequency, and intensity. They ride the line between undertraining and overtraining.
Well, what I like to ask is, given a survival situation, how much can the body adapt to? How much “training” and “exercise” can you handle? What if we take it to the other extreme? For the person who simply cannot make many lifestyle modifications? What kind of “bare-bones” training regimen will still produce the favored adaptations? How little exercise can they “get away with” and still have peak performance given a life or death situation. How much food do you need to eat to gain muscle? How little food can you get away with and gain muscle? How big can you grow your muscle?
But then take that to the opposite extreme…how can one structure their regimen so they have elite level strength and not gain an ounce of muscle? What exercise equipment produces the best results? What if you had none of that…how can you get the same results?
All of these questions get at some of health’s biggest mysteries and revolve around the concept of survivability. If you can do everything science has to offer to be healthy, strong, muscular etc. what is it? Then strip that down, given a survival situation...how can you still perform at your best with none of that healthy supplies and science? Furthermore, how can you toggle between then two?
The two extremes of human performance fascinates me and holds the key to unlocking great advances in pushing human health as well as providing solutions for those in suboptimal health situations.
