I Exercised Twice a Day for 75 Days — Here’s What Happened

“I really just wanted to shock and challenge my body” — Khloe Kardashian on two-a-day workouts
Fitness and I have always been casual acquaintances. I’ve dabbled in the weights section, I’ve had whirlwind romances with running and spin classes, I’ve tried virtually every sport that doesn't involve a bat, club or racquet (I’m woefully uncoordinated). I flirted with fitness, but I never truly committed to it.
Before this challenge, I could run a solid 5k and hold my own in high-intensity interval training (HIIT) but I don’t think I had ever managed a week of consecutive once-per-day workouts. Excluding my regular 45 minute walks to and from work (a distant memory while working from home), I could count on one hand the number of times I’d ever worked out twice in one day.
The Mayo Clinic tells us what we already know — that regular exercise helps us control weight, combat health conditions and diseases and improve our mood, sleep and sex.
However, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, most of us are not getting enough of it: over 80% of adults don’t meet the recommended guidelines for aerobic or muscle-strengthening activities.
I didn’t just work out twice a day
As the first COVID-19 lockdown measures took effect across the UK, I decided I needed a challenge. I decided to commit to exercising twice a day.
I love an intense exercise challenge; I once ran a half-marathon with no training and it truly changed my life. So when I heard about #75Hard, I couldn't resist.
#75Hard is a challenge set by motivational-speaker Andy Frisella which has become famous — or notorious, depending on who you ask — on TikTok. The challenge is not without its controversy.
I went into more detail about my experience of #75Hard, why I did it and the controversy surrounding it in this article.
What is #75HARD and Should You Try it?
I completed the TikTok-famous fitness challenge and here is my honest opinion about it
medium.com
The challenge is a mental and physical endurance test. Every day, for 75 consecutive days, participants are required to:
Follow a diet (any diet) with no cheating — in my case, this meant quitting sugar;
Not drink any alcohol;
Work out twice for at least 45 minutes each time;
Read 10 pages of a non-fiction book;
Drink a gallon (roughly four litres) of water per day; and
Take a progress photo.
I was determined.
As a result of #75Hard, for 75 days straight between 21st June and 3rd September of 2020, I worked out twice a day. Every. Single. Day.
It was tough
But I was excited. I had ambitious plans, a wonderful support network and the timing meant a lot of the fun stuff I’d rather be doing was off-limits anyway in the UK (annoying though this was, it reduced the temptation to give up).
In the mornings I went on runs of increasing length, going from a slow 3km on day 1, where I walked for the remainder of the 45 minutes, to up to 16km a day on the weekends, by around day 30.
In the evenings, I would alternate between pilates and other bodyweight exercises and long stretching sessions where I would just get warmed up and then stretch out my muscles.
With gyms across England shut for much of the duration, I had no access to equipment. Yet I found my pilates and calisthenics workouts (usually led by YouTube videos) felt more productive than some of the equipment-based gym workouts I had tried in the past. There was no waiting for equipment or getting things set up, it was simple and consistently challenging.
Though it was, in my competitive mind, the laziest of the workouts (and I went back and forth over whether I should ‘count’ it as a workout for the challenge), the stretching was one of the best parts of the experience. I have always diligently stretched after workouts (particularly long cardio sessions), but I had never taken the time before to essentially just stretch, because, frankly, I hated it.
I hated the feeling of stretching. But the more I stretched, the better it felt, and I saw incredible progress.
This article, published in Physical Therapy (PJT) suggests that “studies that evaluated the biomechanical effect of stretching showed that muscle length does increase during stretch application due to the viscoelastic properties of muscle. … Most of these studies suggest that increases in muscle extensibility observed after a single stretching session and after short-term (3- to 8-week) stretching programs are due to modified sensation.”
Similarly, a randomised control trial published in Clinical Biomechanics studied the impact of stretching interventions on participants.
The study found that “[an] increased range of motion could not be explained by the structural changes in the muscle-tendon unit, and was likely due to increased stretch tolerance possibly due to adaptations of nociceptive nerve endings.”
In essence, it has been suggested that stretching, instead of actually changing (e.g. lengthening) your muscles themselves as previously thought, in fact, improves flexibility by increasing the stretch tolerance of your central nervous system mechanism.
Meaning, the more you stretch, the less uncomfortable it feels. Towards the end, I was unexpectedly enjoying it.
You have to make compromises, even as you keep pushing yourself
I thrive on a challenge, and my anxiety loved the sense of control in my new, consistent routine.
As I gradually got faster, stronger and more flexible, the challenge made me feel invincible.
However, I remained human.
By around day 40 the end was in sight, and the workouts, along with the other elements of the challenge, had become habitual. I was driven by a goal to find purpose amid the increasing uncertainty and stress surrounding me.
But being human, and working out twice per day, it's incredibly difficult to ensure your body gets adequate time (and energy) to recover.
Whether due to exhaustion or injury, try as I might, I found that I simply couldn’t give every workout 110%, like I did when I exercised less frequently.
As Michael Easter, contributing Editor at Men’s Health Magazine writes, “When subjected to higher training volumes, your body can adapt, but it needs time to do so, and there is a tipping point. If you’re putting in so much work that you can’t recover from your sessions, you’ll become overtrained, and you won’t see progress.”
One of the reasons I kept my workouts so varied throughout the challenge was to try and avoid overtraining myself, but it wasn’t enough.
If done right, easing into two-a-day workouts can be entirely safe and actually decrease your risk of injury.
Research published by the British Journal of Sports Medicine discusses a ‘Training-Injury Prevention Paradox’; training-related injuries are frequently due to excessive and rapid increases in work performed, but “athletes accustomed to high training loads have fewer injuries than athletes training at lower workloads.
… The appropriately graded prescription of high training loads should improve … fitness, which in turn may protect against injury”
However, I was underprepared for the challenge. I didn’t ease it to it and as such, unfortunately, somewhere between days 40 and 50, I started experiencing knee pain as I ran.
Despite all my best efforts to fix it (stretching more, focussing on my form…), it became too much to ignore. I had to give the running a rest.
I switched my runs for hour-long walks and more strength training in the mornings, and let me tell you, the walks were boring, but they did allow my knees to slowly recover.
Sacrificing my morning runs also allowed the giant blisters on my feet to finally begin healing. Despite new, professionally fitted running shoes, with the sheer amount of running I had suddenly been doing, my poor, unprepared feet had been battered by this experience.
Nevertheless, with this compromise, I was determined not to make the challenge easier for myself. The lighter cardio regime meant I was able to hyper-focus on bodyweight strength training, and I felt I got more out of these sessions as I regained the energy to put 110% into them.
I figured if it gets easier you’re doing it wrong. There’s no point committing the time if you don’t also commit the effort.
What kept me engaged throughout #75Hard was that it is fundamentally about showing up and pushing yourself, every single day. And as much as I didn’t really want to do that some days, the deeper in I got, the more determined I was not to give up. It built not just muscle and physical endurance but also my confidence, and it forced me out of my head when I really needed that.
I was surprised by some of the effects it had
I didn’t expect the impact the challenge and its intense workout regime had on my anxiety. I wad also surprised by its effect on my general energy levels and attention span.
In regards to my mental health, at the start of the challenge, my anxiety was fairly high. This was most likely attributable to the catastrophic global pandemic, but perhaps also linked to my sugar withdrawals. However, as the challenge progressed, the regular exercise seemed to help calm it — especially at night. Somewhere within the span of 75 days, I went from laying awake every night with swirling thoughts of my deepest fears to being out cold as soon as I laid down my head.
Charlene Gamaldo, M.D. , medical director of Johns Hopkins Center for Sleep at Howard County General Hospital quotes in this article that “we have solid evidence that exercise does, in fact, help you fall asleep more quickly and improves sleep quality.” However, she goes on to explain that how it improves sleep remains unclear; “we may never be able to pinpoint the mechanism that explains how the two are related.”
The increased stretching I was doing may have also contributed to my overall sense of increased relaxation.
Emma Davies, a writer for BBC Science Focus Magazine explains, “Blood flow to the muscles increases after a long stretch. Muscles are controlled by the nervous system, which has two main components: ‘sympathetic’ (fight or flight) and ‘parasympathetic’ (rest and digest).
Static stretching increases activity in the parasympathetic nervous system, promoting relaxation. Although the heart rate may rise during a stretch, it tends to decrease after.”
Though I was exhausted at night, my general energy levels between workouts seemed higher than usual. Everyday Health explains how the endorphins released by exercising so regularly were raising my energy levels.
My memory and focus also seemed to be significantly improved throughout the duration of the challenge.
This mirrored the effects seen in a study published in Oxidative Medicine and Cellular Longevity, where 24 weeks of moderate aerobic exercise improved cognitive function, including concentration. A study published in the journal Perceptual and Motor Skills further found that more high-intensity training also improved brain function in regards to attention and short-term memory tasks.
Should you work out twice a day?
Andy Frisella is not a certified personal trainer, dietitian, or licensed clinical therapist.
Ultimately, I would recommend trying a challenge like this if you’re looking to level up your fitness… but I’d do so with a few caveats.
I felt unstoppable, completing #75Hard. I felt accomplished. The competitive part of me loved the intensity, and the challenge of it all gave me a sense of purpose I had been desperately searching for.
However, I got injured because I didn’t adequately ease myself into it. If you’re looking to try two-a-day workouts over a prolonged period, follow the science and build up to it.
With that caveat, yes, I would do #75Hard