Wildfitness is a fitness holiday company with the aspiration to help people eat, move and live in harmony with nature. Find practical tips in our Wild Eating, Wild Moving & Wild Living sections, or go to our Wonderations category for more philosophical musings on nature, the wild, our health, the role of science, the meaning of life etc! Enjoy and please let us know what you think.
Please NO NO NO not another year gone by… well I’m afraid it has – but here’s a thought .. it is a new year, time for a resolution, a goal, something to make 2012 stand out against other years – so what’s it gonna be – lose weight, get fit, stop drinking , stop smoking (again), save money or get the finances into order. Hmmm they sound very much like the resolutions on 2011, 2010, 2009, 2008 …
I’m writing this on the 9th January – research has shown that today is the day most people break – 9 days of jogging, 9 days of no alcohol, 9 days of diet – it’s enough, the human mind just hates doing the things it hates. One of the main reasons we end up at best indifferent or worst hating an activity, is boredom – we get bored. The gyms and conventional fitness industry loves this – it’s their bread and butter – everyone signing up to the gym on a year contract (3-6 month cancellation clause) and all they have to do is brace themselves for an oversubscribed 9 days… from then on the gym with it’s 3000 members, with a capacity for 300, breezes through the rest of the year without a worry and the direct debits keep rolling in.
So how do we get past today, the 9th day… how do we continue our resolution into February, March, April into 2013, 2014. Well the first task is not to make our resolution a punishment – many resolutions are born out of guilt and there is no better time to feel guilty than after the festive season – ate excessively, drank excessively, spent way too much money and maybe even stepped over the line with a colleague at the office Xmas party.
We use punishment as a remedy for guilt and have done for centuries not only in legal but also religious and social systems and particularly in our personal lives.
The human mind and body are really not partial to punishment but respond well to the converse learning strategy of reward and reinforcement. So not surprisingly, day 9 into our punishment regime, we really have to dig deep to override our aversion to the tasks we have set ourselves.
One of the best antidotes for boredom is to learn something new … a skill, a challenge, something we thought we could never do – but most importantly it has to be fun. If it’s a physical skill of any kind, there will be fitness and wellbeing carryover. Set a challenge rather than a resolution – if you want a resolution make it a reward based one. How about you stop drinking in January but at the same time you learn to juggle – now if you manage two cycles of juggling with three balls, that has to be worth a glass of wine at dinner.
If you want to get fit, strong, elastic, confident, courageous and exuberant , all natural qualities of the human animal, try a movement challenge, slacklining, balance work, precision jumping, vaulting , tree climbing– there are a whole host of new skills you can master and get super fit at the same time.
Whatever you can do, or dream you can do – BEGIN IT Boldness has genius, power and magic in it – Goethe
If you think you have missed the boat for New Years challenges because it’s now mid January, you are just kidding yourself – start now !
Here are some ideas just to kick off 2012 –
Slacklining – this is a sport/activity growing and whirlwind speed. Attach a webbing strap (like a truck tie-down) between 2 trees about 2 feet off the ground and then balance or walk along it. Amazing for balance, muscle tone, strength, neuromuscular conditioning, proprioceptive conditioning and of course the exhilaration or taking a challenge and nailing it !!
Parkour/Freerunning moves
Like with all new skills – slow, small incremental improvements, not only build the skill but also develop confidence – a vital ingredient of freerunning.
Vaulting - Leaping an object but using your hands for support or to spring off.
Jumping – Jumps can be on and off objects of different heights or precision jumping which is more of a horizontal ‘long jump’ but landing with precision and control. Try 20 minutes of jumping and let me know how your abs feel the next day – you might think your legs are going to suffer but trust me – you’ll be surprised but what muscles are telling you they’ve been working.
Balancing – Balance on anything or nothing – try standing on one leg with your eyes closed – walk along a log or branch near the ground – get a slackline.
Climbing – Climb on anything (without getting arrested) – walls, scaffolding, fences but the best natural climbing objects are obviously trees – they are great to grip, they have a range of branch diameters and grips plus they will always give you energy – man-made objects take energy.
Wall jumps -Jumping onto or off walls or running up and along walls.
Juggling – (actually I learnt to juggle whilst I was writing this article) – get onto the internet, there are some great sites for learning this skill. Great for hand-eye coordination, relaxation and fun.
Frisbee – there are many ways to throw a Frisbee but most take practice and concentration – once you’ve mastered a few, find an ultimate Frisbee game in your local area – amazing exercise throughout the year, very social – muddy winter games are often the most fun.
Try a new conventional sport
Squash – fast, elastic, skilful and social
Tennis – fast, elastic, skilful and social
Football – fast, elastic, skilful and social
Rugby/Touch Rugby – fast, elastic, skilful and social
Conventional sports normally have the advantage of having plenty of teams or opportunities to join in – the disadvantage is if you are just starting out it’s harder to find people of your own standard – don’t give up – many clubs have a novice or newbees teams.
Finally make sure you are having fun – play has been proven to have extraordinary benefits for both our physical and mental health – amazingly play produces BDNF (brain derived neurotrophic factor) which promotes brain cell growth and connections – play makes you clever. One of the definitions of play is that it’s purposeless – it doesn’t help acquiring wealth, assets or food, its voluntary and provides a continuation desire – we want to keep playing.
What is amazing is that some of the last few years resolutions come to fruition without you even realizing – lose weight, get fitter and leaner, be more social, make more time for yourself and save money – Eureka !!
Try and do it outside – preferably in nature. As human animals we have an innate attraction and even homesickness for nature. Again science tells us nature and the outdoors has huge benefits for physical and mental health.
And finally, in our gloomy economic times, most of these activities are virtually free – if you want to splash out on a slackline (which I highly recommend) it will cost you less than a month’s membership of a gym and from then on it’s free.
If you need inspiration – click through to the Wildfitness website and come and join on a holiday – we’ll be doing most of the above…
Do it now – 2012 is dying to be the year you keep you resolutions.
I am always doing that which I cannot do, in order that I may learn how to do it. Pablo Picasso
Andalucía adventures, Tara’s stories of setting up the latest Wild new location in Andalucía.
There are times in life, even for a 33 year old who tends to stand on her own two feet, when you need your mummy. And going on a road trip around Spain to find the elusive ideal Wildfitness location, for me, is one. This is because, when I check out a place I am acutely sensitive to ‘Wildness’ – the depth of the silence, the swingability of the trees, the secret spots up rivers, the right-weighted and smooth-factor of rocks lying about etc.
But when it comes to rooms, I say ‘good!’ if I see a light bulb and running water. My mother, however, is a lady of taste and style who likes her creature comforts. She can tell whether a house has an aesthetic structure, whose lines are pleasing, whose paintings speak of real stories and whose colours pick up on the elements of the environment AND whose creature comforts work.
Essential consultant as she was on this trip, she hasn’t left Africa for a while. This is a woman who tries to make microwaves play movies, mistaking them for TVs. She was to meet me at the airport in Spain and she had no mobile phone and only Kenya Shillings. She missed her connecting flight and lost her luggage. Our ancestors were incredible at surviving in their natural environment, but, transport them to Amsterdam today and they would struggle, I now know.
How we found each other I don’t fully understand.
The parameters involved in finding the perfect Wild location are so rubitzian (rubitz – cube like (?)) that I have to say after extensive research, part of me offered the problem up to the gods, hoping that the force would be with us.
We needed to find a place that was short haul from the UK (where most Wild ones reside), hot in March / April, was accessible, but also remote, had a natural body of water nearby, had availability, had owners with whom you could do business, had enough rooms but not too many and had deep authenticity, silence, nature and soul.
After a month on the internet I had a short list of 8 places to see. However, in the end the obvious, and only choice came from a recommendation from a Wild one (Muchos Gracious Nathalie).
We arrived first in this field:
Where the tom-tom told us firmly was our destination, and then immediately ran out of batteries so we had to use the position of the sun and sounds and scents in the air to find our way onwards.
When we did finally arrive at the Cortijo, our first impressions were:
Mature vines, jasmine, hibiscus, orange trees blooming reverently over a historic beautiful Cortijo.
A strong feeling of real authentic Spain, and of being at home. Roaring fires and antique guns (that have probably killed real people) hanging on the walls.
Modern bathrooms, heating and good beds (phew).
That the owner Genareo is the most coolest Spanish aristocratic, twinkly eyed, caring, funny dude ever. He had a dog called Tara, and delighted in telling me to be quiet and stop peeing on the floor before explaining that, of course, he was talking to the canine Tara, not the lady Tara. And when we were cutting a deal over laundry (which on account of regular sweating, Wildfitness includes as part of our offering), he said: ‘You see, some people, they have a lot of laundry, and others’ he made a brief gesture to my pink trousers and only jumper get up that I have worn every day since arriving, ‘others, they don’t have so much’. You need a serious amount of twinkle in the eye to get away with that. Genareo is one of 9 siblings who was brought up in the Cortijo.
If you aren’t sure whether you are, you probably aren’t, in love. We were sure we were in love with the Cortijo, and so we called up Colin in Kenya and told him to join us.
On further investigations we found:
Space and wildness: Positioned in the lap of a huge estate (1250 acres) the private land around the Cortijo has several sweet hills (so perfect – you can just about run up one without stopping).
A large lake that you can walk to through only wilderness and a couple of sunflower fields that is great swimming and allows no motorised things on it.
A mountain (me on the way up).
Me on the way down.
Deep silence within which you can hear the stars twinkle.
Me doing a handstand to the stars
Old, old olive trees to hug that accept you, even if you are wearing the same pink trousers you have worn for 2 weeks.
Arcos: Streets so narrow that all cars were scratched.
A wild wild beach not so far away that you could only get to by boat that was pranced on by Wild antelope and flown over by migratory birds from Africa (Jambo, we said, to the birds we saw). This was also the place where Colin and I discovered that ‘girls can lift too’ click here to see what we mean.
Harvested from the land: raw honey, herbs, organic olive oil, wild asparagus, rabbits, pigeons.
The dream team will be coaches:
Colin Holding, Augusto Vegas, Paul Ranson, Anne-Laure Pelletier and new to the Wild team Paolo Torrao. Netta Pakenham-Walsh (of the Isle of Wight) will be chef.
So, to finish (before I am tempted to tell you the story of how we found, for Colin, an afro):
Colin - with hair
Come and join us in Spain next year. It is a truly magical place and the Wildfitness course there will be unique, fresh and full of passion. For Wild ones coming back, all activities will be new with a few classic sessions that we just can’t not do. Decide whether you want to do the one week boost course or the two week revitalise course. Click here for more details.
The following is taken from a journal our Wild Coach Gareth Roriston was keeping in the bush as he shadowed, then filled in, as Warden for the Galana Wildlife Conservancy which boarders Tsavo East National Park in Kenya. The idea is to inspire you… so you know that, wherever you are, and whatever equipment you have, you can still design a creative wild workout!
Who’s up for a combo?
“….Evans is keen to learn some wrestling techniques, so after I return to camp from a night in the treehouse followed by a dawn game census, I offer to teach him some basics. He learns to arm drag, go behind, body lock and lift.
I then persuade him to join me in a combo. I feel like I need to train as I’ve felt lethargic for the past two days and am visibly bloated after days of eating posho (maize meal), rice and pasta which are by evolution alien to the human digestive tract and by habit particularly alien to me. They have caused my belly to swell. The combo involves 5 round sprint efforts of:
Lift and throw with Bundu-bag over 5 barrel hurdles in turn followed by two footed jump over, after each throw (the “Bundu-Bag” is a Gareth original design – watch this space!)
Throw the bag as far as possible backward overhead
Fast run around inside perimeter of camp boma (enclosure)
Bulgarian swings with bag: 3 per side
10 weighted jumping press ups, alternating hands up and down
Once each round is completed the partner is tagged and we can rest.
Little Evans can’t actually lift the Bundu-bag above his head so compensates by throwing it to the side like a rugby pass and performing halos with a suitable rock rather than the Bundu-bag.
It’s good for morale for these guys who are stuck in the bundu (wild largely uninhabited region) to do something new and it’s a shame Kahindi is at the gate this morning as he is easily the most enthusiastic when it comes to both work and play which do not appear to have a demarcation in his mind.
After we have finished Julius is keen to prove his athleticism by hurdling the barrels in the traditional manner (not two footed). He repeats the feat a few times stating that he is fit for an Mzee (an old person) and he can beat anyone his own age. I get him to video me performing the bag throw and hop portion of the combo for the sake of posterity. I’m knackered after the combo and stumble on the first jump…”
People on traditional diets are the world’s leading healthy populations.
When people depart from their traditional diet, the majority of them get sick: from obesity, heart disease, dental malformation and a whole host of modern chronic diseases.
Why?
There are several hundred documented inconclusive theories postulating different reasons why. Whatever the reason (although we must always remain curious), a blind respect for our food heritage seems to be in order.
Trying to pull out which food is the health giving food amongst the menus of healthy traditional cultures is, perhaps, like trying to find the constituents in a mango that makes this fruit healthy human fodder. (Even if you were to gather all the macronutrients and micronutrients that make up a mango, they would never replace the sustenance we get from it – a fruit that has shared our evolutionary story, an ancient partner in our survival).
Just the traditional Mediterranean diet alone has been responsible for prolific scientific study. Are its healthy effects due to the olive oil? The red wine? The high fat? The fact that the red wine helps metabolize the fat? Or can the Mediterranean people’s health be attributed to their ability to chill out and eat with gusto?
Even if science has not pinned down the beneficial factors in the traditional Mediterranean diet, this diet has, by definition, stood the test of time. The people eating it are alive and well! They were begotten by their healthy ancestors! A Darwinian ‘survival of the most healthy diet’ mechanism is at play.
Sometimes we can figure out the nature of these mechanisms – for example, cultures that have traditionally eaten soy products also have ancient and laborious methods for making soy into digestible stuff called tofu. Without this process there are all sorts of anti-nutrients in soy that make soy and all the modern soy products not the best choice. Other traditional wisdom includes the use of spice and herb combinations that preserve foods or help you to absorb the food. The classic combination of rice and beans helps vegetarians get the amino acids they need, the range of which are not present in either rice or beans on their own.
Michael Pollan (author of one of my favourite books ‘In Defence of Food’) says ‘The specific combinations of foods in a cuisine and the ways they are prepared constitute a deep reservoir of accumulated wisdom about diet and health and place.’
Beware, however, traditional recipes often have key ingredients that are now more refined and processed than they ever used to be. The French baguette, the Kenyan fluffy maize meal and the Mexican white rice are examples of ‘traditional’ foods that are no longer good human grub because they are so much more refined, or messed with in other industrial food processes.
Let’s take inspiration from some classic Christmas combinations and imbue the wisdom of our ancestors!
Chestnuts
Chestnuts are an old Christmas favourite – did you know that they can be dried and milled into flour, which can then be used to prepare breads, cakes, pancakes, pastas (it is the original ingredient for polenta) or used as a thickener for stews, soups and sauces? Chestnuts are a great traditional alternative to the more modern recipes using more refined ingredients.
Glühwein! The traditional beverage offered and drunk at Christmas. It is usually prepared from red wine, heated and spiced with cinnamon sticks, vanilla pods, cloves, citrus and sugar (why not try it with honey).
One very simple recipe is:
Ingredients
1 litre bottle organic red wine
30z/75g honey (to taste)
1 tsp whole cloves
1 tsp ground cinnamon or stick cinnamon
juice of 1 orange and 1 lemon
Preparation method
Pour wine into a saucepan and add remaining ingredients (you can put whole spices in muslin).
Heat until nearly boiling and strain (if necessary) into a warm bowl.
Serve warm.
Meatballs!
Wonderful traditional Christmassy food! Kofta is a Middle Eastern and South Asian meatball or dumpling. The word kofta is derived from Persian kūfta: In Persian, کوفتن (Kuftan) means “to beat” or “to grind” or meatball.[4] In the simplest form, koftas consist of balls of minced or ground meat – usually beef or lamb – mixed with spices and/or onions
Ingredients (makes approx 20 meatballs)
900g of ground chicken (you can also use ground turkey or lamb)
2 Garlic cloves, finely minced
1/2 inch piece of fresh ginger, peeled and finely minced
1 medium onion, finely chopped
2 teaspoons of ground cumin
1 teaspoon of ground coriander
2 teaspoon garam masala
1 teaspoon of red chilli powder
1 teaspoon crushed red chilli flakes
1/2 Lime for lime juice
salt and pepper to taste
1 large egg, beaten
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
freshly chopped cilantro leaves
Preparation method
Using a large mixing bowl combine all the ingredients and store in the fridge for at least an hour but longer if you have the time. Then form 20 balls, which are then slightly flattened (making a small round even shaped disc).
Using a large frying pan on a high heat, add 2 tablespoons of oil, once the oil is hot add the Kofta balls making sure not to overcrowd the pan – if your pan is too small fry the mix in batches. After 3 minutes flip them over and reduce the heat to medium. They should have a lovely golden brown colour. After another 2 minutes cover the pan for a further 2 to 3 minutes so they will cook all the way through. Drain and serve with a spice tomato sauce or your favourite Indian chutney.
As natural approaches to fitness and evolutionary science gain momentum in the mainstream consciousness, a feast of wonderful new books abound. Being an avid reader (this is Tara writing), and someone who can be deeply inspired by the written word, it is a pleasure to present some reviews of books that have influenced the Wildfitness philosophy.
‘In Defence of Food’ By Michael Pollan
Pollan distils the world of nutrition into clear insights that seem obvious, only after we have read them. It is also a pleasurable and engaging read, which ultimately makes you feel uplifted – I thought ‘I get it! And it’s beautiful!’ at the end. How and what we should eat as humans on the earth.
MP is my hero author. He is investigative journalism at its best. When we write the Wildfitness book, I’d like to write it just like Mike. He is, I think, actually after the truth, the heart of the matter. He talks from no fixed stand point – just presents illuminating facts and insights and has the reader make their own conclusion. Mike lets the big mysteries of life remain, while still grappling with them enough to deepen our understanding.
The main reason you should read this book, oh layman, is because it talks directly to your common sense, personal experience and that ancient wisdom that somehow lives in us all. It’s almost embarrassing for nutritionists and health professionals who often get caught up in misleading science instead of seeing the real patterns of reality. Pollan uses science in a way that clarifies our perception of the way things are, instead of using it to back up a theory or argument. He presents the messy, complex, paradoxical world as it is.
A core text for Wildfitness, this book is almost all you need to read to understand the key issues around food, real food.
Pollan has gone on to write a shorter distillation of this book and his other book ‘An Omnivore’s Dilemma’, creating a short ‘rule book’ called ‘Food Rules’. My favourite rule is: ‘Be the kind of person who takes supplements, then skip the supplements’.
To read more about this book, purchase it or see other books recommended by the Wildfitness team CLICK HERE
‘The Hungry Years’ by William Leith
This radically honest account of a compulsive eater’s (food addict) experiences is both amusing but also deeply insightful. Leith’s sharply analytical and truth-seeking mind goes on a roller coaster through the craziness of all sorts of different diets and therapies to understand and alleviate his obsession with food, before glimpsing the ‘real’ problem. Although he doesn’t conclude with any instructions, he more appropriately offers up a graphic and totally unedited perspective on the world of fitness and diets that will be revelatory to anyone enmeshed in the oppression of dieting and dutiful working out. The rarity of the male perspective and honesty about this subject is startling and makes you question yourself deeply. A very worthwhile read for anyone who struggles with self-image or food addiction.
To read more about this book, purchase it or see other books recommended by the Wildfitness team CLICK HERE
(Paul Ranson is a Wildfitness Coach and was on location in Kenya from July – October 2011. Here he gives us his top tips for wild health and some practical exercises to try too!)
PHYSICAL FUN & VARIETY
Variety is most definitely the spice of life and is hugely important to achieving wild health. Variety of movement, variety of environments and variety of foods help us to achieve a state of optimal balance in our lives both physically and mentally. We need variety to keep things fun and stimulating. I strongly believe that enjoyment is the key to sustainable health and fitness. For the majority of us if we are not having fun or enjoying our time that we dedicate to movement then the likelihood is that we will see it as a chore and ultimately give up. I wouldn’t blame you either, movement without fun is just another job and can be just as stressful, which is the last thing our hectic lives need. What we need is physical fun that challenges our bodies and involves multi plane movement that stimulates our nervous system and thus also our minds. Not everyone will be attracted to the same mode of physical fun but these highlighted themes mentioned need to be adhered to and it will definitely help if you are doing this in a tribe.
The following games would tick all the boxes, but we really need to throw ourselves into them with good vigour, spirit and exuberance.
- Tag (running, crawling, hoping, jumping, animalistic)
- Ultimate Frisbee (or with a ball)
- Tree hanging off ground touch
- Twister
- Royal rumble style sumo wrestling (friendly)
Also the more formal sports such as tennis, basketball and football are great if you enjoy playing them and you can do so with a smile on your face (we don’t want you stressing out for serving a double fault or not winning)!
Most movement prescribed to us in mainstream gyms is not natural human movement and far too sterile to bring much joy to our bodies or minds. Having physical fun and moving the body subconsciously is totally specific to humans and totally good for us. Think about it, 30 minutes on a treadmill when compared to 30 minutes of physical play, whether it’s football, stuck in the mud, volleyball or tennis, feels like a jail sentence. Don’t get me wrong, I love running, but please give me variation of environment and terrain before I go insane!
Mainstream/formal exercise tends to be single-plane but the body moves in 3 dimensions; Sagital, frontal and transverse (forward, side, rotation) and can do all at once and will love it and thank you for it. Moving in a single-plane is body deprivation, it’s like having a smart phone but only using it as a phone, ignoring all of it’s other functions. Unlike the smart phone if we ignore our bodies “other functions” then it can be costly to our health and vitality.
The body and mind find new movements highly stimulating. “Fresh moves” as I like to call them send nutritiously fresh feedback to your brain, it’s a win win combination. Admittedly the fresh move may not feel quite right initially but it’s like eating something with an unfamiliar taste and texture for the 1st time, you’re not sure about it but you are curious, so you try it again and then more often than not you like it. If not then spit it out and try another movement.
“Fresh Moves” – Try It!
Try throwing while balancing on one leg
For an easy intro to fresh movement, try adapting an old favourite such as squats. Here are a few examples of how to have fun and be creative with ye old faithful the squat.
- Go wide off stance, right foot forward, left foot back.
- Go with arms or one arm facing into the sky
- Go with a torso rotation as you go up, down or both!
- Go with a left hand reach to your right foot as you go down.
- Go with a right hand reach to your left foot as you go down.
- Do the same as the latter 3 but on one leg
I think you probably get the idea now! Let these fresh movements flow as much as possible, try and lose your inhibitions – your body needs variety to be truly wild. As Frank Forencich states “Don’t be afraid to look foolish: strange new movements are the foundation of creative physicality and athleticism.”
Variety of Movement – Try It!
When it comes to movement we need to be generalists to achieve wild health. As previously mentioned the body has many functions and can move in a variety of different ways. This functional variety is as a consequence of what we needed to survive and thrive as hunter gatherers. Incorporating as many as you can of the 12 natural movement patterns into your sessions and everyday life is key.
There are unlimited variations that we could play with here but below is an example of how to incorporate different movement patterns into a session.
Ball throwing with sprints and crawls (vary ball size/weight from tennis ball to a heavy medicine ball)
Throw a ball then race after it...
With a friend or in a group start by playing catch with a small ball, but throwing it in different places so they have to reach and stretch. Do the same but this time balancing on one leg, progressively make it more difficult, i.e. Throw it lower, wider and higher. Do the same on both sides.
Warmed up, now with the same ball throw it as far as you can, as soon as it hits the floor sprint as fast as you can to the ball grab it, and then return with a hunter gatherer trot to where you started. Repeat this 5 times. This can be done in a group with multiple balls as described or with a single ball and a heckling (playful challenges to each other, such as a pull back, little push, block, lean etc) race to the ball!
Next grab the heavier medicine ball, squatting down to lift it with good form. Adopt a shot put stance, load your weight onto your back leg then explode your weight onto the front leg simultaneously throwing the ball as far as you can. Short sprint to the ball, repeat the above but this time rather than sprinting, crawl (hands and feet) to the ball, keeping yourself as low as possible as if you were hiding from predators in East Africa! Repeat this combination 5 times, rest, then if you have the time another 5. Again this can be done individually or in a group, just take turns throwing, or even throw to your friend and then crawl to where they were standing.
Or try throwing a ball and crawling to get it!
You will have covered running, walking, balancing, crawling, throwing and lifting all in one time efficient but enjoyably intense session. Excellent I think you will agree!
The combinations and possibilities are endless, your imagination is your only limitation. Remember the essentials, most importantly it needs to be fun, it also should challenge your body, be multi-directional and you should try to incorporate a variety of the 12 movement patterns, which are specific to our species, into your sessions. If you run out of ideas ask or copy some kids who are experts in the field of play and fun.
(Tara Wood, founder of Wildfitness, recently attended a press weekend for the new 2012 Wildfitness location on the Isle of Wight. The 3 day Energizer course on the Isle of Wight is the brainchild of Netta and Ro Pakenham-Walsh, who grew up as “Islanders”. Here is Tara’s story…)
As always before attending a Wildfitness course I develop strange symptoms of unwellness. A niggling hip that made me feel perhaps I should not run, and a sore throat that was perhaps the sign of imminent flu. However, as usual I also felt propelled into the course by the forces that every Wildfitness guest sets in motion when they commit: I had bought my tickets and a whole bunch of people were expecting to be there on fine form. And crying off because of a dippy hip and sore throat is decidedly UNWILD, and something I would tell any perspective Wild-One to ‘get resilient’ about.
There was also the strange apprehension that went with the fact that this was the first time I have trusted ‘other people’ to set up and run a Wildfitness location without the vital input of my breath down their neck. Netta and Ro, (the Pakenham-Walsh or PW sisters) are one of those sister partnerships so fuelled by a sisterly respect, love and familiarity that they act as one powerful unit, one unit with formidable horse power. So not only did their combined skills and energy surpass mine, but they are also truly WILD. I fancy myself as a natural born Wild-One, raised in Africa, but actually the facts of my upbringing were pretty full of civilised colonial privileges like Earl Grey tea served afternoonly on our veranda. The PW sisters however have real-life barefoot parents. Seriously Mr. PW just dropped me off at the I of W ferry at 4am in bare-feet. The PW mum grows all her own food in the garden and Mr. and Mrs. PW on their wedding anniversary sleep out under the stars overlooking the English channel on a bed of heather (this is anniversary look-out, one of the many special Wild places that I discovered through the PW sisters. Another one is ‘boyfriend hill’ but that is a story they must tell you themselves…).
Along with this dynamic sisterhood, clearly children of nature, were Wild coaches Colin and Anne-Laure. Colin, a long-term Wild coach, has that calm confidence that comes from knowing that he is dispelling something very groovy and he knows exactly how to do it. And Anne-Laure, has only been with Wildfitness for a few months, but truly understands us. Anne-Laure will swim in anything. Since as long as she can remember her drug of choice has been the same as ours (the old sweats at WF) – she gets that high that we fellow junkies recognise in each other, the high of being active outside and ravished by nature.
But even surrounded by this uber-capable, Wild-to–their-bones team, I still get that strange haunting that no-one else could possibly run a Wildfitness course the way I could, and the way I could is of course the only way that will do. So perturbed, I arrive at the Southampton Isle of Wight ferry and run into the group of journalists that are coming to christen the first Wild Weekend, and behold the whole cross-section of apprehensions that they hold. There is a blogger whose self-made brand is built entirely on her ‘sass’ and online omnipotence. I can tell why she has such a following because everything she says is engaging. But one of the things she said on that initial crossing was ‘I was on a long run the other day in London and came to a stretch of grass, I had to stop and walk because I just didn’t really know how to run across grass’. Oh my god she had NO CLUE what was about to happen to her. Then there was Rachel who had just come back from Abu Dhabi where she had been ferried from one air conditioned inside space to another for two years and had totally lost feeling in her body and wasn’t sure she could remember how to move. Oh my god she had NO CLUE what was about to happen to her.
We arrived and were whisked away to Northcourt, an enchanted, traditional, self-sufficient manor. I mean enchanted literally, because the place is enchanted by a man called John. He and his wife tend their entire garden themselves and in a little talk he gave us, presented with an incredible mix of composed stateliness and passionate outbursts, he said ‘I plant many edible things in my garden in a place that they can truly express themselves, without the interference of fertilising, watering and too much pruning’. John believes that plants have an inherent virility that can be unleashed by being in their proper place in nature – ideas that mirror the Wildfitness philosophy about human bodies so closely that the beauty of the analogy makes me feel a bit sick. I don’t think John will ever know quite how enthusiastic I am about how he goes about tending his garden. And I wonder whether our little crew tasted the reverence that was in all the food we ate at Northcourt, composed of plants that had fully expressed themselves. Although, to Netta’s (PW sister no. 2) huge credit, Nick (a foodie of note) who works for The Times (a well-known British newspaper) said that he thought the weekend would appeal to foodies as much as to the fitness seekers.
Our first morning was an exploration of our senses and perceptions in the jungle depths of John’s garden. Hyper-sensitive to the reactions of the group to something so new and potentially rejectable on account of its total departure from ‘normal fitness’ I slowly relaxed as Colin’s owl-like authenticity and experience guided us slickly through an awakening experience that was stimulating, playful and that let being outside and moving do its magic. Thank god, I thought, it going to be ok without me!
Then the surreal experience unfolded where every time I wrote something on my note-pad under the heading ‘things that could be done better’; it happened. As the thought entered my mind that on the ‘goddess run’ (along a bald ridge that looks out on both sides to the sea, celestially) we needed to make sure that the very fit (and usually male) participants needed to be able to be challenged more than the less-fit, the group split into two interval running groups, the natural front group and back group with a coach each. As I felt a little shiver on the way back from jumping into the sea at Freshwater bay, the PW sisters distributed blankets and hot herby tea. As I wondered whether the Wildfitness chocolate mousse would be explained in all its low-glycaemic, non-dairy, non-gluten, real-food glory; it was. And so it was as the PW sisters provided famous-five-like lashings of care, and Colin and Anne-Laure proceeded to bring alive the rugged beauty of the Isle of Wight with an adrenaline-fuelled, imaginative, physical programme with the perfect balance between intensity, fun, seriousness, skill and unleashment.
Then, day 3 came. Which is a special day. Because suddenly the people around change from being ‘journalists’ into being your tribe, real people. And you change from being slightly self-conscious that you have been wearing the same pair of stripy pink trousers for three days into unabashedly asking Rebecca a thousand questions about her erotic column that she writes for GQ. And Rebecca unabashedly answering them.
And so we all left the womb of Northcourt resplendent with ‘the force’ and cuddly with each other, ready for another stint in the big bad world. Oh and about the sore hip and sore throat. Totally gone. Healed by the flood of hormones released by intense exercise and the natural forces on my body exerted by evolutionary movement.
It is a strange thing, I tell you, when one sees a personal vision made manifest by other people in a way that you could not even have dreamt up yourself. Not to be too melodramatic, but there is a strange inner death in it. A farewell to a part of yourself that has become redundant. Sigh. Oh well, let them go forth, there are still things that my old bones can lend themselves to.
Okay, here at Wildfitness we will always TRY and get outside for a workout. Nothing really beats the thrill of fresh air and the healing vibe of nature – whether that’s the warm breeze and palm trees of Kenya, the herby olive groves of Crete or bracing beach fun on the Isle of Wight. BUT we do appreciate that many people are urban-based and want to keep up their training but also be inside and cosy on a dark winter’s night. What we implore however is that even if you train in a gym – do not train like a gym-brained person! Stay away from those machines that promote fixed, repetitive movement: natural “wild” movement can also be done indoors and is way better for your body and much more engaging.
Anne-Laure (our Wild Coach in residence at Gloves Gym in London) demonstrates below a range of wild movements you can do indoors, with the help of Ben, fellow Gloves coach (and parkour practitioner). Hopefully this will give you some inspiration! At Gloves, Anne-Laure puts together wild indoor workouts that include such wild movements as crawling, jumping, carrying, throwing, lifting, boxing, hanging and more. The idea is to get creative with natural movement, but of course to also train at high intensity!
If you would love some help and further inspiration for your wild indoor workout, and are able to get to London, you can book a session with Anne-Laure at Gloves – either by phone on 020 7624 5850 or email: alp@glovesboxingclub.com
Balancing and Lifting
Climbing and Hanging
Crawling and Lifting
Jumping Skills from height and ground to specific spot
You may have already been put off by the title and that was the exact feeling around the table on the Isle of Wight journalist course when I (Netta) announced that it wasn’t chicken, but in fact rabbit. The disappointment on their faces; after a day of hard training their bodies were longing for this hearty warm stew, but….rabbit?? The delicious smells became too much and soon everyone was tucking in. Once round two kicked in, I relaxed!
It would have been a lot easier to have used chicken (and I wouldn’t have had to endure that awkward silence at the beginning of the meal!) but it’s become so over-used and actually fairly bland when you start experimenting with other meats. I also can’t help feeling that a wild, island-roaming rabbit is going to be better for you than a farmed chicken, however organic and happy that farm may be. The delight on everyone’s face makes it so worthwhile; I think people are shocked when they realise how much they enjoy it.
The reason I chose rabbit initially was because there were so many of them roaming around the garden in Aug/Sept so this was a great way to control that and have a bag of meat for free! I’m afraid that I left the shooting to someone else though.. For this recipe I used young rabbits as they are more tender. Rabbit meat is very lean and you must make sure it doesn’t dry out during cooking. Allow plenty of time for the meat to fall off the bones – it does take time but it is so so worth it if you are patient. This is a recipe that I have adapted from ” The Sporting Wife” by Barbara Hargreaves and is right up there at the top of my favourite recipe list at the moment!
Ingredients:
2 young rabbits
2tbsp curry powder
3tbsp oil
Half tsp ground turmeric
2 garlic cloves crushed
2 chopped green peppers
3 cucumbers
Salt and pepper
1 red pepper chopped
4 onions
1tbsp root ginger
2tbsp currants
1tbsp almond flour
3tbsp coconut milk
Stock – enough to cover the mixture
1tsp lemon juice
Heat the oil and stir in curry powder. Brown the rabbit pieces in hot oil, then add finely chopped onions, ginger, garlic, peppers, turmeric. Add currants and stock to cover and simmer until the meat starts to fall off the bones. Take rabbit pieces out and put on one side after having taken bones off. Cut cucumbers into 1 inch pieces and add to the sauce with lemon juice. Simmer gently until cucumbers are tender. Strain the liquid in a small pan and add the flour combined with coconut milk and cook, stirring until thickened. Pour back into large pan with rabbit pieces and cucumber. Simmer gently for 5 minutes, adding more coconut milk if sauce is too thick.
One of the new tools that we have incorporated into the course over the last year is the ‘boost’. This is the legacy of two of our coaches from last year, Luke and Heidi. The idea is to add a short but totally intense lactic-acid max out at the end of a session for anyone who still has energy left in their tank… so everyone ends a session knowing they’ve given 100%. Many of our favourite boosts are based on the practice of the Tabata method (developed as the result of research by Dr Izumi Tabata at the National Institute of Fitness and Sport in Tokyo). This involves taking a natural movement and performing it at high intensity for 20 seconds before having a 10 second rest and repeating this 20 seconds on, 10 seconds off cycle for a total of four minutes. It is extraordinary how intense just 4 minutes of exercising in this fashion can be – as many of our Wild Ones will testify! Another favourite is a rugby conditioning practice introduced by Luke. The idea is that all of these work-outs are short but super-intense – a practice that has been proved to be super effective at improving aerobic and anaerobic systems and getting lean.
The Skipping Boost – 20 seconds of skipping, 10 seconds rest, for 4 minutes. Obviously how you skip and the speed at which you skip will make a difference.
The Burpee Boost – So simple, so exhausting – it will seem like the longest 4 minutes of your life! For those of you who don’t know what a burpee involves you start crouched on the floor then spring your legs out behind you, jump them back in, then jump up as high as you can… and repeat. 20 seconds of burpees, 10 seconds rest, for 4 minutes.
The Kettlebell Boost – 20 seconds of kettlebell swings, 10 seconds rest, for 4 minutes.
The ‘Billy Johnson’ Boost – This is based on a rugby conditioning practice, but also something that you could imagine as forming part of stalking and hunting in the Wild… You mark 3 lines spaced 10 metres apart on to the ground / sand. You start lying face-down on the middle line. You get up and run backwards to the line behind you, and get down on your belly again. Then you run forwards all the way to the farthest line and when you get here turn around and get down onto your front. Then you get up onto your feet again and run forwards to the middle line, turn around, and get down onto your belly – and you are ready to start the sequence again. Repeat this six times.
Try a Wild New Year challenge
aping an object but using your hands for support or to spring off.
There are times in life, even for a 33 year old who tends to stand on her own two feet, when you need your mummy. And going on a road trip around Spain to find the elusive ideal Wildfitness location, for me, is one. This is because, when I check out a place I am acutely sensitive to ‘Wildness’ – the depth of the silence, the swingability of the trees, the secret spots up rivers, the right-weighted and smooth-factor of rocks lying about etc.
The following is taken from a journal our Wild Coach Gareth Roriston was keeping in the bush as he shadowed, then filled in, as Warden for the Galana Wildlife Conservancy which boarders Tsavo East National Park in Kenya. The idea is to inspire you… so you know that, wherever you are, and whatever equipment you have, you can still design a creative wild workout!
People on traditional diets are the world’s leading healthy populations.
Chestnuts
Glühwein!
Ingredients 
‘In Defence of Food’ By Michael Pollan
‘The Hungry Years’ by William Leith
(Tara Wood, founder of Wildfitness, recently attended a press weekend for the new 2012 Wildfitness location on the Isle of Wight. The 3 day Energizer course on the Isle of Wight is the brainchild of Netta and Ro Pakenham-Walsh, who grew up as “Islanders”. Here is Tara’s story…)
There was also the strange apprehension that went with the fact that this was the first time I have trusted ‘other people’ to set up and run a Wildfitness location without the vital input of my breath down their neck. Netta and Ro, (the Pakenham-Walsh or PW sisters) are one of those sister partnerships so fuelled by a sisterly respect, love and familiarity that they act as one powerful unit, one unit with formidable horse power. So not only did their combined skills and energy surpass mine, but they are also truly WILD. I fancy myself as a natural born Wild-One, raised in Africa, but actually the facts of my upbringing were pretty full of civilised colonial privileges like Earl Grey tea served afternoonly on our veranda. The PW sisters however have real-life barefoot parents. Seriously Mr. PW just dropped me off at the I of W ferry at 4am in bare-feet. The PW mum grows all her own food in the garden and Mr. and Mrs. PW on their wedding anniversary sleep out under the stars overlooking the English channel on a bed of heather (this is anniversary look-out, one of the many special Wild places that I discovered through the PW sisters. Another one is ‘boyfriend hill’ but that is a story they must tell you themselves…).
Along with this dynamic sisterhood, clearly children of nature, were Wild coaches Colin and Anne-Laure. Colin, a long-term Wild coach, has that calm confidence that comes from knowing that he is dispelling something very groovy and he knows exactly how to do it. And Anne-Laure, has only been with Wildfitness for a few months, but truly understands us. Anne-Laure will swim in anything. Since as long as she can remember her drug of choice has been the same as ours (the old sweats at WF) – she gets that high that we fellow junkies recognise in each other, the high of being active outside and ravished by nature.
Our first morning was an exploration of our senses and perceptions in the jungle depths of John’s garden. Hyper-sensitive to the reactions of the group to something so new and potentially rejectable on account of its total departure from ‘normal fitness’ I slowly relaxed as Colin’s owl-like authenticity and experience guided us slickly through an awakening experience that was stimulating, playful and that let being outside and moving do its magic. Thank god, I thought, it going to be ok without me!
Then, day 3 came. Which is a special day. Because suddenly the people around change from being ‘journalists’ into being your tribe, real people. And you change from being slightly self-conscious that you have been wearing the same pair of stripy pink trousers for three days into unabashedly asking Rebecca a thousand questions about her erotic column that she writes for GQ. And Rebecca unabashedly answering them.
