How I Completed the 75 Hard Challenge
As I reflect on the last 75 days, I keep coming back to what would be most valuable to the reader. I covered what I’ve learned in my halfway point blog, which you can read here: What I Learned from 37 Days of 75 Hard. Rereading that blog, I wouldn’t say much has changed in what I’ve learned. So, this blog will be for those who are interested in completing this challenge and the best tactics for each element of the challenge.
What is the 75 Hard Challenge?
The 75 Hard challenge involves completing specific tasks every day for 75 days. The tasks are:
Follow a nutrition plan of your choice
Two 45-minute workouts - one must be completed outside.
Drink a gallon of water
Read 10 pages of a nonfiction book
Take a progress picture
The Best Tactics for Each Part of the Challenge
A disclaimer of sorts, the tactics I am about to describe worked for me, but it doesn’t mean it is the only way. I am a type-1 diabetic, so some parts will most likely not apply to you.
Following a Nutrition Plan
When choosing which nutrition plan to follow, I initially landed on doing a no-gluten, no-dairy, mostly keto diet, all while counting calories. The reason I chose this is because, as I mentioned before, I am a type-1 diabetic, and a not-so-fun fact is that about 6% of type-1 diabetics also have celiac disease, compared to 1% of the general population. So, because of the higher prevalence of celiac disease in diabetics, plus the difficulty of testing for celiac, I thought this would be an opportune time to test it out for myself. Hence, I decided on no gluten.
The no-dairy part of it came after discussing my plans with my wife. She suggested doing no dairy because if I was already going to be miserable living without gluten, I might as well see if dairy had any effect on me.
For the “mostly keto” part, I have been mostly keto for years now. I say mostly because being on a full keto diet can be extremely dangerous for a diabetic, but if you were to follow the same plan as me, you should know that the majority of the menu items would be low-carb.
Lastly, counting calories. I talked to a nutritionist about my plans, and she recommended counting calories as the best and most scientific way to manage my weight while participating in the challenge.
To follow my nutrition plan, I came up with three systems that I would highly recommend for any nutrition plan:
Plan Your Week
Use an App like MyFitnessPal
Find Recipes and try a Lot of New Things
Plan Your Week
The best and easiest way I found to manage the diet is to plan the dinners for the week every Sunday. I only plan dinners because when following the diet, you have so much to keep track of while working on 75 Hard on top of work and life that your breakfast and lunch should look similar to each other to prevent burnout.
Example of my meals for the day:
My Breakfast: Protein bar and beef jerky
My Lunch: Fruit with either chicken or beef
Dinner: The recipe I choose for the day
Bonus: Protein shake
Use an App
There are many apps out there that can help you with your diet. I highly suggest MyFitnessPal. It can do everything that most people will want, all in the free version. I also think that using an app is better than other manual ways you could track it because you always have your phone on you, and it’s much easier to keep track of if it is easy to track.
Find Recipes & Try A LOT of New Things
Just like Barney Stinson, when it comes to recipes while following your diet: "NEW IS ALWAYS BETTER." Well, most of the time. For me, I found myself so sick of eating the same things over and over again that I had to add a lot of variety to my dinners.
Here are the three ways I found recipes/new things to eat:
Pinterest: This may be surprising to many, but Pinterest’s search functionality does a pretty good job and has a lot of recipes that fit within certain dietary restrictions. Pro tip: look at the reviews on the recipe’s website first before saving the pin. If you are interested in finding some of my favorite recipes, you can follow me here: Pinterest.
Meal Services: This is by far the easiest way to find recipes that are great and they make it so easy. I also loved the time it saved. Using a meal service, even for a little while, can give you a ton of time back. During 75 Hard, I tried three meal services and all of them worked great. Pro tip: use less salt than what the recipe calls for. Here are the three meal services I tried and a short review:
Factor75: By far the quickest and easiest to use. Time is limited, so being able to get a good meal that fits the diet is crucial.
HelloFresh: Recipes are overall great and their filtering functionality is good.
Blue Apron: This is another good one. I didn’t find as many recipes that I loved here, but I needed a change from Factor and HelloFresh.
YouTube/ TikTok: This is by far NOT the quickest way to find recipes, but I found a majority of my favorite recipes this way.
Bonus: The Traeger App: If you like smoking or grilling and want to follow a diet similar to mine, the majority of the recipes you can find on the Traeger app are delicious. I use it weekly.
Note from Connor: I am afraid that this blog is going to be so long that no one will read it. If you are interested in my favorite recipes, click here: My Favorite Meals From 75 Hard.
Two 45-Minute Workouts - One Must Be Completed Outside
Two workouts a day doesn’t sound fun. Believe me, it’s not fun. I think going into it knowing that it will be miserable is actually the best mindset to start because it does get better when your expectations are low. I would also suggest you check out my blog: What I Learned from 37 Days of 75 Hard before starting this section.
For this section’s tactics, I am going to split it into indoor/gym and outdoor workout tactics that worked best for me.
Indoor Workouts/Gym
One of the hardest parts about going to the gym is knowing what you are going to do. Luckily, there is so much content out there that it’s not too hard to find a workout program. Here are my suggestions for where to start:
GymShark Training App: It’s free! Plus, I had everything I needed to do my workout and track my progress.
Jeff Nippard: His YouTube channel came as a recommendation from the nutritionist I mentioned in the nutrition plan section. His workouts are scientifically based and he does an excellent job explaining them.
Use ChatGPT: AI is amazing. When I finished my first program and needed a new one, I tried ChatGPT to come up with a 7-day workout split with the equipment I had and it built it out for me. This isn’t my favorite way, but it can work.
Here is an outline of my workout week to get you started:
Monday: Push - GymShark Training App
Tuesday: Stationary Bike
Wednesday: Pull - GymShark Training App
Thursday: Legs & Abs - GymShark Training App
Friday: Yoga
Saturday: High-Intensity Cardio
Sunday: Full-body Kettlebell and Stretching
Outdoor Workouts
One of the places where I can't entirely agree is in the outdoor workout section. On Andy Frisella’s website, he says that leisure sports and physical labor do not count as workouts because your intent should be to work out. Which is great and all, but I think it’s better to be active than not doing anything. My rule of thumb was if the workout was on my Apple Watch, it put my heart rate in zone 2 or 3 at least, it burned at least 100 calories, and my intent was for it to count as a workout, I counted it. If you want more ideas on workout ideas from Andy, click here: Link
For me, one tactic helped me accomplish my outdoor workouts more often than anything else: having a dog. When I started 75 Hard, my dog, Ollie, and I were out of shape, but he wanted to go out on walks and run so badly. So that’s what we started with—we went on light jogs, and the more we went, the more he wanted to go. I didn’t want to let him down! (Plus, he was a better-behaved dog when he got that time with me.)
So, Ollie and I went on a light jog every day. If we were really sore, we went on a fast-paced long walk, snowshoeing, hiking, etc. He was the best outdoor workout partner I could have asked for.
For those of you who do not have a dog, or do not have a big dog like I do (for those who are interested, he is a Bernese Mountain Dog and Poodle mix) who can keep up easily with me, I have thought a lot about what you could do:
Find something you enjoy doing outside: For me, snowshoeing or hiking was my go-to. I love being in nature, and that felt like I was rewarding myself while accomplishing my daily goal.
Find a good audiobook to listen to: This was another reward for me. I really enjoy reading and listening to audiobooks. During my outdoor workouts with Ollie, I would put on a fiction audiobook. Obviously, I didn’t count this towards my reading for the day because it was fiction, but it gave me something to make the time go by faster and it was something I enjoyed doing.
For those who are interested, I would recommend you check out my list of 5-Star Reads, many of which are excellent as audiobooks.
Positive Reinforcement: As you might have noticed, the ways I have mentioned to accomplish your goals revolve around enjoyment or pleasure. That is by design. In a study by Brigham Young University, 2,536 students aged 5-12 observed in 151 classes across 19 schools and three different states found that when teachers used positive reinforcement, students focused on tasks up to 30% more. I used this same concept to “hack” my behavior. After a workout (indoor and outdoor), I would eat something sweet or high-calorie.
Drink a Gallon of Water
In my last blog on 75 Hard, What I Learned from 37 Days of 75 Hard, I covered this topic specifically because it was my least favorite part of the whole challenge.
Here is the TLDR (too long didn’t read) version: Drink 80-86 oz before 3 pm. This will help with waking up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom. Check out my reasoning in the blog mentioned above.
For the more in-depth tactics I used, I unfortunately don’t have much. I typically like the taste of water, and going to the bathroom a lot is annoying but not a big deal to me. The only other thing I can think of if you are not someone who likes the taste of water is to get Crystal Light packets. One thing I would do occasionally, that is surprisingly good, is mix a raspberry Crystal Light packet with some coconut cream. It is surprisingly tasty.
Read 10 Pages of a Nonfiction Book
I talk about reading a lot on my website. Since I started reading every single day, my life has improved dramatically. If you are interested in book reviews, book insights, and more, I highly recommend you sign up for my newsletter. In every email, I try to provide as helpful content as possible.
Before I begin talking about the ways I would recommend accomplishing this, I highly suggest you read these two blogs first:
This will give you helpful advice and context into how I accomplished this portion of the 75 Hard challenge and why I thought it was the easiest part.
For those who want the three tips for reading 10 pages of a nonfiction book a day that worked for me:
Read what you are most interested in: I can’t tell you how many times I hear “I just need to finish the book I’m reading” even though they aren’t all that interested in the book. They feel like they must finish it because they started it. If you aren’t dying to read the next part or you are not looking forward to reading, find a different book. If you are looking for a place to start, I recommend checking out my Top 10 Nonfiction Reads of 2023 or my list of 5-Star Reads
Make a routine: A routine can and most likely will be your saving grace. My nightly routine was mine while doing 75 Hard. To accomplish my reading goal each day, I would do my science-based bedtime routine, put my phone way out of arm’s reach, pick up my book, and read.
Read multiple nonfiction books at a time: One of my “secrets” to finishing books and reading a lot of nonfiction is to read multiple at a time. Nonfiction books can be heavy reading, and breaking it up into smaller pieces helps a lot. For example, during 75 Hard, I was reading: A Promised Land by Barack Obama, Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe, Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates, Talking to Strangers by Malcolm Gladwell, Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer, and The Big Leap by Gay Hendricks at the same time. Meaning, when I got into bed each night, I had several interesting things to choose from. Similar to choosing a TV show or YouTube video to watch before bed.
Take a Progress Picture
Taking a progress picture is important to see your growth, but don’t let it be the reason it stops you. As you might have gathered from the majority of this post, eliminating as many things as possible to ensure your success is a lesson I learned while doing 75 Hard and a lesson I always find myself relearning.
If you are interested in learning more about doing more by doing less, I highly recommend Essentialism by Greg McKeown, and you can read my review of the book here: Review for Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less.
For the progress picture, in the first couple of weeks, you will not see much of a difference, which can be really hard when you take a progress picture every day. Maybe I am the only one, but the times I took the progress pictures were also the times I most felt like quitting. My solution? Delete the picture after taking it. (I only kept the first and the last day photos.)
I didn’t see anything about deleting your progress pictures being against the rules and found that it worked wonders for me. I liked that if I wanted to, I could compare my first picture to my third week’s photo, but I didn’t have to see little to no progress from one day to the next. A daily picture is just too often.
I also loved the feeling of deleting the photo. It was like throwing away my “old self” daily, and I was onto better things the next day. The best thing I can compare it to is checking something off of a to-do list. At the end of the day, I’d take a photo and delete it like a ritual that one more day had been completed.
One more thing, for those who are interested in keeping all your photos, I would highly recommend taking the photos in good lighting. It makes an absurd amount of difference in how you feel you look. There are plenty of videos on YouTube on it. For me, I used a large soft key light at a 90-degree angle from me.
Final Thoughts on 75 Hard
I feel like you and I just went through a lot getting through that blog. If you can read that, you can do 75 Hard. For my final thoughts, I think that 75 Hard is an excellent challenge. I learned a ton while doing it, and I loved the results. I hope that what I learned will help you on your journey to completing this challenge. I would love to hear from you in the comments if any of this was helpful and if you have any insights of your own.
Also, as a quick PSA to everyone: 75 Hard is the real deal. It can be a major challenge, it is time-consuming, and every day is not easy. I believe that this challenge is NOT for everyone. But for those of you who are able to start, I am proud of you, and you should be proud of yourself. This isn’t easy, but you can do it.
