Episode 45 - Reclaiming Body: Just Rucking Do It Already

In Episode 45, Michael and Scott discuss the recent and anticipated future benefits of rucking - the latest addition to Reclaiming Man's strategy for Reclaiming Body.

Episode Transcript

Scott (00:05):
So the french fry effect, this is fascinating actually.
So you know when you get theWhopper?
And you open, or the Big Mac orwhatever, Big Mac, and you open
up the clamshell.
When they first tested this outin like the 50s.
You open up the clam shell.
What do you do if you were toget McDonald's right now?
And you got the clam shell andthe value meal with your fries

Michael (00:24):
and all that.
What do you do?
You'd throw the ketchup andfries and the other side of the
clam

Scott (00:29):
shell.
Yeah, exactly.
But here's what McDonald's didis they opened it up and said,
place fries here.
And people fucking hated it.
Yeah.
Like they hated it.
Yeah.
So then they went back to thedrawing board and they just
didn't do anything.
And what happened is everyonefucking put their fries there.
And so what the French fryeffect is, even if you design

(00:50):
something that's specificallytailored to produce an outcome
from somebody, if you let themthink that they were the ones
that were like, Oh, this is aperfect spot to dump my fries,
they get the satisfaction.
So in marketing, it's becomethis thing of what can you do to
French fry people where you'regetting the outcome you want
from them, but you're lettingthem take the credit, like it
was their idea.

(01:11):
And so I think that's what, likeone of the things I've been
thinking about this is if youdon't tell people how this will
impact their life, you justdescribe what you did and how it
impacted your life.
Like they're going to take andapply that to their life in ways
where they're going to feel likethey did 90 percent of the work,
even though they did 10 or what?

(01:32):
So anyway, like that's what hasworked so well.
I think with this content is Iwasn't telling people how to
grow their business.
I just said, Hey, here's what Idid.
Welcome to episode 45 of theReclaiming Man podcast.
I am your host, Scott Silvey,and not with me.
Not as always Preston theSouthern Canuck Radomski enough
about him.
He ain't here mastermind.

(01:53):
What up, brother?
How are you

Michael (01:56):
so far?
2024 is Delivering on all fronts

Scott (02:01):
man.
Yeah, I am on fire this year.
So yeah, I'm just gonna keepthis rolling as long as possible
I agree Just real quick Prestonnot with us today.
He's got some family in town andhad some things come up that
Would have made it a challenge.
I won't say on his marriagebecause they've got a great
marriage, but he would have beenwithdrawing from the familial

(02:24):
Love tank if you will by notbeing here tonight, so miss you
buddy Hopefully you listen tothis and realize how awesome of
a conversation it was and Wewon't make you feel shitty for
not being here, but you aremissed.
Happy birthday.
Mr.
41 Preston yeah, so tell meabout your year.

(02:46):
I, know, I don't want to get toomuch into a year goal podcast.
Cause we covered that last time,but why would you say things are
off to a phenomenal start foryou?
What's new, what's different.

Michael (02:59):
What's new this year.
Came as a by product of, a book.
We talked about comfort crisisand one of the activities that I
think is a game changer, basedon my two weeks of experience.
So I can't definitively say it,but I'm very confident based on
the research, based on a lot of,just get to

Scott (03:19):
it.
What the rock are you talkingabout, bro?
What the rock are you talking

Michael (03:22):
about?
Yeah.
Rucking is it.
It's been a game changer.
And I think it's going tocontinue to really elevate every
area of my life from my posture.
And by posture physically myposture mentally and just my
approach.

(03:42):
It changed, it shifted myperspective and I love things
that changed my perspective forthe good because

Scott (03:48):
so what, go ahead.
Sorry.

Michael (03:50):
Yeah, no, I was just gonna say, because there's so
many times I get in a rut ofdoing things that I believe are
going to have a positive impact.
And atomic habit, slight edge.
They talk about just do the 1%,1%.
And so you're in it for the longhaul and you are.
Planning on compounding.
And so you get into thismindset, like I'm going to, I'm
going to be running every daythis year, or I'm going to be

(04:10):
working out every day this yearwith the exception of a day of
rest here and there.
But, then you have somethingthat radically changes your
perspective, comfort crisis andrucking.
And so without getting into allof the benefits and advantages,
I will just say that it was oneof those perspective shifting
types of activities that thefirst time I did it the reason

(04:31):
that I knew it was so good as itinstantly transported me back to
the boundary waters.
It instantly brought me back toportaging following my brother
along these trails in northern,Minnesota with a 70 pound food
pack on your back and thefeeling of exhilaration and
accomplishment and You know thatthe mini me so be I would call

(04:53):
it because you're like, I don'tknow if I can make it man This
is an insanely heavy pack andthen you find yourself on the
other end of the portage.
You've completed it And you'veproven that you have this level
of potential that you didn'tknow existed.
That's what I'll start with onit, but yeah, it's been a good
start to the year because ofthat, and I also gamified in the
form of just setting up tasks inmy phone.
Really simple, but somethingthat Scott, you told me a buddy

(05:15):
had done, and I was like, whydon't I do, why don't I do that?
And I tried it in Notion, and itwasn't as accessible.
And this is, Yeah.
The best part about it is thatit's on a shared calendar.
My wife is like, why are yousupposed to be working out
harder, dude?
Cause that's what I wrote inthere.
Work out harder, dude.
I was like that's the name ofthe game.
So she sees all the things I'msupposed to be doing.
And if I don't.

Scott (05:36):
Call me out on it.
She's your accountability buddy.
Yeah.
Episode 45 is going to be aboutrucking because why the ruck
not?
We'll see how many ruckreplacing fuck jokes I make in
this episode.
There'll be, many like buckleup.
It's a recall up.
That one was unintentional.
Oh, dad jokes.
All right.

(05:58):
Not really dad jokes cause Idon't usually F bomb in front of
my kids.
But, yeah, working it isdefinitely something that is, I
came into this year, we've gotright in our plans in May.
I've been thinking about,whether I do a half or a full or
our good buddy and friend of theshow, Zach, is planning a half

(06:20):
and a full this year.
Obviously Ryan Ironman has run.
He just ran the St.
Jude half.
Michael, you run marathon?
I don't think you have, right?

Michael (06:30):
But you run a half?
I've done a couple of halves.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Two half marathons.

Scott (06:34):
Yeah.
So it was on my list of maybeI'll do this or maybe I'll get
into adventure racing, likethat's more my style, like a
25K, 50K sounds rad.
But I've almost completelyreplaced running with rucking
and it, and so I actually puttogether in notion, it's not
really a task list if I couldconvert it to one, I would and I

(06:56):
may end up just doing the samething you did, which is to just
set up like a folder in yourreminders in your, iPhone and
then set up daily tasks in therethat you can check off and then
clear the next week.
So I may end up doing that, butI built a calendar in notion
where I'm filling out my daywith my essentials.
To make sure I get the thingsdone in a given work day that I
want to get done.

(07:17):
But at 5 a.
m.
is rock.
And now I'm probably not goingto rock at 5 because it's cold.
So I'm more likely to work outin my semi heated.
It's not heated, but it's anattached garage.
So it's like radiant heated fromthe attached house.
So I'll probably work out atfive and then do my rucks at my
10 a.
m.
It's usually around 10 a.
m.
time.

(07:37):
Yeah.
Then you have sun at least.
Yeah.
Or at least just 15 degreeswarmer.
But yeah, I've completelyshifted my focus from running to
rucking.
And we can get into a bit ofmaybe the why here in a second,
but I agree with you, like thisis the year of the rock I'm
committed to averaging a 5k aday, which that's.

(08:00):
1, 100 and some miles of rockingthis year which I'll probably
just round up to 2000 cause whynot?
Yeah.
That's

Michael (08:08):
not a rounding up, but I appreciate that.
And with your with your me soggyvery well may.

Scott (08:15):
Yeah.
Oh yeah, that's true.
And maybe we'll get into thattoo, but like for me, so I've,
worked out five times this yearin two days.
And so I won't talk about 75hard much because we've talked
about that a lot, but I am doinga 75 hard with a plan to fail on
the 19th when I go sailing andthen apply to start it back up
way back.
But with that is a 45 minuteswhen I rock now it's, really

(08:41):
interesting, right?
Especially having gone throughthis, not a runner to suddenly,
like I ran a couple of five Ks aweek towards the end of the
year.
I did.
The day before we left or theday we left for our road trip to
Wisconsin to visit my wife'sfamily for Christmas I did an
eight mile rock at a 14 minutepace.

(09:02):
So that was on a trail, right?
So this was not just a perfecttrail.
I ate it once when I tripped ona route.
Yeah, gnarly.
Yeah.
So to be able to go eight fullmiles, I've never run eight
miles in my life.
And now it wasn't a fast run, itwas just a jog, but I've never
gone that distance for thatduration or that duration.
And I did it with a 30 poundpack on and it was amazing.

(09:24):
I felt a little exhausted,crampy for five minutes, but it
just felt amazing to accomplish.
So on the first actually on the31st, I did a rock but it was
like a 14 minute pace, just inmy neighborhood.
I did three miles three and ahalf miles.
It was fine, but nothingspecial.
And then yesterday I went out.

(09:45):
After having worked out, and hadrucked the day before, but I
felt really good.
And so usually what I do now isI just go out and whatever pace
my body wants to go is what Igo.
And I'll look down and sometimesit's 14 minutes.
Yesterday it was 10 minutes and30 seconds.
So if I'm going to do a 10minute, 30 second pace and I've
got 45 minutes that I've got towork out, that means I've got to
do four miles.

(10:06):
So yesterday I just casuallywent out and did 4.
3 miles at 10 minutes and 32seconds pace with a Rucka,
right?
Six months ago, I hadn't runfour miles in my life.
So that's wild.
Pretty

Michael (10:16):
amazing.
It is.
Yeah.

Scott (10:18):
I, but also rucking is amazing.
Yeah.
It's

Michael (10:22):
rucking awesome.
Yeah.
So the past two weeks since Istarted it I haven't,

Scott (10:27):
yeah.
Tell me about what, what's sodifferent about it for you?

Michael (10:31):
What's, really different is after you ruck for
a few times, then you go back torunning.
Right now, you feel like you'refloating, so I'm doing 33
percent of my body weight.

Scott (10:44):
You're doing way more than me.
I'm, doing like 15 right now'cause I only have a 30 pound.
Oh

Michael (10:50):
Yeah Plate.
You're gonna get a, you

Scott (10:51):
said you were gonna get 30.
I'm gonna get another 20.
Yeah, I figured I'd start with a30'cause there's my ruck, I have
a goruck ruck saxon goruck.com.
No affiliate links shouldprobably get'em.
And so there's two platecarriers built into the back.
And so I figured I'd start withthe 30 and then get the 20.
And in fact, the last few daysI've been like, I need to get
the 20.
So I'm going to order it hereany day now.

Michael (11:13):
Yeah.
But glutton for punishment.
And so I started with 50 andbased on previous knowledge, I
was like, Oh, I used to do 50 to70 pounds in the boundary
waters.
With the backpack.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And so I was like, give it ashot.
And so right now just two 25pound dumbbells and a backpack
may or may not use it.
have been like a laptop bag.
So it's really not built for it.

(11:34):
No, no chest strap, no hipstrap.
Yeah.
Those are really big.
That's a substantial change toyour ability to manage the
weight more and keep it tighter.
And so yeah,

Scott (11:46):
mine doesn't have the hip belt, but I have the chest strap
and that makes a big differencebetween when it's connected.
And yeah, it doesn't

Michael (11:51):
cut off your circulation as much in your
arms.

Scott (11:54):
But so what you're normally like a seven to eight
minute mile guy.

Michael (11:57):
Yeah.
But what do you do with a rock?
Yeah.
So today I did three miles atabout a 10 minute mile pace.
So that's really good.
Yeah.
And first of all, I love howmuch it makes me sweat.
It makes you sweat hard and, Iwas in 49 degrees in my garage
which is.
Pretty balmy for MinnesotaJanuary 2nd, but I love that

(12:22):
factor.
It, feels like you're doing aharder workout than a run is
naturally because you are.
And, yeah, it just, it changesyour.
Your focus on your form a lotmore and rucking is a different
posture is so important and it'sa different it's a different

(12:42):
form than running because youdon't really lean forward as
much as you when you're runningand so it keeps you more
centered and from a techniqueperspective, you're not taking
longer strides.
You're really trying to keepyour center of gravity.
So it's a healthier cadence,your cadence is higher and it's
what actually running.

(13:03):
They say the optimal cadence is180 strides per minute, which is
really fast.
I'm not sure if you've evertried to do it, but that's three
per second.
Those are a couple of the piecesthat I really like.
But the, feeling.
I would say I liken it to thecold plunge.
You get out of the cold plunge,you feel like Superman and you

(13:24):
finish the ruck and you feellike you're on fire.
Like I want to do more.
And then I'll go into some ofthe body weight stuff, pushups
and squats.
And all of a sudden you justfeel so light, relatively.
So

Scott (13:39):
A lot of rucking exercises, which I haven't
really gotten into.
I did a little bit on my, I dida.
A 13 mile rocker, 12.
6 mile rock the same day thatRyan did the super impressive.
Yeah.
That one was like 16 plusminutes, but a lot of that trail
was, it was, it rained on me allday.
I won't show it on camera.
But as Preston said in our polo,I've got holes in my feet.

(14:05):
And I almost did, like I had themoment of Oh, I'm going to pull
this up.
And then I was like, I don'tknow, maybe not.
I, destroyed my feet, but it wasalso like a very rocky, like
boulder scrambly style trail.
So it was tough to, you weren'trunning at that point and it was
all wet and mossy and all that.
Yeah.
But, I don't

Michael (14:25):
think it's meant to be I don't think it's meant to be
too much faster.
I think any faster starting toreally get into it.
to the run form.
And so even as I wasretrospectively thinking about
the workout tonight, I was like,I think it's a little faster
than I really want to go.
I think the ideal is probablyaround five miles per hour
versus six.
So someplace around like a 12minute mile, maybe.

(14:46):
So what I've

Scott (14:47):
heard from people who run more than me, and I know this is
one data point.
Is it's about 10 pounds more forevery 10 pounds you're carrying.
It's about a minute slower inyour mile.
So if you're a seven minutemile, you should be doing 13 or
in your case, if, or should yoube doing 12?
Yeah.
So yeah, that checks out.
Yeah.

(15:07):
And ultimately that's, so I'mhoping to do a ruck with Apex
guys in May or April and talk toJJ today.
And he was like, yeah we're justmaybe going to end up building a
huge community around all ofthis.
I don't know if they're gonnaactually, it's two and a half
hours from here at some pointI'm gonna go rucking with those
guys and, but the pace I wastold to expect if we do an event

(15:28):
is about 12 minutes.
I know that's with elevation andstuff as well, but, yeah, I was
pretty happy to do 4.
3 miles

Michael (15:35):
at 10.
Oh yeah it does feel good.
And so not sure exactly what youwere going to get into here, but
one of the things that I've beenstruggling with is weight gain.
And it's because I've been over.
Indexing, as you would say,which I always, I stole that
word from you, by the way, butyeah, I've definitely been

(15:56):
focused on cardio because Ioriginally started running
because I wanted to have bettercardiovascular health for
golfing, which is the oddestthing ever.
But then when I thought aboutrucking, I was like, this is
even better because it actuallysimulates me carrying a golf
bag.
And so now I'm going to be evenin better shape, but it's

(16:16):
building a lot better musclemass.

Scott (16:18):
Yeah.
You think about the strength inyour core and legs and back.
Yeah.
It's like when I finished the 12mile ruck, I felt that in my
back for days.
But now in the last three days,I've done a total of maybe 11
miles at 14, 10 and, 16 minutes.
And I did a back and bicepworkout today that murdered me.

(16:41):
And we'll see how I feeltomorrow, but that'll be more
from the workout today than itis from the rock.
Yeah, I think the.
The workout is for sure moreintense.
And even today, when I walked, Itook a meeting that worked out
perfectly.
It was right about 45 minutes.
So I got a little over 3.
06 miles at a 14, 18 pace orwhatever it was.

(17:03):
And, even that, right?
Like I could just feel it.
Like it's, a different sensationin my body.
Then going for a walk, let alonegoing for a run.
Yeah, I

Michael (17:17):
have a couple of dogs, so it's I can throw on the
rucksack and go take the dogsfor a little, it's like a 1.
3 mile loop around it's prettyclose actually to the loop that
you do.
Yours is a little bit longer,but I just like the fact that
again, it's something that addsefficiency.
To what I'm doing and you can, Inormally wouldn't go on a run

(17:37):
with my dogs cause I run toofast for the dogs, but I don't
ruck too fast for the dogs.
So it's flex, bro,

Scott (17:44):
sick flex.

Michael (17:47):
I.
It's just that distance, right?
We all know the dogs canprobably smoke me on a flat out
race sprint, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
They're inhumanely fast becausethey're not humans.
But all right.

Scott (18:00):
So what's the, this does tailor really nicely into my mi
oggi, which is, I haven't, Idon't think I've shared on the
pod what I'm planning on doing,but in September, I will do
attempt to the John Muir Trail,which is 211 miles from Yosemite
Valley to Mount Whitney, whichis the highest point in the
lower 48 211 miles.
And I'm gonna do it in 10 daysor less.

(18:21):
Which I've never, I've done 20miles in a day before.
I've never done two in a row,let alone 10.
It's definitely possible.
People have done it.
But whether or not I can do it,I feel like right now there's
less than a 50, 50 chance.
And I'm hoping to get to a pointwhere I feel confident that if
things go well, I will have ashot.
But one thing we haven't talkedabout at all, let alone on the

(18:43):
show, is when are we doing a goruck challenge?
For example, the go ruck heavy,which is at least 30 pounds, 24
hours, 40 plus miles, has a 50percent completion rate.

(19:04):
I like that.
Then the tough is 10 to 12hours.
It's a, I believe it's a, Idon't know if it's a relay.
It's a team event.
So anyway, we got to look intothis.
I would love to do a go rockchallenge together.

(19:24):
Let me see how often they havethem.
It looks like they have them.
Not at all.
They have none listed for 20,none listed for 2021.
I guess

Michael (19:36):
we're gonna have to make our own,

Scott (19:37):
right?
That's always an option.
I'm going to go try to, yeah,they have, well, at some point,
hopefully they say they have athousand events worldwide.
So I don't know if they just arehaving issues or if 2024 data
hasn't been posted yet.

(19:58):
Because it is 2024, which ispretty fucking wild.
But anyway, I was hoping to pullthis up and be like, Oh, we
should commit to one right now.
But best laid plans.
We, but we, yeah we haven'ttalked about that.
I would love to do, either aGoRuck challenge or I know
there's charity Rucks I've seenon the internets before.

(20:21):
So more to come on that, but Ido expect we will do a Ruck
together this year, whetherit's.
I know we'll do one togetherthis year, but the question is
whether it's in challenge formor it's a mini Misogi where we
decide to go do like our ownchallenge Hey, we're going to
do, I

Michael (20:39):
don't know, I know it's in the future.
I'm not sure if it's 24 or 25 or6, but Boundary Waters is the
perfect environment you're doingit.
Usually like a 55 to 65 poundcanoe, and then you're usually
doing that in addition to a 50pound pack.
So you're, going heavy on thoseusually, which is a lot of fun.

(21:02):
And there's other elements ofsurvival and no electricity and
running water and things likethat, that I think are key in
the mix.
I like that too.
Plus it's one of the few placeslisted in Comfort Crisis that
has the potential to have zerosound pollution.

Scott (21:19):
I love that.
All so I don't see anything onGoRuck events.
They're having a 500 server iswhat I'm seeing now.
So that's my guess is they justhave something wrong.
Hey people at GoRuck, actually,I don't want to probably work
with them because they probablyjust have WordPress and crap and
they don't want to deal withthat.

(21:42):
But I'm looking at, interesting.
So there's another,RuckForMiles.
com has rucking events in June,July, August, September,
November, December, and theyhave them all over the world,
but they have them almost every,tough challenge, 10 6,

(22:09):
Pittsburgh, Detroit, Hartford,Milwaukee, Nashville, all on 10
6.
Looking in November, orDecember, they had a tough in
Charleston on the first andGalveston in Honolulu and
Wilmington, Delaware on thesecond in Charleston.
So I think there's a lot ofevents that we can find.
So yeah, we just need to, wejust need to find one this year

(22:32):
along with the Tough Mudder.
Tough Mudder in Atlanta in Apriland in Nashville in October,
it's a 15K, so we've got to dothose.
But, all right, bringing itback, rocking I think we can
probably wrap, but I think.

Michael (22:49):
The key other things that stand out for me, just to
highlight a few of them.
Number one, it's accessible toanybody that has a backpack.
And has a sandbag or whatever.
So I like that fact about it.
It's the same, the similar torunning where it's as hard as
you want it to be.
And I like things that you canprogressively get better at,

(23:10):
make it harder, make it easierdepending on the day and you can
make, it's the same sort ofsocial type of event to a guy
who I met.
At a conference last year who I,in the first 15 minutes knew he
was just a kindred spirit basedon how he was talking to me
about life.
I invited him to polo last weekand he was telling me about a

(23:31):
ruck club that he started withsome buddies on Sunday.
So somewhere at 6 a.
m.
He's going with a group of guysand rucking, and they start off
at five miles or whatever.
So there's that social componentto it.
It's nature, generally, if youcan get outside and find some
trails.
So that's also something that'sa huge plus for me.
And it just seems to lend itselfreally well to increasing your

(23:53):
form for just about every otherexercise in life.
So you

Scott (23:58):
just touched on something there that I wanted to mention,
which is So in Comfort Crisis,he talks about how we evolved as
humans to go long distances at aslower pace than, say, your dog,
who can run faster than you in asnapshot of time.
But then carry heavy things,right?
So we'd go our competitiveadvantage over the animals that
we would hunt.

(24:19):
Is that we could wear them outjust through exhaustion because
they had to stop and pant tocool down.
So we would just chase themdown, We might be 10, 15 miles
away from home.
Then we'd kill the animal andthen have to carry it back,
right?
But also as part of kind of theexplanation on rucking, he talks
about how there's a bigdifference physiologically

(24:39):
between running on a treadmilland running outdoors.
And then there's a bigdifference between running
outdoors on a sidewalk versus ona trail.
And there's something about thatconnectedness with nature and
that, that kind of where youhave, you're forced to be
present because if you don'twatch every little footstep,
you're going to probably faceplant and hurt yourself.
So to me, that is one of thethings I really love about

(25:00):
rucking is even more thanrunning.
I feel, especially when I'm outtrailing, like trail running or
rucking is I took a tumble andwhen you have a 30 or 50 pound
pack on your back, it hurtsmore, right?
And you have less margin forerror on potential injury.
I'll touch on that in a second,but ultimately I feel like I'm

(25:20):
much more focused and present onwhat I'm doing rather than if I
just go for a walk on thesidewalk, I could be thinking
about anything.
But getting back to injury Iguess I'm going to contradict
myself there.
Yes, if you do fall, it's goingto hurt more potentially.
But, one of the reasons that Ithink we talked about on our
comfort crisis episode, that themilitary in particular advocates

(25:41):
for rucking and does a lot oftraining.
Is you get a lot of the samecardiovascular benefits, you get
more strength benefits and theinjury rate when rocking is six
times less than running.
Oh, that was much less likely tohurt

Michael (25:54):
yourself.
Yeah, that was the other thing.
I was gonna, I'm glad youbrought that up because so a
couple months back injured mycalf and I've been running
pretty slow building back upintentionally.
I was just with discipline.
I'm like, I'm running slow.
I'm running slow.
And yeah, yesterday was the.
The first seven minute mile, Iran a few, I ran a few seven
minute miles and I was justlike, Oh my gosh, this feels so
good.
I haven't done this in a coupleof months.

(26:15):
And

Scott (26:15):
we'll think of all the strength that you're not just
doing to your muscles, but toyour joints, your tendons, like
all the, like you're putting,like when you run, you have a
high impact.
You don't have as high impactwhen you're rucking because it's
more of a shuffle.
So it's not like that.
Exactly.
And but, you are carrying aroundin your case, 33 percent of your

(26:38):
body weight.
So your ligaments and tendonsand all of that, like they're
getting more stress put on them,but not more impact.
They're getting more weight.
So you're strengthening them ina way that's less.
Harmful to your body.
Yeah.
So the, yeah then you go out andrun.
And it's like that to me isprobably why it's more
interesting is I've also, asdealt with when I first started

(27:00):
running.
In fact, every time I've triedto run when I 2012, 13, 14,
whatever it was, when I trainedfor Tough Mudder last.
I didn't run it because I hurtmy calf.
And then when I started runningagain this year, I hurt my calf.
And so I love this idea of partof what's great about running to
your point is I get toincrementally improve, but with

(27:23):
rucking, I don't feel like I'm,I feel like I'm exerting myself
more, but I'm feeling better.
Like I'm feeling strong.
Like you said, I get done with aruck like yesterday when I got
done and I looked down and itwas 45 minutes and I just did 4.
3 miles with a ruck.

(27:43):
And I took that ruck off, man, Ifelt it's a lot like when you go
backpacking, you take that packoff at the end of that long day,
you literally feel weightless,but then there's like this
euphoria.
And I don't know if there's adopamine hit in there, but like
that sense of accomplishment.
Yeah.
Which which I love too.
So yeah, I think all told thisis the year of rucking for me.

(28:05):
Yeah.
Get the ruck out there, get theruck out there.
You ruck and rucks.
But yeah I'm really lookingforward to learning this game,
figuring this game out with you,going on rucks with you and
Preston and some of the guys.
And I totally like it's for meas somebody who was a non

(28:25):
runner, I feel like I saw peoplein running clubs and at the time
I was like, you fucking weirdos.
Mostly because I just was hidingmy shame and not being able to
join them.
But I see like you mentioned thesocial benefits a minute ago and
I think that's really an aspectthat I'm really looking forward
to is, realistically.

(28:47):
If you just walk fast, like whenI started out being wildly
unhealthy, like the idea ofwalking a 15, 16 minute mile was
impossible.
Like I couldn't do it forsustained periods of time, but
suddenly you start walking acouple of miles and then you're
walking at a 16 minute pace.
Then you throw a rucksack on andnow you suddenly get to a point,
maybe you're not doing that 16right away, but you get back to

(29:08):
the point where you're nowwalking with a ruck at 16.
You take that ruck off and nowyou're, walking pace is 14 or
15, right?
Like it just takes you to thatnext level.
And I'm going to wrap with, thisreminded me of my favorite
Christmas purchase, which I didnot get for Christmas.
I purchased while at my brotherin law's for Christmas.

(29:29):
Cause he's got a gym in hisbasement and when you're doing
like bicep isolations orspecific shoulder deltoid
isolations, like for me, 15pounds sometimes is enough
because I'm just doing isolatingone specific muscle, but going
from 15 to 20 really sucksbecause that's a 33 percent jump
and it's hard to do while he hasthese little one and a half

(29:51):
pound or one and a quarter poundthings that you clip onto your
dumbbell on both sides.
So now you have two and a halfpounds, so you can go from 15 to
17 Really smart.
So it's the increment.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So I bought those and I usedthem today on some of my bicep
exercises, and it was amazing.
Why I bring that up is, whatmade me think of that was just
this idea of being able to doincremental improvement.

(30:12):
I feel like for people for Iwon't speak for anybody, but for
me as a non runner transitioninginto being a runner was really
difficult.
Really difficult.
And I think if I had been ableto start with rocking and just,
and to really, like nowadays if,I look at my leg muscles.
They're way different, just fromrunning.
Way different than they werebefore I ran, because I built

(30:33):
them.

Michael (30:34):
That's the number one difference I notice in my body.
Honestly.
I wish, and I know it'll happen.
My wife will probably hate mefor saying this, but it's like
my upper body, it's fine, it'sin good shape, because I don't
have a ton of body weight orbody fat but I've never really
even with last 75 hard, I lookedat the day one and day 75 and I

(30:56):
was like, yeah, I guess there'sa little more definition.
My face looked a little bitthinner, but I've had a tough
time putting out weight, butthen I looked at my, calves,
from running so much and doingmore, those types of that's
right.
That's right.
So that's probably the onlything that I've truly seen
physically noticeably.

(31:16):
Different.
And I think with rucking, it'sgoing to be across my whole
body.
I'll start to feel that samesort of strength.

Scott (31:22):
Yeah.
And I think it's, you're able todo it in a way that isn't as
extreme as trying to go fromlike couch to 5k, which is what
I did.
And so I love, and you can startwith 10 pounds and then 15 and
then 20, like there's a muchsmoother on ramp or gradient if
necessary, particularly forsomeone who was wildly out of
shape.

(31:43):
Even when I had lost the first50, 60 pounds.
I was still not in shape to run.

Michael (31:48):
Yeah, and I'll tell you what, I've walked 18 golfing,
right?
Carrying and I was ashamedbecause I was like, man, I
thought I was in good shape.
This kicked my, this kicked myass.
And so I guarantee this summerwhen I go out there and golf and
I'm carrying, it's going to feellike a dream.
It's going to be no problem.

(32:08):
So that's a huge win for me.

Scott (32:11):
Yes, sir.
All right, man.
Yeah I you all for listening toepisode 45 of the Reclaiming Man
podcast.
Hopefully you learned a littlebit about why.
Michael and I are all in onrucking in 2024.
So continue to follow along withour journey into rucking.
Michael will rock more milesthan me this year.
I can guarantee you that.

(32:33):
But I will rock more miles thananybody else I know.
So that's my commitment to you.
I know.

Michael (32:39):
So far you got me beat though.

Scott (32:42):
I'm at 10 and a half and you're right.
If, I am, if I do 211 miles in10 days, I'm also going to be
training.
So I guess we, all right, here'swhat we'll end with.
Michael and I will keep track ofour total miles rocked this year
and the winner gets a betterbody.

(33:06):
All right.
Challenge accepted.
Challenge accepted.
All right.
Love you, buddy.
See you next time.

Michael (33:11):
Yeah.