Day 0 of the JFK50
Tomorrow is the first day of a new 50-day training program for 50-mile marchers
Veterans Day is 50 days away.
That makes tomorrow Day 1 of a 50-day training program that will culminate in my annual 50-mile march.
I've come to think of the event as a benchmark. Have I maintained, improved, or degraded my health over the past year?
But the answer to that question is not yet set in stone. 50 days allows for a lot of conditioning.
MMA fighters do an 8-12 week "camp" in order to reach their peak fitness before their big fights. Tennis players do the same before Major tournaments, and I assume the same is true of other top competitors.
The “athlete of life” can train all year for the year-round competition that is life. But there is something to be said for a concentrated seasons of higher-intensity training. And absent a marquee athletic competition for everyday citizens, I had to invent one. Or rather, I had to revive the tradition that has given all of my physical efforts so much meaning over the past 6 years.
50 days is long enough to lose more than a few pounds of more than just water weight.
It’s long enough to gain some lean muscle or rather, build the underlying strength and adapt the body to the specific demand of long-distance walking.
Most importantly, it's long enough to develop sustainable, permanent habits so you don’t immediately revert to your old form.
And so, in the tradition of other time-limited challenges like 75 Hard, Whole 30, and Exodus 90, I propose the JFK 50.
The JFK50 Training Protocol
My training regimen this year will consist of daily walking/rucking (weighted walks), weekly runs, a focused and efficient strength program, plus mobility days between the harder workouts to recover. This will follow the four-day "Tetrad" cycle used by Philostratus in his ancient Roman gymnasium.
The other planks will include a flexible yet rigorous eating program that completely eliminates seed oils and junk food, and alternates between periods of high fat low carb, low-fat high-carb, and balanced macronutrients. I've modified Rob Faigin's macronutrient-cycling regime from Natural Hormone Enhancement, combining it with Ray Peat's pro-metabolic perspective and Anabology's "Honey Diet," to create a 5-day cycle that won't drive my wife crazy with absurd requests to change our family dinner routine due to my obsession with optimization.
After a long hiatus, I've returned to fasting (thanks Exodus!) and will be maintaining Wednesday and Fridays as OMAD—one meal a day—days.
My friend Michael Ostrolenk is one of my role models for disciplined peak performance. He recently reminded me of the ultimate importance of sleep.
So, I'm including a simple morning routine that includes hydration, stretching, grounding, and solar gazing, plus a wind-down routine of warm showers, baking soda, blue blockers and a consistent bed time of 9:30pm.
It's in vogue to mock the Huberman fanboys, who titrate their sun exposure to the exact lux level, weigh their supplements in grams, and dial in their morning routines to the millisecond. Much of that mockery is deserved. But taking society as a whole, are we erring on the side over-optimization, or under?
Sleep First, March Later
There's an essay by George Mack that starts with a thought experiment: If you woke up in a third-world jail cell, and could only call one person to help get you out… who do you call?
Sleep and the practices that support it are basic hygienes. I'd rather be mocked than be operating at 60% capacity.
Michael also reminded me of the importance of environmental design—are your surroundings contributing to the person you're trying to become?
First you create your environment; then your environment creates you.
For me, this means purging the pantry of things I don't want around, keeping my shopping list on point, and making my exercise platform an inviting place.
You might put a pull-up bar on the door of your office.
Even little things like positioning the shoes I wear for running at the door so they become signposts toward doing the thing I want to do.
It's easy to underestimate the power of inertia—both the static kind that keeps you stuck, and the kind that gets you where you're going.
And so every day of the JFK50, you are called to put one thing on your to-do list that changes your environment for the better.
The Five Pillars
In previous years, I've boiled down the 4 pillars of the march as:
Metabolic conditioning (your cardiovascular fitness)
Metabolic flexibility (your ‘fuel efficiency’)
Strength (resistance capacity)
Grit, or endurance
But there is a fifth column—a mental muscle of sorts, that only gets stronger when you exercise it:
Agency
It's become something of a buzzword thanks to George Mack, who wrote an excellent essay on the topic.
JFK was high agency (you don't get to be President without it).
Teddy Roosevelt was high agency.
Charlie Kirk, whatever you thought of the man, was high agency.
It's not unique to Americans, but to embody the American spirit is to act with agency and see possibilities where Old World thinking might see only constraints and the need for a permit.
I anticipate a breakout year and renaissance for the 50-mile march, not this year but soon.
A wave of energy has been unleashed across the country that doesn't have many clear or productive outlets.
2026 is the 250th birthday of the United States, which lends a certain symbolic punch.
RFK Jr. and Pete Hegseth recently provoked the predictable breathless headlines from NPR and the NY Times when they raced to complete 100 push ups and 50 pull ups in under 10 minutes; and Trump just signed an Executive Order to bring back the Presidential Fitness Challenge.
These seem like steps in the right direction, and I applaud them for their individual agency, but there is a grain of truth behind the criticisms that—absent other reforms—the challenge will amount to a humiliation ritual for the mass of obese and out-of-shape kids who have been de-conditioned by a steady diet of ultra-processed foods, seed oils, and high-fructose corn syrup, combined with increasingly screen-dominated sedentary habits.
My friend, the historical kinesiologist Ron Jones criticized RFK and Hegseth’s move as a kind of PR stunt, that is out of touch with the reality of how unfit the average young person is. He has a point.
Setting an impossibly high bar won't get them from "fat to fit" any more than telling a drowning person to swim like Michael Phelps will save them from sinking. You need stepping stones, not pole vaults.
Michael Ostrolenk also makes an excellent point about the need for better rites of passage.
"Right now, the rites of passage are like you get drunk, you get laid, maybe… That's the thing you did to make sure you're a man."
Indigenous cultures had challenges that helped boys become men through genuine hardship and accomplishment. The 50-mile march fills this void.
"I think we need to start much younger having these challenges,” Michael says, “Something a little bit more physically challenging that causes mental toughness, emotional resiliency, self-mastery to some degree... that helps them recognize that they're physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually capable of much more than our present-day culture suggests they are."
Rites of passage require preparation.
With a healthy lifestyle and the right training, attempting a 50 mile march shifts from an irresponsible impossibility to a fitting mega-challenge: a once-a-year-kind of trial that gives purpose to the other 364 days, and makes all the smaller hardships (mental and physical) seem quaint in comparison.
It's not impossible, but I also recognize that I’m getting to an age where if I don't prepare, I'm being foolish.
No One is Coming to Save You
There is a temptation to hope that solutions will come top-down from Washington D.C.
We can hope in earnest for structural, legislative and/or executive actions to unwind the perverse incentives in our food supply and environment that are making Americans sick.
But when it comes to physical activity, the best we can hope for is better role models.
I applaud Hegseth and RFK Jr. for putting some skin in the game, but we need thousands if not tens or hundreds of thousands of men taking up the call to embodied excellence.
JFK's line about asking what you can do for your country—though worn down to a cliche by decades of overuse—holds the answer to the question that Americans of good will are asking across the board.
What is to be done?
We don't need another Red Scare—however real the threat of leftism, communism fascism, or fill-in-the-blank may be.
And we don’t need ‘hate speech’ laws or some sort of warmed-over PATRIOT Act.
Wisdom suggests that those of us who feel ill about the direction of the country would be better off turning our attention to the areas under our greatest control.
Granted, self-improvement is a tired genre. I hate to think of myself as a knock-off Jordan Peterson, telling my readers to clean their room, or an Andrew Huberman reminding them to drink their AG-1.
But to the extent I have a platform, however small, I won't apologize for using it to encourage my readers to take responsibility for their health. Take responsibility for your strength. Increase your agency, your stamina, your energy, and your sense of purpose. Become a gritty, metabolically flexible, mentally resilient, well-rested, mission-driven beast.
Join the Beta Program
Over the next 50 days, I'll be sharing more specifics as I boot up my ‘pilot program’ with a few friends. And I’ll be sharing a few motivational readings, alongside some practical tips for training.
If you're interested in participating and organizing a march in your area, message me privately.
Stay tuned and stay moving.
Past Reflections
The Philosophy of the March
Stop Poasting, Start Marching - Why digital activism is no substitute for embodied action. The 50-mile march as antidote to online culture wars.
I Walked 50 Miles in a Day. Here's Why It's Worth Doing - The transformative power of voluntary hardship and what happens when you push past your perceived limits.
Are You Ready for What's Coming? - Physical preparedness as civic duty in an uncertain world.
Training & Transformation
The Mile 35 Shift - The epigenetic transformation that occurs during extreme endurance. Why mega-challenges create permanent change.
Get Light. Get Lit. - The spiritual and metabolic dimensions of shedding excess and building capacity.
The Ultimate Training Protocol - Combining ancient wisdom (Philostratus's Tetrad) with modern science for optimal training.
Lighter, Better, Faster, Stronger - Walking technique, footwear philosophy, and the lost art of natural movement.
The Movement
The JFK50 Challenge - Historical context and why Kennedy's fitness vision matters more than ever.
50-Mile Reboot - Lessons from failure and the importance of community in physical challenges.
Siempre Adelante - Always Forward