Social Workout

Going Deep

Free Diving Record and Mammalian Diving Reflex

News we missed: On September 25th, Natalia Molchanova of Moscow became the first woman to freedive to 100 meters. What, you ask? Freediving, as described in a recent profile of the sport by Alec Wilkinson in the New Yorker:

Modern free diving is a sport in which divers, in a single held breath, descend hundreds of feet, into cold and darkness; they often pass out before they return. It is frequently described as the world’s second most dangerous sport, after jumping off skyscrapers with parachutes....

The freediving record for men (in the hardcore "constant weight" category) is 122 meters. For women, reaching 100 meters had been a seemingly impossible barrier. Well, Natalia did it, diving off Sharm el Sheikh in Egypt. What's a free dive look like? Think of The Abyss, and please see amazing video after the jump. (Thanks to the Yoga Spy for the tip and thoughtful post on the mentality of freedivers and the connection between freediving and yoga's pranayma breathing.)

Crack of Dawn

CEO Fitness Bragging

Ever watchful, the SocialWorkout trendspotting team has detected a new one: Early morning workout bragging amongst CEOs.  Well, it's tough to brag about share prices these days, so maybe we should cut them a little slack.  Still, from Brady Dougan, Credit Suisse Group CEO, and his tales of 4:30 A.M. runs to Robert Iger, Disney CEO, and his descriptions of 4:30 A.M. exercise and multi-tasking sessions, these people make snoozing sound like the root of all evil. Sleeping till 6 A.M. or, heaven forbid, 7 A.M.? That's for sloths and losers, baby. Or, we wonder, is it just for people who aren't crazy! 

Breakfast

On Early Mornings and Raw Eggs

Tad Friend writes in recent New Yorker of 46-year-old Leo Nordine, a wunderkind broker of foreclosed real estate in Southern California. It's a moving tale of the desperate condition of SoCal real estate, but what jumps out at me is the description of Nordine's breakfast. To set the scene, Nordine is mid-property visit, and, nicely, about to spare a young mother from immediate eviction:

Nordine nudged aside a yapping poodle with his sneaker and listened attentively; customarily barefoot, he puts on shoes only to visit his properties and to skateboard. He also wore board shorts and a white T-shirt, having got up at 4:30 A.M. to hit his favorite surf break -- he is one of California's best paddle surfers -- then drink five raw eggs and eat raw slmon jerky, then fight at his local martial-arts studio. The whites of his green eyes gleamed, in that rackety kitchen, with almost accusatory health.

On Socialness

Why We Sweat Together

In the latest New Yorker, Atul Gawande writes about the horrors of solitary confinement. His piece begins:

Human beings are social creatures. We are social not just in the trivial sense that we like company, and not just in the obvious sense that we each depend on others. We are social in a more elemental way: simply to exist as a normal human being requires interaction with other people.

Deprived of human contact, we come apart at the seams. When measured by EEG, apparently, the trauma inflicted to brain by isolation appears not much different than that inflicted by physical injury.

It's an inappropriate leap, no doubt, but the thought occurs that this explains why we choose to pay good money to cram ourselves into overlit gyms and stuffy yoga studios to work out together. There are other, more practical explanations, of course: Larger spaces, machinery, the advantages of not sweating on your living room carpet. But the need to be with other people is not to be ignored.

After hours of staring at the screen, with instant message alerts echoing in my brain, I too begin to come apart at the seams. Often, I find, when my schedule is out of whack, I'll check myself into any group class: Give me retro aerobics, or kickboxing, or slow flow yoga, it doesn't matter. It's the getting out of my head that I crave. And there's some potential for human communion in those classes, often missed, or just glanced, that draws me.

I think for many of us living in the big city, working late, and returning to small spaces, the trip to gym or studio or dojo is about more than calories burned. It's about being near other people. And apparently that's just as important to our health as the actual exercise.