Kenny G and Omar Little

‘Listening to Kenny G’ is a documentary on HBO that made me love Kenny G. The Man is inspirational.

Kenny, like Baltimore’s famed stick up man Omar Little, has a code.

‘I don’t think there’s anything wrong with hard work, putting in the reps, and then reaping the reward.’

And now you’re asking, what does Kenny G have to do with fitness?

Fitness can be boring. We’ll help liven it up.

Time after time Kenny mentions practice.

He practices his saxophone 2+ hours every day.

I can’t even do things I like for 2 hours.

He practices to this day. He’s sold millions of records; He was one of the first 10 investors in Starbucks (actually true); He has nothing to prove; and he still embraces the mundanity of practice.

He makes a point that his kid’s see him practice.

That’s fitness. If you want to make a change in your strength/endurance/balance you have to practice. You can’t just practice the fun stuff you’re good at either. You have to embrace the boring, mundane stuff that needs improvement.

The Balance gym

The leading cause of accidental death past the age of 65 is falling. Everyone needs great balance.

But no one wants to train for great balance.

Some of your balance lives in your feet and ankles. The majority of balance comes from the vestibular organs of the inner ear.

Training the vestibular system is tedious.

I’m 20 days into a 70 day ‘Balance Gym’ program. My training involves me standing on one foot, eyes locked on a target, moving my head.

Or walking while my eyes are fixed on a distant object while I shake my head. It is no one’s idea of great fun.

On day one I test my balance. I manage to stand on one leg with my eyes closed for 13 seconds on the right, 20 seconds left. I test in about a half dozen times. Those were my best scores.

This week I stood on one foot, eyes closed, for 65 seconds right side, 73 seconds left. First time.

Go ahead and try standing on one foot with eyes closed. How’d it go? Now you understand what a huge improvement that is in a little over 2 weeks (15-20 minutes a day).

It’s tedious practice, like playing sax for 2 hours a day…

But it works.

In his book The Talent Code author Daniel Coyle describes how purposeful practice creates “myelin, a microscopic neural substance that adds vast amounts of speed and accuracy to your movements and thoughts. Scientists have discovered that myelin might just be the holy grail: the foundation of all forms of greatness, from Michelangelo’s to Michael Jordan’s. The good news about myelin is that it isn’t fixed at birth; to the contrary, it grows, and like anything that grows, it can be cultivated and nourished.”

Practice, Practice, Practice

Name an esteemed athlete, performer, or craftsman and there’s a story about the 10,000 hours of practice that came before the esteem. Their brains had to bank all that Myelin.

What you practice is also crucially important.

To improve balance I have to sharpen my Vestibulo ocular reflex. When I began training I was taught to train balance by exercising on one leg while standing on an unstable surface (which actually makes balance worse). It should come as no surprise that practicing bad balance gets you… bad balance.

Having a Coach who knows what you should practice is kind of important.

Here at Train we don’t play the sax; but anything regarding strength, balance, coordination, endurance… we have a coach who shared your goal.

Who did the work, built up the myelin.

Who can get you the result you’re looking for.

You can train always yourself, but you run the risk of standing on one leg, on an unstable surface, actively undermining the very goal you’re trying to achieve.