Idaho鈥檚 River of No Return Wilderness is a blast to explore until you smack into two uncomfortable facts:

1. You鈥檙e as far as you can get in the continental United States from the nearest paved road.
2. A big pine has crashed across the only trail that can get you out of there.

鈥淚 got this,鈥� said Patrick Brown, handing me the lead rope of his mule. He unknotted a few ropes on the mule鈥檚 pack and carefully pulled out his lumberjack saw: six feet of shark-toothed steel known to old-timers as a 鈥渕isery whip.鈥� Patrick was a mule-packer for the National Park Service and ran into this kind of logjam all the time. I鈥檇 never seen a crosscut in action before, so I settled down for what I thought would be a long wait. Within seconds, I was back on my feet, riveted.

Patrick had that thing singing. He threw his whole heft into each stroke, making the teeth growl on their way in and ting-ting-ting like chorus bells on the pull back. Every bendable joint in his body was getting a piece of the action. Patrick would rear back with his fists high in his right armpit, then lunge like a fencer, following through in a grunting thrust with his back and arms. Sawdust was rocketing out of the groove. Within minutes鈥�15 maybe? no more than 20鈥攈e鈥檇 taken a chunk out of that beast and we were on our way.

When I got home to Pennsylvania, it took only one afternoon with a chainsaw before I was scouring eBay for a crosscut of my own. I couldn鈥檛 stand the chainsaw鈥檚 scream anymore, and after watching Patrick cut loose with his backwoods Pilates, it suddenly felt stupid to just stand there and let a machine do all the work. Luckily, I found a ton of old crosscuts for sale, which I guess shouldn鈥檛 have surprised me. Crosscuts have been around forever, while chainsaws aren鈥檛 much older than boxer briefs. The first one-man chainsaw was invented in the 1950s, and that brute was so heavy and wildly dangerous that it took nearly 20 years before a homeowner鈥檚 version was available. Until then, just about anyone who had a fireplace had a crosscut hanging out back in the shed. It was only around the time your dad was giving up on bell-bottoms and suede vests that backyard machinery took over for manpower.

Patrick had that thing singing. He threw his whole heft into each stroke, making the teeth growl on their way in and ting-ting-ting like chorus bells on the pull back.

You know what that means, right? For thousands of years, some of the cleverest designers in the world were working to make the misery whip a perfect extension of the human body. They had to, because before we could do anything else鈥攂efore we could raise pyramids, plant crops, hammer together homes, build the Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria鈥攚e had to take down trees. Crosscuts settled the West and fed your great-grandpa. On the Hot 100 of Top Tools, they鈥檙e up there with spears and fire. Even Leonardo da Vinci dabbled in saw design, sketching the first known teeth that could cut on both the push and pull stroke.

I understood in a flash exactly what all those centuries of R&D were about when I got my hands on my first crosscut. (Yes, 鈥渇irst.鈥� Once you get hooked and discover you can buy a beaut for around 60 bucks, it鈥檚 a quick ride from beginner to collector.) I hoisted a locust log into a sawbuck I鈥檇 built out of a few two-by-fours and, with a few short strokes, scratched out a preliminary cut. With a groove established to guide the blade, I began to relax into it, letting the saw do most of the work, until I was gliding back and forth in a motion not much harder than pushing a kid on a swing set.

Sawing by hand is harder and way slower, no argument, but it鈥檚 also irresistible.

Only when I stopped for a break did I realize my shirt was soaked through. For pure functional fitness, the misery whip is a one-stop gym; it requires good posture, range of motion, endurance, and pacing. Jack Dempsey knew that: before his title bouts, the Manassas Mauler always brought a crosscut and an ax to fight camp to strengthen his grip and lengthen his reach. Know who else trained with a crosscut? The stars of Boys in the Boat, the underdog amateur rowers from Seattle who defeated the world鈥檚 best to win the gold medal in the 1936 Olympics.

Here鈥檚 why: sawing by hand is harder and way slower, no argument, but it鈥檚 also irresistible. Once you get started, you don鈥檛 want to stop. Even after your arms are fried and every muscle in your back is urging you to call it a day, you鈥檒l be tempted to push through one more slice. It feels like real work, not just a workout. Something true. Important. How often can you say that about exercise? When you walk out of the gym and someone asks you what you did, what can you say? Just a bunch of numbers. Ten reps of this, 20 minutes of that鈥攏othing especially memorable for you or useful for anyone else.

Now try answering that question after hanging up your crosscut for the day. You don鈥檛 have to say a word. All you have to do is jerk your thumb over your shoulder at the stack of fragrant oak waiting for that first frosty evening. And the best part is you don鈥檛 even need a fireplace. You don鈥檛 even need your own trees. Because someone close to you does鈥攁 neighbor or a buddy who鈥檚 been too busy with work and his new baby to clear the deadfall in his backyard. There is no bottle of wine or box of Omaha steaks they鈥檒l appreciate more than the cord of firewood their buddy cut for them.

And when it comes to sweat equity, you won鈥檛 find a much better way in your daily life to live up to the Ancient Greek definition of a hero: applying strength and skill in pursuit of 虫别苍颈补鈥�compassion, or just plain old usefulness. 滨迟鈥檚 been 14 years since I began cutting our winters鈥� wood each year with a crosscut, and in that time, I haven鈥檛 once stumbled across a burning door that I needed to kick down to rescue a toddler. But the opportunity to 鈥渂e fit to be useful鈥濃�攁s George H茅bert, that old French fitness guru, put it鈥攁rrives every weekend.

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鈥淪o, because of your own attention deficiency,鈥� was saying, 鈥淚鈥檓 sure you鈥檝e had to鈥斺��

鈥淲ait,鈥� I interrupted. 鈥淚 don鈥檛 have ADHD.鈥�

For a few beats, we looked each other over and considered our positions. We were backstage at Harvard University, about to step out for a panel discussion on natural human potential. Ratey is the Harvard psychiatrist who wrote Spark, the groundbreaking book about the brain鈥檚 creative mayhem, and I was the sweaty guy whose most vivid memory of grammar school was being sent to stand in the hallway so often that I could walk across the street and buy a hot dog at the convenience store without anyone noticing.

鈥淚鈥檓 not trying to diagnose you, of course,鈥� Ratey said, but he didn鈥檛 have to. Things were starting to make sense.听

Put any animal in a zoo and more than likely it will develop anger issues, disordered eating, sexual dysfunction, and circulatory problems. In other words, it turns into us.

I spent the first nine months that I was working on Born to Run sitting down to write at 5:30 every morning and staying there until dark鈥攁nd getting nowhere. Eventually, I flipped it: I goofed around all day, running trails and cutting firewood and saying 鈥淵up鈥� to any weird favor from neighbors. The only firm commitment in my weekly calendar was a Tuesday-morning run with my wife on Pennsylvania鈥檚 Conestoga Trail. But each night after dinner鈥攁fter I鈥檇 charged around all day鈥擨 finally sat down and got to it. It worked: every night, I settled in and turned out a smooth flow of pages.

I was still patting myself on the back for my self-medicating genius when I realized that it wasn鈥檛 mine at all. My dad had been chucked out of his parents鈥� house as a teenager and came off the streets of West Philly to put himself through college on the GI Bill after serving in the Marines during the Korean War. When he had three kids of his own and a day job as a telephone lineman, he decided to muscle his way through law school at night, studying on his feet to stay awake. After he passed the bar exam and had to wear a tie to work for the first time in his life, he began strapping on a pair of black Chuck Taylors each morning before dawn to jog around the block for a half-hour. Those runs got longer and longer, until every autumn he was clocking at least two marathons: always the Marine Corps, plus Philly or New York or both. He invented a training method that鈥檚 so ball-busting, to this day I鈥檝e never pulled it off: beginning each spring, he matched his daily mileage to the month and doubled it on Sunday. Four miles a day in April, eight on Sunday; five a day in May, ten on Sunday; come October, he was hammering out 80 miles a week, 30 of them on the weekend. No rest days.

I always figured he was a master of discipline, until I began following in his footsteps and realized that it was the exact opposite. Those were his moments to get naked and go savage. Put any animal in a zoo and more than likely it will develop anger issues, disordered eating, sexual dysfunction, and circulatory problems. In other words, it turns into us. We鈥檝e created our own cages, and we鈥檙e paying the same price. Unless, the way my dad showed me, we learn to bust out the door and let ourselves run wild.

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Human evolution, you鈥檒l be happy to hear, has officially let you off the hook: 滨迟鈥檚 normal and healthy to hate the gym. Here鈥檚 even better news: There鈥檚 a way you can never go back and still get into true Olympian shape. You just have to learn one simple movement flow: the Traveling Maxercist.

Your true enemy when it comes to fitness 颈蝉苍鈥檛 laziness. 滨迟鈥檚 ancestry. We鈥檙e hunter-gatherers at heart鈥攃reatures of movement鈥攚hich makes us hardwired to respond to variety. Our eye is out for new frontiers, not the old terrain we鈥檝e already picked over. 滨迟鈥檚 made us the most restless animal ever to walk the earth, so hungry for fresh hunting grounds that we鈥檙e not even satisfied with our own planet. Two million years of adaptation have developed a brain that rewards us with a burst of endorphins whenever we push into the unpredictable, even if it鈥檚 just running outside on a trail in the wind instead of on a treadmill. That glow of exhilaration that warms you from the inside out is your body鈥檚 reminder that this鈥攖he variety of pace, terrain, temperature, and strength demands鈥攊s what鈥檚 best for your body and the species.

That鈥檚 why when old-school gyms needed trainers, they hired fighters. Nobody knew natural movement better than boxers, because they either got it right or got demolished. When young Teddy Roosevelt showed up at Wood鈥檚 Gymnasium in Manhattan as a sickly teenager, 鈥淧rofessor鈥� John Wood shoved Teddy right into the hands of John Long, a professional pug. Together, the fighter and the novice tackled 鈥渂eautiful and effective combined exercises鈥�: swinging on parallel bars, twirling Indian clubs, vaulting gymnastics horses, shuttle running with a medicine ball. Teddy learned about strength rings: two circles of steel that opponents grip between them. The object is to yank and twist until the other guy loses his grip or footing. 鈥淭hey bring into play every joint and muscle of the body,鈥� one of Wood鈥檚 students affirmed, and it was an approach that Roosevelt never abandoned; as president, he鈥檇 invite soldiers into the White House to spar with him using cudgels. Even in his fifties, Roosevelt was strong and agile enough to swim the Potomac and climb the cliffs of Rock Creek Park鈥攐ften in the same night.听

Until the 1970s, that鈥檚 what gyms were like: big, open warehouse spaces that allowed skillful movement, range of motion, and body-weight exercise. But functional movement has one major flaw, at least if you鈥檙e a gym owner. Mobility is murder on profit margins. You can have only so many clients lurching around with medicine balls and wooden clubs before they start klonking each other into the emergency room, which means you鈥檝e got to limit how many paying customers come through the door. To really cash in, you鈥檇 have to figure out a way to make everyone stay put. You鈥檇 have to come up with something that looked enough like natural movement to get people to pay but without all the messy mobility. Something stationary. Something like鈥�

Bodybuilding. It was perfect. Especially because, in 1976, a little indie film transformed it from weird underground cult into Hollywood gold. Before , the entire audience at bodybuilding鈥檚 premier championship could fit inside a school bus. Its biggest star, Arnold Schwarzenegger, was barely getting by as a pinup model for brown-wrapper men鈥檚 mags. 鈥淚t was a tiny little world,鈥� Charlie Butler, Pumping Iron鈥檚 director, would say. 鈥淪o he was the king of 300 people.鈥澨�

Until the 1970s, gyms were big, open warehouse spaces that allowed skillful movement, range of motion, and body-weight exercise. But functional movement听is murder on profit margins.

But behind the beefcake, drama was brewing. Lou Ferrigno, the deaf and brooding Brooklyn giant with the domineering dad, was determined to dethrone Arnold, the golden prince of Venice Beach. Ferrigno was tormented, hungry, and huge. Arnold was handsome, charming, and diabolical. Surrounding them was a crazy court of knights and jesters, all oiling each others鈥� backs while looking for a spot to sink the knife. Butler couldn鈥檛 believe his luck. He鈥檇 stumbled across the spiciest of melodramas, a Macbeth in banana hammocks played out by a hard-partying pack of near-naked men. It made an amazing movie and a nice bit of stage magic; we saw Lou and Arnold and Franco and believed we were being shown the path to amazing fitness, when actually we were witnessing for the first time what anabolic steroids could do to the human body.听

Looking back, the fraud should have been obvious. Didn鈥檛 it seem weird that every man in the film was more developed than any other man on the planet had ever been? But that鈥檚 why Pumping Iron was such a sensation. No one had ever seen a body like Arnold鈥檚, and for good reason: The drugs hadn鈥檛 existed. Nobody can pack that much muscle mass onto a human frame by natural means, as Harvard researcher Dr. Harrison Pope would prove in his expos茅s of bodybuilding techniques; it鈥檚 just not physically possible. If you really want to look like Arnold, you鈥檇 better invest in injectables and find a vein.

We weren鈥檛 shown that, of course. Pumping Iron didn鈥檛 film the furtive injections of Dianabol and estrogen, the man-breasts and shrunken testicles, the home experimentation with drugs linked to cancer, dementia, uncontrollable anger, and strokes. Instead, we were delivered a new male body fantasy鈥�supersize me鈥攁nd a new standard of fitness: What you look like is more important than what you can do.

Instead, you isolate one body part and tear it down, repeating the same movement over and over until the muscle begins to tear. Basically, you鈥檙e injuring yourself; the soreness and swelling you feel is an emergency reaction as blood rushes in to immobilize the damaged area. Pain, perversely, was now a selling point. In the short term, all you did was temporarily pump the muscle up like a balloon. In the long term, you ignored many important surrounding muscles. This leads to imbalances that will inevitably leave you injured as soon as you put your new physique into action playing an actual sport. But so what? Isolation got you huge, and that鈥檚 what mattered. Feel the burn. Get big!

The timing couldn鈥檛 have been better. Just as gyms began pushing the stay-put approach, the perfect stay-put device fell into their laps. In 1970, a bizarre character from Florida showed up at the Mr. America competition with his pet invention, the 鈥淏lue Monster.鈥� Arthur Jones was a chain-smoking high school dropout turned big-game hunter who鈥檇 married six wives, shot 63 elephants, and spent his downtime trying to overfeed his 14-foot alligator to Guinness World Record size. He was also a self-taught mechanic who鈥檇 built an exercise machine with a kidney-shaped cam. Because the gear also resembled a seashell, Jones renamed his creation the .

Nautilus machines were ideal for keeping people stationary. They were so compact that you could fit four people into a small space without worrying they鈥檇 smack into each other. You didn鈥檛 even need to carry a weight over from a rack; you just sat on a padded seat and reached for smooth plastic handles. 鈥淭he idea of a health club really changed. It became big business. It was Arthur Jones that started that,鈥� a Nautilus colleague would after Jones died in 2007. 鈥淢r. Jones鈥� invention,鈥� the article went on to say, 鈥渓ed to the 鈥榤achine environment鈥� that is prevalent today in health clubs.鈥�

Okay. But given modern lifestyles, 颈蝉苍鈥檛 the gym better than nothing?

No鈥攂ecause to most people, it is nothing. That鈥檚 statistical fact. The average annual dropout rate at health clubs is astonishing. More than 60 percent of members who enroll in January are gone by April. Rather than being ashamed of offering a product that over half its clients find tedious, repetitive, and unpleasant, health clubs bank on it. Gyms routinely oversubscribe by up to 500 percent, taking money from five times as many people as could ever fit inside. Sure, it gets a little crowded after New Year鈥檚 (鈥渃attle call鈥� gets thrown around a lot), but every other person soon disappears. That would cripple most industries, but thanks to the power of guilt and magical thinking, people keep coming back for more. Even during the darkest days of the recession, health clubs continued making a mint off a product that the majority of its own customers hate.

Steve Maxwell 颈蝉苍鈥檛 shocked by the dirty secrets of gym owners, because for many years, he was one. Maxwell trained pro athletes and pudgy newcomers alike in his popular Philadelphia sweat shop, and one thing he realized is the stupidity and dishonesty of the 鈥渨illpower model.鈥� We keep blaming people for not going to the gym by saying they lack discipline, Maxwell says, but if you鈥檙e relying on willpower to get in shape, you鈥檙e doomed. 鈥淚f you hate something, you ain鈥檛 doing it. You may come roaring out like a lion, and maybe even stick it out for a surprising amount of time, but the writing is on the wall.鈥�

So quit making promises you won鈥檛 keep, he suggests. Instead, try the 鈥淭raveling Maxercist,鈥� an exercise flow he created that works every muscle and movement chain in the body and is so well rooted in the pleasure of natural movement that willpower may no longer be an issue. For inspiration, Maxwell looked to the first and most formidable of the ancient Olympians: wrestlers.

鈥淚 originally came upon the Maxercist concept while attempting to figure out exercise combinations to simulate the stresses of a prolonged grappling or MMA fight,鈥� he says. 鈥淚t was my desire to include all elements of human movement encountered in a grappling match: pushing, pulling, static strength, strong core activation, grip, [plus] hip, spine, and shoulder mobility 鈥� all while under a high cardio stress.鈥�

But as complicated as it sounds, the Traveling Maxercist couldn鈥檛 be simpler. The basic positions are modeled on familiar yoga poses, and the only real trick is concentration: The end of each movement is the beginning of the next, so you can鈥檛 zone out the way you would on a bicep bench. 鈥淵ou must focus on what you鈥檙e doing and concentrate on connecting the movements together into a super-flowing kinetic chain,鈥� Maxwell explains. 鈥淭his requires a filtering out of external stimulus鈥攜ou must be here now鈥攁nd that鈥檚 excellent practice for high-level athleticism.鈥澨�

Think you can survive the Traveling Maxercist? Scroll up to the video for complete instructions.

听

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Step on any lawn, and chances are you鈥檙e crushing a plateful of Leda Meredith鈥檚 high-performance superfoods.

Like lady鈥檚 thumb. That stuff is everywhere, in every front yard you鈥檝e ever seen, but until Leda told me that it鈥檚 actually a nutrient-packed cousin of buckwheat, I鈥檇 always just mowed it down and shot it out the chute along with bluegrass clippings and severed dandelions. (That鈥檚 a confession I鈥檒l soon regret: 鈥淣ot all the dandelions?鈥� Leda asks, knowing in her heart I鈥檓 about to disappoint her. 鈥淵ou don鈥檛 even harvest the young 辞苍别蝉?鈥�)

Leda is a professional forager, a job made no easier by the fact that she lives in Queens, works in Brooklyn, and spent the better part of her life as a professional ballerina. I invited her over to see if she could find any edibles around my house, and within two steps of the back door, she鈥檚 already yanking and snipping. 鈥淎h, look at this! Wild mustard,鈥� she says, stuffing some weeds into a plastic grocery bag. 鈥淗ere鈥檚 burdock鈥� and lady鈥檚 thumb鈥� and look up there!鈥� She points toward the edge of the property, where a villainous patch of purplish stalks has been growing for years despite my attempts to wipe it out with everything short of Agent Orange. I鈥檝e literally tried firepower, and the stuff keeps growing back right through the scorched earth.

鈥淭丑补迟鈥檚 pokeweed,鈥� she says.

鈥淭丑补迟鈥檚 poison,鈥� I reply. 鈥淕oats won鈥檛 even eat it, and they like poison ivy.鈥�

Here in Lancaster County, we sons and daughters of have many differences but one common foe: pokeweed. We鈥檝e all got it, and we all hate it.

鈥湵醭兮�檚 only harmful when it鈥檚 mature,鈥� Leda explains. 鈥淲hen it鈥檚 young鈥攔ight when the shoots are coming up鈥攊t鈥檚 healthy and delicious, like fresh asparagus.鈥� Pokeweed is also an ultratough perennial, as years of frustration have taught me firsthand; you can hack the crap out of it, and every spring its deep taproot will still send up new growth.

Before long, Leda has a crazy amount of greenery crammed into her foraging bags and she鈥檚 ready to whip up a meal. I lead her into the kitchen, molding my face into what I hope is a polite amount of phony enthusiasm. Leda is a whiz and this is a fun little experiment, but I know that once she鈥檚 gone, there are better odds of me eating human flesh than anything in my lawn鈥�

Until I catch a whiff of what she鈥檚 up to at the stove, and my stomach starts changing my mind.

I first tracked down Leda because of an odd experience I had on Crete. I hiked across the island several times while researching a crazy adventure by a band of World War II Resistance fighters, and everywhere I went, I came across people plucking weeds from stone walls and sidewalks. Anywhere life could grow, some Cretan was swooping down and carrying it home.

Where, I discovered, it was all being tossed together in the ancestral island wonder food known as horta. Which is? Well, here鈥檚 how Leda puts it:

鈥淓very spring, there came a moment when Yia-Yia Lopi, my great-grandmother, stubbed out her Kool menthol cigarette and declared that it was the right day to gather horta in the park,鈥� she describes in her wonderful memoir, . 鈥淭he timing had to be just right: too soon and the leaves would be too small, too late and they鈥檇 be too bitter. Yia Yia was the expert on when to go because she鈥檇 grown up picking wild edibles in Greece.鈥� Back in the kitchen, the women steamed their free-range pickins and mixed them with olive oil and chopped garlic. 鈥淭heir eyes would gleam,鈥� Leda notes. 鈥淭he first wild greens of spring were better to them than chocolate.鈥�

The trick to making a tastier-than-M&M鈥檚 horta is all in the assembly. You can鈥檛 just chuck in any weed or too many of one type. Crete alone has more than 100 varieties of wild-growing edibles, so the true horta artist is constantly adding and adjusting that day鈥檚 recipe by how much dandelion, purslane, lamb鈥檚-quarter, chicory, sorrel and other varietals are available. The greens are then braised and tossed with garlic, pepper, and a citrusy squirt of lemon. Add a little olive oil for fat and flavor, and you鈥檝e got a nutritional powerhouse of iron, calcium, omega-3 fatty acids, plus an alphabet soup of vitamins.

鈥淪tomach problems, skin disorders, breathing difficulties, even emotional uneasiness鈥攜ou can treat them all with so-called weeds,鈥� Leda says. Her mother was a ballerina with a Los Angeles ballet company, so Leda was mostly raised by her grandmother, a Greek immigrant who lived in San Francisco and often foraged in Golden Gate Park. Leda later followed her mother into dance, and during her years on tour, she鈥檇 often shock her fellow ballerinas by turning up for rehearsal with her arms covered in angry scratches after a morning spent rooting among nettles and greenbriers. After she retired from full-time performing, Leda went back to school to study ethnobotany and turned herself into one of America鈥檚 very few professional foragers.

Now, Leda can cruise through Brooklyn鈥檚 none-too-culinary-looking Prospect Park and scavenge together a meal in minutes. 鈥淭he parks department has a limited weed-control budget, which is great for me,鈥� she says. 鈥淧eople have no idea what鈥檚 right here.鈥� One of her favorite spots, just for the irony, is right outside the fancy-pants Park Slope Food Coop. Inside, lamb鈥檚-quarter sells for rib-eye prices of $7.50 a pound; outside, it grows free along the curb. 鈥湵醭兮�檚 too bad we鈥檝e developed this mentality that if it鈥檚 free and natural, it can鈥檛 be good,鈥� Leda says.

Horta is such a superfood that you can even fry it into fast food and it鈥檚 still more nutritious than any produce you can buy. Researchers from Austria and Greece performed a chemical analysis of a Cretan fried pie in 2006 and were struck by two things: the sheer variety of the horta filling and the sky-high levels of vitamins, antioxidants, and essential fatty acids. The bite-sized crescents called kalitsounia are typically packed with a combination of fennel, wild leeks, sow thistle, hartwort, corn poppy, sorrel, and Queen Anne鈥檚 lace, all of it growing wild. 鈥淚n most cases,鈥� the researchers concluded, 鈥渢he wild greens had higher micronutrient content than those cultivated.鈥�

鈥淭hese will blow your mind,鈥� Leda says.

Out of my oven, she鈥檚 pulling a cookie tray of garlic-mustard greens baked into chips鈥攁nd, good gravy, she鈥檚 right. They鈥檙e salty and tangy and perfectly crisped. On another tray are gingko nuts, those hard little kernels found in those gooshy stinkberries that litter city sidewalks. Leda shucked the mushy coating and baked the kernels, then tossed them in soy sauce. While I鈥檓 demolishing the snacks, Leda is spooning out a pesto she whizzed together from field garlic, dandelion, bishop鈥檚 weed, and black walnuts. She鈥檚 serving it over pasta, but often she鈥檒l use it to dress a salad of roasted root vegetables: carrots, apple, red onion, potato, parsnips, and celery root. Today鈥檚 main course is a little meatier: broiled flank steak, sliced thin and sprinkled with chopped field garlic.

滨迟鈥檚 a fabulous meal but a vexing problem: Without a chain-smoking Yia-Yia around to show me the ropes, how can I trust what I鈥檓 plucking? Books are helpful, but not enough: Wild greens in pictures all kind of look alike, and they鈥檙e usually photographed in bloom, when they鈥檙e prettiest but past their prime. If you eat the wrong greens, your best-case scenario is missing out on the nutritional and medicinal benefits you鈥檙e looking for. Worst case: Poison Control.

So Leda offers two bedrock rules:

1) First and last: 鈥淲hen in doubt, leave it out.鈥�
2) Every moment in between: Let xen铆a be your guide.听

Xen铆a is Greek for compassion, and along with strength and skill, it鈥檚 one of the three key ingredients in hero training. But the ancients had a much grittier notion of compassion than we do: Deep down, they realized it has nothing to do with sweetness, or charity, or even trading favors. 滨迟鈥檚 really about saving your own ass, not someone else鈥檚. Compassion is your social spiderweb, a protective netting of highly sensitive strands that connects you to your kinfolk and alerts you the instant one of them runs into the kind of trouble that can find its way back to you. We like to put on our halos and think of compassion as an angelic virtue, but it really springs from our raw animal need to figure out what鈥檚 going on around us and the smartest way to respond.

Do compassion right, and you instantly detect changes in body language, voice pitch, and behavior. You hear what 颈蝉苍鈥檛 being said and see what 颈蝉苍鈥檛 being shown. Compassion demands patience, focus, and mental retention, but the payoff is self-preservation: You may look like a saint, but by helping those in need, you鈥檙e fortifying your own fortress of friends. Special Forces fighters call this 鈥渟ituational awareness鈥濃�攁 constant mental scan of your environment so you鈥檙e always up to the second on the best and worst way out of any situation.

Sounds way easier than knife throwing, Stotan training, and Parkour, right? But simple as it seems, xen铆a is tougher to develop than strength and skill, because it takes longer and 颈蝉苍鈥檛 nearly as fun. You have to dial down your focus to just one thing, paying attention to how it鈥檚 changed from yesterday to today and compares to other just-one-things you鈥檝e studied before. The benefits can be life-changing, which explains why has sold way more copies than a book that boring really should. All 419 pages can be boiled down to one gorgeous point: Train your attention-paying muscles鈥攜our 鈥渆yes that hear and ears that see鈥濃�攁nd they鈥檒l serve you wherever you go, no matter what you do. Awareness is the all-access laminate, a lift ticket you can punch on any slope.

And it all begins, Leda says, with this droopy stalk in her hand.

鈥淪tart with something you see all the time, like lady鈥檚 thumb,鈥� she tells me. She holds it up on her palm so I can see the wilted-looking leaves, the tiny red seed balls, the darkish smudge like a thumbprint that inspired its nickname. 鈥淭hose are your identifiers. Soak them in, and you鈥檒l instantly recognize lady鈥檚 thumb like a friend鈥檚 face. Then you add one more plant鈥攍ike garlic-mustard鈥� and pretty soon, you鈥檒l be seeing friends all over the place.鈥�

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Sink into a chair, and before long, the chair sinks into you.

That鈥檚 what has learned from people who come to him with nagging injuries鈥攖hose twinging heels and sore groins, dodgy hamstrings and aching backs that just won鈥檛 go away. Maxwell has been fixing the bodies of world-class fighters鈥攈is own included鈥攆or nearly 40 years, and he鈥檚 been remarkably successful because the wisdom he taps into is even older. Ever since his days as a Division 1 college wrestling champ and throughout his career as a Brazilian jiujitsu teacher and belt holder, Maxwell has been studying ancient grappling science to see how traditional fighters managed to heal themselves and get back in the ring with no access to ultrasound, ibuprofen, or even ice. He used that knowledge to make his tough Philly gym, , a destination for years for both federal agents and mixed martial artists (as well as the training base for his son, world-champion grappler Zak Maxwell), but it was only after he sold the business and went on the road as a consultant and traveling scholar that Maxwell made what could be his biggest discovery.

His breakthrough came when he discovered a link between the brutal training of Hindu wrestlers and the odd spinning rituals of Sufi monks known as whirling dervishes. The holy men weren鈥檛 just dancing, Maxwell realized; they were taking a page from the brawlers and rehabbing their bodies. Monks were the couch potatoes and Internet addicts of their day, spending insane amounts of time frozen in prayer and hunched over texts. All that butt time takes a toll on backs and knees and hips. Maxwell believes the monks picked up a self-healing tip from their spiritual brothers鈥攖he wrestlers鈥攚ho were also considered a sacred caste.

Maxwell calls the technique 鈥渧estibular reset,鈥� after the internal gyroscope we all have in our inner ears. Sit too long, and your vestibular system gets out of whack. You lose your sense of where your body is in relation to the ground; that鈥檚 when the fuse starts sizzling toward an injury. And why?

鈥淏ecause everyone slumps in their own way,鈥� Maxwell explains one afternoon. We鈥檙e in the shed behind the house where I work. He鈥檚 assessing the way I typically sprawl in my desk chair. 鈥湵醭兮�檚 not just the fact that you鈥檙e sitting that causes problems. When you stand up, the way you slump鈥攖he way your back has molded around the chair鈥攊s going to affect the way you move.鈥�

In my case, I鈥檓 pretty much the Maxell speakers guy with a few degrees of leftward lean. Someday, Maxwell promises, that鈥檚 going to bollix my hardware and software, if it hasn鈥檛 already: My constant slump is going to throw off both my posture and my posture awareness. My inner ear will adapt to the new coordinates so that when I鈥檓 hunched over, I鈥檒l feel like I鈥檓 ramrod straight. I won鈥檛 even know when I鈥檓 off-center. Awful will become the new normal.

鈥淓ven people who work out still end up sitting more than they move each day,鈥� Maxwell points out. 鈥淎nd your body adapts to what you do most.鈥�

Maxwell has a remedy: his own version of the vestibular reset, which he鈥檚 designed as an equally effective but less dizzying way to follow in the whirling footsteps of the dervishes and reboot healthy movement patterns. All you need is about 10 minutes a few times a week to put yourself through the same balance initiation you went through as a baby. The results, Maxwell promises, will blow your mind. He knows鈥攈e鈥檚 his own best customer.

鈥淚 carried chronic tension and pain in my mid-back for years,鈥� he says. 鈥淢obility and breath tension-release exercises never got rid of it. After a couple weeks of 鈥榖aby training,鈥� my back has never been this tension-free. The exercises are as simple or complicated as you want to make them. They can be really easy or so challenging that even a high-level athlete would find it difficult.鈥�

First, Maxwell wants to measure the damage. Stiffening 颈蝉苍鈥檛 just another part of aging, he points out; it鈥檚 a death sentence. You鈥檙e nearly seven times more likely to die within the next six years(!) if you need both hands and knees to get up from the floor. We鈥檙e creatures of mobility, so when we give up our ability to move, we鈥檙e signaling our body that it鈥檚 time to shut down. Luckily, the damage can be reversed if it鈥檚 caught in time. So Maxwell has me get out of the chair and step up against the wall. My head juts out a good four inches, and my arms torque inward as if I were still reaching for a keyboard.

鈥淣ow let鈥檚 get outside,鈥� he says, 鈥渁nd take a few years off you.鈥�

The reset, I鈥檓 shocked to discover, is a blast. I thought he was going to rack me out with all kind of grunting pretzel poses, but instead I鈥檓 rolling and crawling and generally monkeying around. 鈥淚 do some form of this every single day,鈥� Maxwell notes. 鈥淚 also get up from my iPad and do the rocking, marching in place, and baby crawl as a reset to balance out the sitting on the chair.鈥� Best of all, there鈥檚 no right or wrong way to assemble your own reset. Just pick from the menu and, baby-style, do whatever you want.

Watch Steve Maxwell explain the vestibular reset in this video:

The Vestibular Reset

Rolling Over
Roll from side to side (back to stomach and back). Do each roll eight times on both sides (16 total reps).

1. Roll over with arm, leg, and head.
2. Roll over with arm and head only.
3. Roll over with leg only.
4. Roll over with head only (don鈥檛 use your legs or arms to help).

Advanced Challenges

1. Roll across the room without touching the floor with your arms, legs, or head!
2. The 鈥渉ard roll鈥�: Roll left and right from the back without pushing off or assisting with your hands or feet and keeping your elbow in contact with the opposite knee. There should be no separation. Very challenging.
3. Roll across the room on your stomach and holding your ankles (how pose position).

Commando Crawl
Crawl for three minutes total, alternating forward and backwards.

1. Crawl forward using your forearms and thighs in a cross-crawl pattern. Keep the hips down and the head and chest high.
2. Crawl backwards using the cross-crawl pattern of forearm and opposite knee.

Rocking
Do each move 16 times.

1. Rock back and forth from all fours鈥攈ands and knees (head up with butt to heels, and rock forward until the hips touch the floor).
2. Rock back and forth from all fours鈥攅lbows and knees (bring your hips back to the heels and then to the floor).
3. Without allowing the knees to touch or moving the hands, rock from a support position on your hands and toes (butt to heels and hips to floor). Keep your head up.

Baby Crawling
On hands and knees, crawl in each direction for one minute.

1. Crawl forward, making sure that the opposite hand and knee touch simultaneously.
2. Crawl backwards, making sure that your opposite knee and hand touch at the same time.
3. Crawl laterally to the left, and then to the right.
4. Crawl in a tight square. Four 鈥渟teps鈥� forward, four right, four backwards, four left. Repeat in the reverse direction.

Crawling Challenges

1. Leopard crawl: This is almost identical to baby crawling, but keep your knees off the floor and hips even with the shoulders. Your head stays up with the chest pushed forward. Take small steps at first鈥攖his uses every muscle in your body. Crawl forward for one minute, and then crawl backwards for one minute. Take care to keep the opposite limbs moving simultaneously.
2. Sideways crawl: Start with knees together and hands apart, then move the knees apart and bring the hands together. The opposite hand and knee work together. Many find this pattern very challenging, but that鈥檚 what the reset patterning is all about. It stimulates the brain in a positive way. Crawl on each side for one minute.
3. Spider-Man crawl: This is the ultimate, because it demands strength, balance, and constant attention to form. Unlike a bear crawl, which can get sloppy and allow your spine to sag, the Spider-Man Crawl requires you to keep your hips stay below the shoulders while your head and chest remain upright. Prepare to fall over a few times, but stick with it: 鈥淵our resulting fitness will be amazing,鈥� Maxwell promises. Start with just one minute and build from there. Add a few seconds each day. Your goal is five minutes nonstop.

Marching
This is a great vestibular reset. 滨迟鈥檚 surprisingly cardio. Emphasize standing tall and lifting the opposite leg and arm. The rear hand reaches back to the thigh at waist height, as if reaching for your back pocket. Notice how the forefoot contacts the floor first, and then the heel. This is an excellent drill for teaching barefoot running. Do this at least 100 times.

Standing knee-to-elbows drill: Hold your hands behind your head. Try to touch your elbow to the opposite knee. 滨迟鈥檚 okay if you can鈥檛 touch鈥攃ome as close as you can.

Vestibular reset adapted from .

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I was waiting at the checkout counter of a drugstore in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, when a human cannonball sailed past the window. I glanced around. Did anyone else just鈥�?

A second body flew by, right behind the oblivious cashier鈥檚 head, looking like it had been flung by one of those over fortress walls. I swiped my card, grabbed my bag, and hustled outside to see what was going on. I could have taken my time, it turned out. The two guys were still there and totally absorbed by the handicap-ramp railings: vaulting, swinging, tightrope walking, basically wringing a crazy amount of movement out of two blue bars. When I鈥檇 spotted them through the window, they were practicing 鈥減recisions鈥濃�攂road jumping back and forth between the railings and sticking precise landings on top of the bars.

鈥淵ou start practicing parkour,鈥� one of the guys told me, 鈥渁nd whole nights disappear.鈥�

Technically, he鈥檚 talking about l鈥檃rt du deplacement, more universally known by the funkified French version of its other name, parcours, for 鈥渙bstacle course.鈥� Parkour was when a band of mixed-race kids living in the outskirts of Paris got tired of being roughed up by bullies. They created their own 鈥渢raining method for warriors鈥� and called themselves the . Being rebels and outsiders, they detested the idea of organized competition; even after parkour became a phenomenon, the Yamakasi never bothered cashing in with how-to stuff. They were innovators, not explainers. If you wanted to come to Paris and follow in their footsteps, fine鈥攂ut that meant being yanked out of bed at 2 a.m. to train in a midwinter rainstorms. Otherwise the Yamakasi had just about zero interest in sharing their skills with the rest of the world. That left two places you could go if you wanted to learn parkour: France or .

Not surprisingly, my two new parking lot buddies got their start at YouTube U. 鈥淚 got into it because I was so fat,鈥� one of my new buddies, Neal Schaeffer, told me. He鈥檇 begun partying after high school and by age 20 had bloated up from 175 pounds to 240. One afternoon, he was in a nearby park watching some strangers 鈥溾�� picnic tables鈥攖hey鈥檇 charge a table, plant their hands, and shoot both feet through their arms like gorillas and fly off the other side鈥攁nd they talked Neal into giving it a try. He was shocked to discover that even out of shape, once he got over his fear, he could master skills that at first looked impossible.

Well, maybe not master. 鈥淵ou鈥檙e on this endless trajectory where you鈥檙e always getting better, but it鈥檚 never good enough,鈥� Neal explained. 鈥淭丑补迟鈥檚 what鈥檚 so exciting. As soon as you land one jump, you can鈥檛 wait to try it again. You鈥檙e always looking for ways to make it cleaner, stronger, flow into your next move.鈥� Neal became a member of a local parkour tribe that likes to train after midnight, because after dark the city is all theirs. Whenever a police car prowls by, they drop to the ground and bang out pushups. 鈥淣o matter what time it is, no one bothers you if you鈥檙e exercising.鈥� Within a year, Neal had become so slim and nimble, he was able to scramble to the roof of a three-story building and crouch high on a flagpole. 鈥淛ust like Spider-Man,鈥� he told me.

To himself, he鈥檇 said, 鈥�You鈥檙e back.鈥�

Two weeks later, I wiped my palms and weighed my chances against a six-foot brick wall . It was lunchtime rush in downtown Lancaster, and people swarmed past us on the sidewalk. 鈥淵ou鈥檝e got to learn to shut out distractions,鈥� told me. 鈥淔orget who鈥檚 watching you. Forget where you are. Just focus and go.鈥�

Andy is one of America鈥檚 few trained-in-Europe parkour coaches, and by a bizarre twist of luck, he lives 20 miles from my house. That Spider-Man comment stuck in my mind and made me track him down. Who wouldn鈥檛 want to be able to skitter up the sides of buildings? And frankly, if a double-stuffed slacker like Neal could forge himself that quickly into an , how hard could it be? Age ain鈥檛 on my side鈥擨鈥檓 twice as old as Neal鈥攂ut that鈥檚 another theory I wanted to test: Maybe parkour is what human strength is really all about. Because logically, the one thing we rely on for survival鈥攖he way birds rely on flight and fish depend on fins鈥攚ould be the one thing we鈥檙e all good at, men and women, old and young alike. Most of the spectator and recreational sports we get excited about now are kind of phony. They were created by men, for men, to show off what men do best, and they have just about . They鈥檙e a guy pride parade. So is it possible that parkour, with its emphasis on agility and creativity instead of bulk and brute force, is really the tightest link we have in sports to our evolutionary past?

was sure of it, and the 鈥淢ovement of Three鈥� women back him up. H茅bert was a French naval officer and the philosopher king of . Back in the early 1900s, H茅bert survived a volcano eruption in the Caribbean. Thousands of people died horribly all around him, and H茅bert was scarred by the fact that many didn鈥檛 have to. They could have run, jumped, climbed, swum, and carried each other to safety鈥攅xcept they鈥檇 forgotten how. We鈥檝e let our bodies become stupid, H茅bert believed. We used to be really clever on our feet. We knew how to make the world our playground, instinctively creating the most animal-efficient way to fly over, around, and under the hard edges of the landscape the way monkeys tumble through the trees. Herbert went on to develop his own theory of physical education, the 鈥淣atural Method,鈥� and helped create obstacle courses to train French marines. But his teachings have largely been forgotten. Years of sitting around have since drained away our savage gusto and brought his second golden age of natural movement to an end鈥攁nd that was even before we had an app for听.

But there is a way back, as three women in a North London housing project demonstrate. They鈥檙e not especially impressive looking, at least not when the begins. They鈥檙e just giggling around in baggy sweats, looking like they鈥檙e in the mood for something pumpkin-spiced after Bikram. She told me it took a year before she could do a single pullup; the first time she tried, she just hung helplessly from the bar. Now, on camera, she muscles herself up onto a swingset and balances on top in a full squat, blowing soap bubbles. 鈥淢ovement of Three鈥� is a fast-moving masterpiece, a sort of time-lapse display of how average women can use parkour to turn themselves into an aerial urban-assault team.

鈥湵醭兮�檚 not magic,鈥� Andy Keller told me when we got together for our first parkour session. 滨迟鈥檚 ass elevation. If Georges H茅bert and the Yamakasi ever have a statue erected in their honor, that beautiful breakthrough should be the inscription: 鈥淲e Raised Asses.鈥� Andy and his buddy Adam show me what they mean by getting me started on the turn vault, a basic parkour move. 鈥淰ery handy for, like, jail breaks,鈥� Adam points out. We head into an alley behind a tire repair garage and run toward a chest-high cement wall with a metal guardrail on top. Andy and Adam plant their hands on the rail, swing their legs over, then twist their hips so they 180 and land facing back the way they came. I try the same thing, clang knees on steel, and fall backward.

My problem: poor butt boost. Like most people, I鈥檝e lost my taste for being weightless in space. We all used to love it, which is why every kid destroys his parents鈥� box spring at some point and would trade a sibling for rope swings, trampolines, diving boards, or sliding boards. But grown-ups keep warning you you鈥檒l get hurt, recess monitors yell at you to cut it out, and over time you grow so nervous about falling down that you forget how to jump up. Watch anyone over age 20 attempt a cartwheel: A nine-year-old girl goes straight vertical and takes all the time in the world, while the 20-something rushes through and barely gets his feet off the ground. The higher our hips, the more anxious we get.

So Andy starts me over, this time in the kiddie pool. We plant our hands on top of the waist-high guardrail and turn ourselves into desktop drinking birds: head drops down, ass tilts up, boosting our butts higher and higher and spending longer each time supporting our weight on our hands. For a two-second maneuver, it鈥檚 got a lot of moving parts: one palm faces out, the other in, your knees press together and your elbows lock out straight. After three reps, my knees are higher than the rail; after five, I suddenly twist, swing over the rail, and execute a turn vault without even thinking. It just seemed so natural.

鈥淢an, I could do nothing but this all day,鈥� I said. Even that little taste of parkour was the perfect combo of kaizen and kid on a rope swing: You want to keep smoothing the move, like a sushi chef obsessing over his tuna slicing, but you don鈥檛 mind because, you know, you鈥檙e flying over walls like a fugitive. But Andy had other plans for the afternoon: the Big Wall.

国产吃瓜黑料 the Wells Fargo, Andy briefed me on technique. Then he sprinted straight for the wall, kicked hard against the bricks, and disappeared over the other side. As he trotted back, he was met with applause. An audience had formed, blocking the sidewalk.

鈥淚mpressive, 颈蝉苍鈥檛 he?鈥� I said to the guy beside me.

鈥淚 knew he鈥檇 make it,鈥� the man responded. 鈥淚鈥檓 waiting to see if you 诲辞.鈥�

Yeah, well. Let鈥檚 just say he got a show.

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The doctor delivers your death sentence: You鈥檙e sick, you鈥檙e incurable, you鈥檝e got just a few months to live. What鈥檚 your next move?

Head to the racetrack, naturally. That was Percy Cerutty鈥檚 attitude. Back in 1938, Percy was a binge-drinking, chain-smoking, chronically coughing, 43-year-old Australian postal worker who was bedridden with fainting spells, blinding headaches, and a mysterious pain arcing through his legs and back. Doctors were called to his bedside, where they found him smoking four packs a day despite wheezing with pneumonia. The only debate was how much time to give him.

Mr. Cerutty, they began, pronouncing it Ser-ootee.

滨迟鈥檚 SIR-itee, Perce spat. Like 鈥渟incerity,鈥� without the 鈥渟in.鈥�

Well, that was debatable. The doctors agreed on six months.

So Percy decided to spend it watching ponies. He hauled himself to the track and there, sitting in the sun and making his peace with the world, he saw something he鈥檇 never had the patience to notice before: all horses鈥攆ast or slow, colt or stallion, lean or lumpy鈥攎ove the same way. They flywheel their legs, keeping their hooves low and landing always under their center of gravity. Weird. It should have been obvious, but Percy had never heard anyone mention it before. The particulars of the technique didn鈥檛 jolt Percy so much as the fact that there was a technique. This was muscular logic at work, a law of locomotion that defined the species. And what was true for horses, Percy figured, must also hold true for people. If you could zero in on the One True Way, then hallelujah; you鈥檇 be hailed as a god of fitness. Because there was no reason the human animal should be exempt from this law of nature, right?

Too bad he鈥檇 never find out, Percy mused. He鈥檇 probably be dead by Christmas. Even if he survived, who鈥檇 take health tips from a wreck like him? The irony was excruciating; with the clock running out on his miserable life, he鈥檇 suddenly found a reason to live. Percy shuffled down to the nearby beach and waded into the freezing sea. Maybe he could, sort of, shock his body back into functioning. Every day from then on, Percy returned for an icy wade. He quit smoking cold turkey, and cut out all fried and packaged foods. He began feeling a little better and resumed his visits to the track, this time early in the morning when the jockeys were working out the horses. He stripped off his shoes and shuffled along, barefoot and . The jockeys didn鈥檛 care; the sight of a bony old white-haired freak cantering along behind them was pretty hilarious.

But amazingly, it worked. Percy bounced back from the grave in spectacular fashion. With his bonus time, he began to jog, then run, then fly: by age 50, he could run a mile in 4:54, a marathon in 2:58, and 100 miles (yup, the dead man was now doing ultras) in 23:45. He created his own nature-based lifestyle philosophy and called himself a 鈥淪totan鈥濃�攈alf Spartan, half Stoic.

Which means鈥攚hat, exactly?

鈥淎 is one who hardens, strengthens, toughens and beautifies the body by consistent habits and regular exercises,鈥� Percy preached. 鈥淢y philosophy is based on communication with nature, this communication takes place when the person sleeps under the stars at night, hears the birds in the morning, feels the sand between his toes, smells the flowers, hears the surf. Nature can bring the mind and body into perfect harmony and balance with the universe. This is one of the factors that allows the athlete to reach new levels of excellence.鈥�

Say howdy, in other words, to the world鈥檚 first Paleo CrossFitting locavore, a role he fit right down to the box: In 1946, Percy bought himself a half-acre of no-man鈥檚-land on Australia鈥檚 rugged southern coast and hauled a shipping crate down there to use as the bunkhouse for his 鈥淚nternational Training Center.鈥� He began crafting his own system of natural-movement exercises, with lots of outdoor weightlifting, sand dune sprints, and open-water swims. He was a purist about running form, but a total savage with the steel: the best way to hoist a weight, Percy felt, was whatever way you hoisted the weight. He would awkwardly wobble around under a heavy bar while straining through snatches and shoulder presses and 鈥渃heat curls,鈥� but that, Percy insisted, was the whole damn point. Did you think Mother Nature let your ancestors be sniffy about the big-game carcasses they hauled home and the logs they had to lift? Weight lifting should be intense, so intense that five reps should blow you out. True fitness was all about unsteadiness, uncertainty, and fear; you fought for balance and recruited every single fiber in your body every single time.

鈥淐ivilization has ruined youth in the activities that his fathers and forefathers had that kept the upper body strong. No longer do they chop wood, have to do manual labor,鈥� the Stotan Warrior groused鈥攚hich is fine if your chief goal is to keep the damn kids off your lawn but not too tactful if you鈥檙e hoping teenage track stars will leave their suburban homes and come follow you into the barrens to live in a packing crate with no phone, no electricity, and no indoor plumbing.

But the young hopefuls came anyway鈥攁nd were transformed.

鈥淗e was not speaking theory. This guy based what he had to say to you in the practice of his own life. He knew that it worked,鈥� recalled 听in a later interviews with Australian media. Eliot joined Percy as a young man and became an Olympic champion and world-record holder who only lost one race鈥攚hen he was 14 years old. 鈥淗e started to study the great people of history and the challenges that they had. He started to read philosophy. He became incredibly well self-educated, and it was out of that that he grew into the person that he was.鈥�

Each morning, Percy would rouse his Stotans and鈥攕ince he always said, 鈥淵ou can only teach it if you can do it yourself鈥濃�攈e鈥檇 lead them into the dunes for a day like this:

7 a.m. 鈥� A five-mile run before breakfast in any direction our whim took us, followed by a dip in the ocean.
8 a.m. 鈥� Breakfast of uncooked rolled oats (without milk) sprinkled with wheat germ, walnuts, sultanas, raisins, and sliced banana. Perhaps a few potato chips to follow.
9 a.m. 鈥� Swimming and surfing or outdoor chores like chopping wood, painting and carpentry.
Noon 鈥� Training and lectures, followed by another swim.
2 p.m. 鈥� Lunch: fish and fresh fruit.
3 p.m. 鈥� Siesta
4 p.m. 鈥� Weight lifting
5 p.m. 鈥� Ten-mile run along dirt roads ending once more at the beach.
7 p.m. 鈥� Tea and a general discussion led by Percy
11p.m. 鈥� Lights out

The sweltering box on the beach became the white-hot center of an Australian distance dynasty. , another future superstar, came to train with Percy, as did the great , although both eventually got tired of Percy鈥檚 guff and moved on. For decades, Percy was an unstoppable tribal chief of natural movement. At the 1952 Olympics, he banged on 鈥檚 door and spent so much time praising the Czech champion for his own Stotan-like lifestyle that Zatopek finally left to go sleep under a tree. At the 1960 Games, Percy charged past soldiers guarding the track and shinnied over a spiked fence so he could wave Herb Elliott on to a new world record and a 1,500-meters gold medal. 鈥淎ll I saw was Percy鈥檚 towel swirling through the air,鈥� Herb would later recall in a television interview, 鈥渁nd this V of gendarmes heading toward him.鈥�

And then the lights went out. At age 80, Percy suddenly died of motor neurone disease without even being aware he was sick. His hut was boarded up, his athletes drifted away, and the mighty old Stotan was all but forgotten.

The reason I know so many details of Percy鈥檚 life? I鈥檝e been gathering info on the fitness iconoclast for years (and shelling out painfully to Alibris for his out-of-print books with such perfectly-Percy titles as and ). That鈥檚 where I unearthed so many of these amazing anecdotes. I wanted to write about him in Born to Run and then again in my upcoming book, Natural Born Heroes, but both times he was a flavor too strong for the stew; Percy tales were so rich, they overpowered all other narratives.听Luckily, the long backburnering turned out to be an advantage. Lately, there鈥檚 been a quiet but growing Percy revival and it鈥檚 turned up priceless material. Graeme Sims鈥� excellent biography, Why Die?, is now available in the U.S., and for the first time in 50 years, several of Percy鈥檚 own books are in re-issue. Australia media has rediscovered its forgotten national hero, airing fresh interviews with Percy鈥檚 surviving athletes and, best of all, unearthing fantastic archival footage of the Loinclothed Legend himself in action (for 10 seconds of pure joy, check out 鈥溾�� as Percy demonstrates his run-like-a-horse breathing exercise) Just this past July, a terrific Percy resource was launched by David Cavall on his 鈥溾�� blog.

But the greatest validation of all has come from current elites who are now looking back and wondering if they shouldn鈥檛 have been paying more attention to Percy all along.

鈥淚t鈥�'s a shame, as most of his training ideas and advice have been lost or ignored since the time of his athletes,鈥� writes on 鈥�,鈥� his blog about vintage fitness wisdom. Magness is the author of and an elite-level coach who worked with the Nike guru Alberto Salazar. 鈥淭he main reason his methods aren鈥檛 widely praised or known is that Cerutty was seen as eccentric or crazy by the public.鈥�

Percy was really on to something, Magness is convinced. And now, bit by bit, others are starting to notice. Bet you have, too. Ever been to a CrossFit box? by 鈥溾�� innovator ? Churned through a we鈥檙e-all-in-this-together Tough Mudder, or seethed because 50-year-old pretty boy Laird Hamilton is still ? Tick any one of those categories and you have been face-to-face with the spirit of the Stotans. Percy鈥檚 creed came straight from the heroic ideal of the ancient Greeks and Romans, and it was all about three things: strength, skill, and awareness.

In practice, it looks like this:

Go Wild: The worst mistake you can make is believing you鈥檙e anything except one thing鈥攁n animal. You鈥檙e not a runner, or a lifter, or a yoga pretzel. You鈥檙e a beast, and beasts aren鈥檛 specialists. They don鈥檛 limit their movements. They don鈥檛 stay inside when it鈥檚 icky, or wait for race day. All-around athleticism is the key to perpetual improvement, Percy taught, and you achieve it through natural challenges. Wet roads, leafy trails, hot sun, foot-sucking sand鈥攅verything a gym was designed to help you avoid, basically, is exactly the fiber-firing wildness your body needs to develop agility, balance, core strength, deep lungs, and poise in the face of the unpredictable.

Get Raw: Percy was both ahead of his time and way behind it when he sneered at exercise machines. Machines were created for one purpose: to make work easier. They isolate, they cushion, they stabilize. Well, forget that noise. You want to recruit, toughen, and adapt. Down in Percy鈥檚 box, the Stotans relied on gear that any Roman centurion would recognize: chin-up bars, climbing ropes, parallel bars, vaulting horses, Roman rings, and trampoline. 鈥淗e emphasized doing everything the natural way,鈥� Magness writes. 鈥淧rimitive and uninhibited.鈥�

Train Your Gut, Then Trust It: 鈥淣othing must be dictated, fixed, or regimented,鈥� Percy instructed. 鈥淲hen an athlete goes out to train, his body should dictate his needs and he runs according to its capacities and demands.鈥� That sounds a little chamomile for a guy so leathery that he once ordered his runners to keep going after one of them passed out in the sand. (鈥淟eave him be,鈥� Percy commanded. 鈥淗e鈥檚 not dead.鈥�) But it鈥檚 true; ultimately, you鈥檙e wasting your time trying to persuade people to do want they don鈥檛 want to. The greatest thing you can do for anyone, athlete or not, is light a fire within and get out of the way.

鈥淗e would just inspire you and then leave you pretty much to your own devices,鈥� Herb Elliot explained. 鈥淗e鈥檇 check on the sort of intelligence of your training, to make sure that it made sense, but he just seemed to know that you were committed or you weren鈥檛 committed. And if you were committed, he walked away from it at that point.鈥�

To the Stotan chief goes the final word:

鈥淲e train as we feel, but rarely feel lazy.鈥�

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If you think heroism is an accident, you don鈥檛 know the Clown.

That was one of George Psychoundakis鈥� code names. Another was the Changeling, after those magical trolls who swap bodies. Yet another was “The Cretan Runner.” It's this last name I kept coming across a decade ago while researching 鈥攁 mysterious Greek shepherd-turned-ultrarunner who become one of Word War II's unsung heroes. Years later, I finally had the chance to examine Psychoundakis' story in detail; I was so fascinated by what I found that I eventually travelled to Crete, researching his exploits for my next book project, .

When World War II broke out, the Clown was a young and semi-goofy shepherd on the Greek island of Crete. Nobody thought of him as tough or especially brave; he was actually small and kind of skinny. If he was known for anything, it was for writing cornball poems, like his 鈥淥de to an Inkspot on a Schoolteacher鈥檚 Skirt.鈥� As with everyone else on Crete, he鈥檇 been lucky; the horrors sweeping across Europe hadn鈥檛 touched the island, leaving the Clown free to mosey along each day behind his flock. Until, early one morning, the sky went dark and an odd rumble cut through the coppery clong of the sheep bells. The Clown looked up and stared in awe as an airborne armada blocked out the sun. Hitler had decided he needed Crete and needed it bad; it was the perfect transit spot for his do-or-die assault on the Soviet Union, so he鈥檇 unleashed his elite airborne unit to conquer the island and crush even the thought of resistance.

And so, standing alone in a meadow, the Clown faced a choice: He could keep his mouth shut and put up his hands, or鈥攚ith no warning, no training, and no weapons鈥攇o to war against the deadliest fighting force in human history. No one else in Europe had any trouble making that decision; after Hitler blasted through nine armies in a matter of weeks, not one country offered any spontaneous civilian resistance. None, that is, until Crete. While the Germans were still dropping from the clouds, Cretans were pouring out of their homes with axes and knives and ancient hunting rifles, banding with a ragtag crew of Allied soldiers to repel the invaders with such determination that they nearly delivered the F眉hrer his first defeat. Once the battle was lost, the Clown took off for the wilderness and became a runner for the resistance, carrying messages some 50 miles back and forth between mountain hideouts.

Wait鈥攚as the Clown actually running on these missions? Yup. “I felt as if I were flying,鈥� he鈥檇 say. 鈥淩unning all the way from the top of the White Mountains to Mount Ida. So light and easy鈥攋ust like drinking a cup of coffee.” A British undercover operative described what it was like to have the Clown appear at a hideout late at night after one of his 50-mile scampers. 鈥淭he job of a war-time runner in the Resistance Movement was the most exhausting and one of the most consistently dangerous,鈥� he explained. The Clown would deliver his message, throw back a shot of moonshine鈥斺�淎 little petrol for the engine!鈥濃�攁nd set right back off for his return journey. 鈥淲e could see his small figure a mile away, moving across the next moonlit fold of the foothills of the White Mountains, bound for another fifty-mile journey,鈥� the Brit recalled.

How is that even possible? How do you hammer out serial ultramarathons on a starvation diet, night after night, while dodging German patrols? For four years? The Clown wasn鈥檛 the only one, either. The island was crawling with these superathletes, I discovered鈥擟retans and Brits alike, all of them bounding across the peaks and bedeviling the Germans with ultra-endurance derring-do. So what did they know that the rest of us don鈥檛? How could average people suddenly become unbreakable and thrive under challenges that would humble an Olympic athlete?

The answer was right there on Crete. For centuries, the island had been the quiet custodian of high-performance secrets of the ancient Greeks.

The Greeks didn鈥檛 just sit around hoping for heroes to appear鈥攖hey built their own. They believed heroism was an art, not an accident, so they developed skills that were passed from parent to child and teacher to student. The art of the hero wasn鈥檛 about being brave; it was about being so competent that bravery wasn鈥檛 an issue. They learned to unleash the tremendous sources of strength, endurance, and agility that many people don鈥檛 realize they already have. Simply to survive, early humans had to be able to flow across the landscape: bending their bodies over and around any obstacle in their path, leaping without fear, and landing with precision. Heroes learned to tap into remarkable stores of reserved energy, all of it in their bodies鈥攁nd yours鈥攁nd waiting to be uncorked.

For thousands of years, the Greeks perfected the three pillars of the heroic arts鈥�paidea (skill), arete (strength), and xenia (compassion)鈥攁nd then they were gone. Luckily, their techniques still exist, scattered in bits and pieces around the world, some hidden right in front of us. Take performance fuel: As a professional ballerina, was taught by her canny Greek grandmother that the best energy food in the world wasn鈥檛 just free; it was growing right under her feet. Likewise for : Brazilian jiu-jitsu fighters would travel to his small Philly gym for training advice because Maxwell was a student of sacred Hindu wrestlers and Golden Age boxers. 鈥淵ou never go wrong if you rely on the mighty men of yore,鈥� Maxwell believes.

That鈥檚 the mission of Natural Born Heroes: to track down these custodians of the lost arts and revive the skills that can turn even a Clown into a hero.

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Now hold on鈥�

kept his mouth shut, but his mind was screaming. World War II had just broken out, and his Army instructors were busy teaching him and a bunch of other new grunts how to shoot, but Rex knew one thing they didn鈥檛.

Uncle Gus never shot that way.

Rex had grown up in the backwoods of Oregon with his uncle, Gus Peret, a professional hunter and trick-shot artist. Gus was a Wild West barnstormer, one of the last of the old breed who could thunder into a ring at a full gallop and control his horse with his knees while blasting thrown bottles from the air with a big old Navy Colt in each fist. Rex used to spend his summers helping Uncle Gus keep his eye sharp by heaving bricks into the air as flying targets. The one thing Gus never did was exactly what the Army was telling Rex to do now: steady the pistol at head height and aim carefully down the barrel through the sights. Gus was just blazing away from the hip, but he was still way deadlier than any of these Army experts.

So what did Uncle Gus know that the U.S. military didn鈥檛?

Rex was pretty hardheaded, and even though his country was in peril and drill instructors were bellowing in his face and the whole point of an army is to button your yap and follow orders, Rex couldn鈥檛 shake the feeling that everyone was wrong except him. So when he spotted a chance, he grabbed it; Rex found a way to meet , the maverick industrialist appointed by Roosevelt to create America鈥檚 first black ops fighting force. Rex harangued him about Uncle Gus, and Wild Bill was intrigued. He authorized Rex to go off base and research frontier sharpshooting. And that鈥檚 how, while digging through ancient diaries and letters in a dusty Dakota mailroom, Rex made his big discovery:

Instinctive aim.

All you really have to do is point your finger. That鈥檚 it. That鈥檚 the secret that allowed Annie Oakley to split a playing card from 40 feet away and fire left- and right-handed at two hurtling clay pigeons and vaporize them both. Humans have an amazing natural ability to zero in on a target, Rex learned. Just glance at something and instantly鈥攆aster than the speed of thought鈥攜our fingertip can find it. (If you don鈥檛 feel the urge to immediately test this for yourself, see a doctor.) But not even Rex fully grasped the scope of his discovery. He wasn鈥檛 just reviving a nifty sideshow stunt; he was pulling back a shroud from one of the greatest technological advancements in human history.

Doubt it? Watch Patrick Brewster chuck a knife. You鈥檒l change your mind.

Brewster came to my house one afternoon to teach me . He mounted a slice of log on an easel, pulled out three knives, and鈥攁s he whipped them in from all kinds of angles and distance鈥攄emonstrated why no-spin might be the answer to one of the great riddles of modern anthropology. It goes like this:

• Hitting a target is an amazing act of calculation, because often you鈥檙e not aiming where something is; you鈥檙e aiming where it 颈蝉苍鈥檛. You have to factor angles, directions, and muscle force, all of it in a blink.
• We鈥檙e the only animal that can pull it off, and once we did, it changed everything. Learning to throw transformed us from prey into predators. Better hunting gave us more food; more food grew us bigger brains. We also upgraded our software: Throwing taught us the kind of sequential thought that would become the human imagination and spur the creation of language, technology, medicine, and art.
• So explain this: If humans are such natural marksmen, why are the majority of us like Shaq at the free-throw line?

鈥淵eah, that was me,鈥� Brewster says. 鈥淚 had all the cards stacked against me. Never played baseball, no real sports background at all. First time I threw a knife, I failed miserably.鈥� He鈥檇 seen videos of expert throwers, the kind who send knives flipping end-over-end toward showgirls, but when he tried to copy them, he clanged all over the place. Then one day while working construction, Brewster began monkeying around with a screwdriver. If he held his finger straight up along a screwdriver鈥檚 spine, he could fling it perfectly into the ground. Every time. A quick Internet search later, Brewster found himself in the midst of an entire tribe experimenting with the same throwback throw. There was Roy Hutchinson, 鈥�,鈥� and , a high-school science teacher in Florida who likes to no-spin butter knives across her kitchen.

Brewster explains that the spin technique鈥攖he kind of throwing you see at every circus and Vegas show鈥攊s inherently flawed. 滨迟鈥檚 not natural. Spin is terrific for long tosses, and it can be supremely accurate, but only under artificial conditions. For a spin to work, both you and the target have to be stationary, and you can only be a precise number of steps away. Shift even a little and you shank.

But with no-spin, you cash in on the fact that your index finger is neurologically wired to your eyeballs. In fact, you can learn no-spin with startling ease. You鈥檒l need a target, naturally. Any solid chunk of wood will do. I just sawed a round slice off the end of a log and bolted it to an old picnic table turned on its side and braced with a two-by-four. (So easy, it almost took me longer to write it than do it.)

Next up: your blades. One of the beauties of no-spin is that just about anything will do. Steak knives, butter knives, screwdrivers, metal chopsticks, nails鈥攊f it鈥檚 got a point, you can fling it. For ease and safety, though, Brewster recommends a tempered-steel knife that won鈥檛 shatter or feel weird in your hand. He makes his own by hand (and sells them at FlyingSteel.com) and brought me a set of three of the simple black shanks he calls North Wind.

The best place to start is so close to the target you could almost reach out and touch it. 鈥淭he nearer you are, the less you鈥檒l try to overpower the throw,鈥� Brewster explains. 鈥淵ou鈥檒l let the knife sail on its own.鈥� For your first throws, face the target slightly in profile with your left foot forward (opposite for lefties). Then remember these four steps:

1. GRIP the knife lightly, with your index finger straight up.
2. EXTEND your arm back and high over your head.
3. Push your ELBOW forward, not your hand.
4. RELEASE when the knife passes your ear and the point is still aimed at the sky.

As soon as you get the feel (and don鈥檛 be astonished if it only take two or three throws) you can begin stepping back, adding distance each time and experimenting with angles. With a little practice, you鈥檒l soon be letting fly the way your ancestors did: fast, on the move, from any direction. And any gender鈥攊n Australia, indigenous girls play the same throwing games as boys, and both develop fabulous arms. Of course, we now live in an age when most high-velocity hurling has been outsourced to teenage Dominicans, so you could say, 鈥淲hy bother?鈥�

Or you could think a little harder and realize that throwing is really higher function in disguise: 滨迟鈥檚 directly linked to 鈥渢emporal-sequential ordering鈥� and 鈥渟patial cognition鈥濃�攎ath, in other words. 鈥淭hrowing is about finding order in chaos,鈥� I was told by William Calvin, PhD, a professor of neuroscience at the University of Washington and a specialist in the evolution of the human brain. 鈥淭he more you鈥檙e able to think in sequence, the more ideas you鈥檙e able to string together. You can add more words to your vocabulary, you can combine unrelated concepts, you can plan for the future, and you can keep track of social relationships.鈥�

So, someday in the future, when is designing the guidance system for your personal hovercraft, thank the mom who first slapped a ball in her hand.

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If you think it鈥檚 scary to race , the 27-year-old Spanish ultrarunning beast, try dating him.

One September morning in 2013, Jornet set off for a light and fast climb in the French Alps with his girlfriend, 27-year-old Swedish trail runner . To her competitors, Forsberg sort of is Jornet. She鈥檚 gorgeous and charming and superstrong, and like him she arrived as a young nobody and now reigns alongside him as a world champion and frequent event winner in the , a collection of some of the hardest mountain races on the planet. She鈥檚 also a world-class ski mountaineer, but when she joined Jornet for that morning run, Forsberg got a taste of something new鈥攆ear.

After hours of scrambling in little more than running shoes and technical pants up the Frendo Spur, a classic mountaineering route ascending icy 50-degree pitches above Chamonix, France, heavy weather set in just below the summit. They lost time searching for the right route, causing Forsberg to struggle. 鈥淚 became so cold, and I couldn鈥檛 focus my thoughts very well,鈥� she recalls. 鈥淚 was stressed and felt trapped.鈥� They called for help, and a rappelled down and got them to safety. 鈥淚鈥檓 very angry when I see the continued rise of sneakers despite our requests,鈥� the rescue chief fumed. 鈥淢ountain practice must be undertaken with adequate equipment.鈥�

Jornet was grateful for the help, but he has made a habit of ignoring such warnings. In 2012, he was inches away from his idol鈥擲t茅phane Brosse, the legendary French ski mountaineer鈥攚hen as the pair attempted a speed crossing of the Mont Blanc massif. Jornet bounced back from that tragedy by going even higher, lighter, and faster. He recruited another Frenchman, , for a speed attempt up and down Mont Blanc in the summer of 2013, but this time his partner suffered minor injuries when he fell into a small crevasse on the descent. Unable to keep the pace, Jacquemoud told Jornet to race on alone, and Jornet . A month later, a solo Jornet bagged another: in less than three hours. In June of 2014, he raised the stakes again, setting off alone in falling snow and 鈥攁 climb that typically takes two weeks鈥攚ith an ultralight ski-mountaineering setup. He finished in 11 hours 48 minutes, nearly five hours faster than the previous mark.

All of it鈥攖he meagerly equipped assaults on expedition-size peaks, the close calls with close friends, the thrill of microsecond choices on crumbly shale atop fall-and-you-die ridges鈥攈as positioned Jornet as the breakout star in a movement most people don鈥檛 even know exists but will be hearing a lot about soon: FKTs. Fastest known times.

FKTs have no rules, no schedules, and often no witnesses. You pick a spot, you pick your moment, and you go. No waiting around for race day, no packet pickup or starting waves, just the challenge of blitzing down a classic trail or inventing your way through rarely traveled wilderness as fast as you can. Since Jornet in 2010 (7 hours 14 minutes round-trip), seeking FKTs on iconic trails and peaks has become de rigueur among ultra-endurance athletes as an exercise in cred building. FKTs seem like a new idea, but they鈥檙e really a throwback to the glory days when all the sport鈥檚 races were just a glimmer in an enduro freak鈥檚 eye. Before there was Western States, there was wondering if he could run 100 miles as fast as a horse. Before there was Badwater, there was setting out alone to see if he could jog 146 miles across Death Valley in 130-degree heat.

Jornet relies on his own body fat for fuel. During his almost 12-hour Denali circuit last June, he consumed a half-liter of water and a single energy gel.

FKTs don鈥檛 win you Olympic medals or official recognition. In most cases, no one will know or care if you set a new one鈥攏o one except you and your friends, those fellow believers who scamper all night into the wet, buggy, coffeeless woods to hand you a burrito as you flash by in the dark. When ultrarunner Jenn Shelton鈥檚 partner bailed halfway through on the 223-mile John Muir Trail, Shelton was startled to come around a bend and find waiting. The elder statesman of ultrarunning had gotten word that she and her partner were struggling, so he grabbed his gear and bolted into Yosemite to pace her home. She finished in four days and nine hours, good for second-fastest female and a lifelong bond of respect. 鈥淥ne of the worst nights of my life, spent with one of the best motherfuckers I know,鈥� .

Expect the growing FKT movement to shed its scrappy, unpublicized existence next spring. That鈥檚 when Jornet will head to Mount Everest without oxygen, carrying only the slimmest survivalist鈥檚 pack of food, water, and protective gear, and attempt to lay down a new record on the world鈥檚 most scrutinized peak. Jornet hasn鈥檛 settled on his precise route or starting point yet, but he does have a time in mind: 20-some hours up, 35-ish back down. Bottom to top to bottom in one weekend.

Jornet鈥檚 emergence as a crossover star in the high-risk sport of alpinism comes as little surprise to anyone paying mild attention to trail running over the past decade. He鈥檚 been Sky Running world champ six of the past seven years while also dominating the most prestigious ultra races鈥�, 鈥攁nd more than a dozen smaller muscle flexers, including the and the . During his debut at last summer鈥檚 , considered America鈥檚 toughest ultrarunning course, he threw back a midrace tequila shot and dillydallied at an aid station because he was lonely and wanted the second-place runner to catch up and keep him company. Socializing complete, he surged off to crush the course record by 40 minutes.

You can retire with a trophy case like that, but Jornet insists he鈥檚 still apprenticing. He has no coach or specific training plan, preferring instead to disappear into the mountains every day for seven or eight hours, usually alone but often stopping to quiz random hikers and climbers about approaches and conditions. 鈥湵醭兮�檚 important to keep your ears open,鈥� he tells me during a Skype call from his summer base in Chamonix. 鈥淵ou need to be humble.鈥� And humbled, as he was during the rescue with Forsberg. 鈥淭his sport is about improving, not winning,鈥� he explains. 鈥淵ou never learn from victory.鈥�

Already, his trial and error approach has given him the most daunting and versatile skill set in endurance sports. Take his chainring: while growing up in the Pyrenees as the son of a mountain guide, Jornet developed different gaits for different types of terrain. On steep climbs, when everyone else is walking, Jornet straightens his back and downshifts to a pitter-patter that look like he鈥檚 running in place. In fact, he鈥檚 using elastic recoil from rubbery leg tendons to get extra uphill bounce.

Additional findings from the Jornet lab:

Fat is your friend. He was one of the first ultra-runners to reduce his calorie intake on long outings, relying instead on body fat for a more dependable, nearly inexhaustible fuel source. During his almost 12-hour Denali circuit, he consumed a half-liter of water and a single energy gel.

Cross-training helps you cross over. Unlike many burnout-prone ultrarunners, Jornet does much more than log endless miles on trails. He skis all winter, runs all summer, and climbs in between. He鈥檚 as comfortable on skins as he is on ropes, as quick with an ice ax as he is on switchbacks. Changing things up opens his eyes to new techniques. Ski mountaineering, he discovered, translates to raw foot speed: 鈥淵ou build leg strength, so you can take longer steps running downhill.鈥�

For focus, add fun. Jornet competes nearly every week of the year鈥�25 races on skis, 15 on foot鈥攚hich forces him to stay sharp and in the moment. But the more he races, the more joyful he gets: in his first Western States, Jornet was going head-to-head with the two favorites when he leaped off a rock and clicked his heels like Fred Astaire. 鈥淲as that on purpose?鈥� I ask. He laughs. 鈥淵es, you have to make some fun. What we do 颈蝉苍鈥檛 serious.鈥�

鈥淭丑补迟鈥檚 something I鈥檝e got to learn from him,鈥� says , a 24-year-old Colorado trail-running savant who joined the rare league of Jornet beaters in 2012 by . 鈥淭he week before Hardrock, he ran like five hours on the course every day. Crazy! But he鈥檇 never been there before and wanted to check out the scenery.鈥� Jornet confirms his no-taper approach: 鈥淪uch beautiful mountains! I went out, met people, ran the summits, the rivers. 滨迟鈥檚 a shame if you just go there to race.鈥�

Jornet remains cagey when asked about the details of his Everest FKT attempt. He wouldn鈥檛 elaborate on his gear or fueling strategy, but he did divulge one tantalizing detail. To make his bid more 鈥渓ogical,鈥� as he put it, Jornet plans to start much lower than 17,600-foot Base Camp, where previous record seekers have launched. Instead, he鈥檒l begin in one of the villages below (he won鈥檛 say which one), adding another 14,000 feet and a marathon鈥檚 worth of mileage to his ascent.

鈥淲hoa!鈥� says upon hearing this plan鈥攚hich is saying a lot. Ulrich, 63, is O.G. FKT, a grandmaster of both mountaineering and ultrarunning, with a r茅sum茅 even more daring than Jornet鈥檚. (Doubt it? Find someone else who has run all 450 miles around the circumference of Death Valley without support, reached all Seven Summits on his first attempt, and summited Everest and run the 146-mile Badwater in the same summer.) Marshall was a seasoned mountaineer when he first climbed Everest, and it still took him five weeks. 鈥淢ost people take days to hike in to Base Camp to acclimatize, and it damn near kills them,鈥� Marshall says. 鈥淏ut he鈥檚 running up? Wow.鈥�

From a risk-management standpoint, it鈥檚 tricky to decide whether Jornet should be cheered on or waved off. He鈥檚 the Rocketeer, always aiming higher and never sure if his crazy invention will bring him back from the clouds or explode in midair. If he succeeds on Everest, you can count on a generation of ultrarunners suddenly honing their ski-mountaineering skills, pulling on their skimpy base layers, and charging into the Death Zone seeking similar records on the world鈥檚 highest peaks. When asked if this kind of daredevilry could leave a lot of people seriously FKT, Ulrich doesn鈥檛 hesitate.

鈥淚 think it鈥檚 fantastic,鈥� he says. 鈥淭his guy doesn鈥檛 flinch at shit. He鈥檚 super smart and has an unbelievable amount of experience for his age. He鈥檚 reserved, not cocky. I suppose he has an unbridled adventure voice speaking to him all the time.鈥�

Ulrich鈥檚 prediction: 鈥淗e鈥檚 going to kill it.鈥�

Christopher McDougall () is the author of the bestseller . His new book, , will be published in April.

Faster, Higher, Crazier

Kilian Jornet isn’t the only one setting FKTs. He’s just leading the pack.

• Grand Canyon (rim-to-rim):听Rob听Krar:听2h, 51m, 28s; May 5, 2012
• Matterhorn (round-trip):听Kilian Jornet:听2h, 52m, 2s; August 21, 2013
• Grand Teton: Andy Anderson:听2h, 53m, 50s; August 22, 2012
• Kilimanjaro (ascent): Jornet:听5h, 23m, 50s; September 28, 2010
• Teton Grand Traverse: Rolando Garibotti:听6h, 49m; August 26, 2000
• Denali听(round-trip): Jornet:听11h, 48m; June 7, 2014
• Long Trail: Jonathan Basham:听4d, 12h, 46m; September 7-11, 2009
• Appalachian Trail (supported): Jennifer Pharr Davis:听46d, 11h, 20m; June 15-July 31, 2011
• Appalachian Trail听(unsupported): Matt Kirk:听58d, 9h, 38m; June 10-August 7, 2013

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