I’ve been doing “The Space Race” for the last 3 years. It’s an initiative from – what used to be – nonprophet; a community of practitioners who explore the intersection of physical fitness and psychology.
The Space Race was – in their mind – a way to see out the year and start the new one on the right foot, to challenge oneself, and set the tone for the rest of the year. Rather than get plastered and wake up with a terrible hangover.
This year I programmed the workout myself, while the last 3 years I partook in the workout designed by nonprophet. In part, this was symbolic of carving my own training philosophy; of branching out and recognising the value in my own experiences as a teacher, a coach and athlete. I have no doubt that the official Space Race was programmed way better than I could have, but I figured if I didn’t start experimenting and exploring with own methods and ideas now, I might never.
I’ve learned, that when programming something like this, one should start with a theme or concept they would like to explore. In this vein, I’d started to consider how limitation could mostly be self-imposed – whether these were physical or psychological burdens – and that perhaps, the only thing holding one back, was themselves (or whoever one thought their self to be).
The workout was to be long and done individually – 6 hours I’d decided (like the first Space Race), which is usually long enough to want to quit. Their needed to be an individual variation to it so that each person’s workout looked slightly different, and using bodyweight – I thought – would generally be a good way to do so. There was to be a carry (symbolic of carrying oneself) and an arduous, grinding element. The workout therefore, came together as such:
6 HOUR AMRAP
Max Cal Echo Bike
Every Hour Complete: 10m x BW Farmer Carry Shuttle
The Farmer Carry weight needed to be meaningful, approximately 50% of Bodyweight (I used 2 x 20kg Kettlebells). The distance on the carry was also determined by bodyweight; so for me, 80 x 10 was 800, so at the start of every hour (from the 0:00), I completed an 800m carry broken up into 80 laps of a 10m shuttle.
I got asked at the start of the workout whether we could complete the carry outside. I said no. There was something about being stuck in a cold, dark gym, with nowhere to hide or break up the monotony of the shuttle (back and forth, and back and forth) which intensified (and therefore, added to) the experience.
We recorded our calories at the end of every hour, prior to embarking on our next carry. Mine dropped dramatically every round, as the carries took longer and longer, even thought my RPM’s on the bike stay relatively consistent, before I improved in the final hour.
About 2 and a half hours in, I wanted to stop. And as the workout dragged, this feeling intensified. It became very dark around hour 4. Yes, the first portion had challenged me; I’d close my eyes and play games to keep my legs ticking over – trying to guess my cadence and output or resist the urge to look up at the clock, so that when I did, it created the illusion that time was moving faster; or I’d fix my gaze upon an arbitrary spot on the wall and imagine it dancing in the darkness.
But it was between that fourth and fifth hour that I experienced despair like I never had in a workout. It wasn’t despair like I wanted to quit; it was despair knowing that I couldn’t quit, that no one was coming to save me; like nothing I was doing mattered and that it was all just pointless (which in hindsight, was not entirely untrue). And yet there was still a job I had to do; a pointless, stupid, meaningless, arbitrary job that I had not only agreed too but created.
I was crouched behind my kettlebells feeling sorry for myself; my head down between my knees and my forearms swollen and depleted. I still had about another 200m to go. The hour had ticked over some 25 minutes ago whereas my first carry had taken me around 12 minutes. I probably would have stayed in that same defeated position if it hadn’t been for Petra (one of the people we’d roped into joining us).
“Come on Serge. Pick them up” she said, softly but definitively. It was something so small – her voice was barely audible over the thrum of the bike’s fan – but it ripped me right out of the hole I’d been digging myself. Despite the individual theme of the workout, I was grateful I wasn’t completely alone in that moment. I picked up the kettlebells again, and started back on the familiar straight.
In the days following, it is my backside that is the most sore; sitting on a bike for 6 hours ought to do that to anyone – even with bike pants on. Apart from that, my body seems to hold up pretty well. It speaks to the fact that during those longer, endurance style efforts, it’s not our body that gives out but our brain. Moving slowly, at a low intensity, most of us would be physically capable of finishing.
I didn’t really reflect on this workouts after I finished. It’s more fatigue and relief rather than enlightenment and revelation. But for those 6 hours, there isn’t much else that mattered; consciousness and attention were directed into that effort, and maybe that’s the way it needed to be to see something like this through. Maybe I’m a different person in doing so. Or maybe not. It doesn’t really matter anyway.
Every year The Space Race creeps up on me. I don’t like saying that it is now officially a yearly ritual, because saying so scares me. But I know deep down that I will continue to do so. It gives me an edge I think; some action to back up the talk; some self-esteem knowing that I committed to something I said I would. And confidence knowing I can.
So here’s to 2026.
CHANGE IS THE POINT 