Whether you’re training for your tenth marathon or run only occasionally, you’d never lace up your shoes if you weren’t up for a challenge—which might have brought you to the trendy challenge known as 75 Hard.
Just as there are different ways to test for your strength and endurance, there are varying plans to test your nutrition. If a three-day clean eating “reset” is a 5K, and the Whole 30 program is a half marathon, think of 75 Hard like an ultra—it’s not for the faint of heart. Yet if you scroll through social media lately, chances are, you’ve seen at least one friend posting about this daunting two-plus-month program. (#75hard has more than 998,000 tags on Instagram alone.)
The website for 75 Hard claims that more than 100,000 people from around the globe have completed the program.
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So is 75 Hard healthy and something you should try? Read on to learn more about what 75 Hard actually involves, including what rules challengers have to stick to for full completion and program “success.” Then get the scoop from dietitians and trainers on whether they recommend it.
What is 75 Hard?
75 Hard was created in 2019 by Andy Frisella, a public speaker, podcaster, and the CEO of 1st Phorm International, a supplement company. 75 Hard’s marketing team describes it as a “transformational mental toughness program” that’s like “an Ironman for your brain.” Frisella and co. promise that completing the 75-day plan can improve confidence, self-worth, fortitude, grittiness, and discipline (to name just a few of their claims).
“75 Hard is a combined nutrition, fitness, and self-improvement program, with the goal of transforming your entire life,” explains Roxana Ehsani, RD, CSSD, a Miami-based board certified sports dietitian and a national media spokesperson for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. “It includes rules in each aspect, such as a nutrition plan, how many workouts you should be doing each day, how much water to drink, how much to read each day in a self-improvement book and taking daily pictures of yourself to track your progress as well. The rule is that you must complete each of these rules for 75 days straight, if you slip up and don’t do one on one days you must restart the 75 days.”
The 75 Hard rules in full, which they call “critical” daily tasks:
- Follow any nutrition plan designed for your goals, with zero alcohol and no cheat meals.
- Complete two 45-minute workouts every day, one of which must be outside.
- Drink a gallon of water every day.
- Read 10 pages of an educational or self-improvement non-fiction book every day. (Audiobooks and podcasts do not count.)
- Take a progress picture every day.
If at any point, you slip up on any of these mental or physical challenges, you must start over at day one. If you complete all 75 days, by the end of the challenge, you’ll have read 750 pages, sweated for 6,750 minutes and drank 9,600 ounces, with zero drops of alcohol and no “cheat” foods.
Is 75 Hard healthy (or necessary)?
Sure, 100,000 individuals may have completed the challenge, but how many have “failed” or bailed because of the strict tasks?
When setting health goals, they should be “SMART,” Ehsani believes. That means they should be specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and timely.
Ideally, your goal should check all of those boxes. In reality, 75 Hard does two: measurable and timely. It’s far from realistic or attainable, believes Natalie Rizzo, MS, RD, plant-based sports dietitian with Greenletes in New York City and the author of Planted Performance. And it’s not super-specific about the what, how, and why for any of the daily tasks.
“If you can stick to it for 75 days, which is really tough, then what happens when the 75 days are over? Do you go on a crazy binge from all the restrictions? Creating healthy habits does take a shift in mindset, but you can’t force ‘mental toughness’ on yourself and expect to build lifelong sustainable habits,” Rizzo says. “I’d rather my clients focus on creating healthy behaviors and work on how you set goals. Ask yourself what is prompting your desire to change your body. If it’s something that is really important to you, that should provide motivation in and of itself.”
Beyond that, it lacks scientific backing to prove that all of these rules are relevant, necessary or even healthy for all people. For example, those who work two jobs very likely don’t have the time for 90 minutes of fitness every single day. Also, where are the rest days? And how might taking and comparing progress pictures impact the mental health of a participant who is currently trying to build body positivity or has a history with eating disorders or body image concerns?
It takes an extreme amount of discipline for a person to successfully complete this challenge. Most who try 75 Hard will likely fail, “as the program has not been set up for success. It’s only set up for a person who has an intense amount of discipline. It’s also not realistic, what person has time to do two 45-minute workouts per day? Most people can barely get in one workout,” Ehsani says.
While Ehsani and Rizzo agree that you should probably run far away from this program and any other that sounds too good to be true or too rigid and not realistic, April Gatlin—who has completed 75 Hard herself—has a more compassionate view.
“As a fitness professional, I recommend all of the parts of this challenge, just not to the extreme of 75 Hard,” says Gatlin, who is an ACE-certified personal trainer and master coach for STRIDE Fitness in Chicago. “Having structure in your workout and diet is always positive when trying to live a healthy lifestyle.”
Is there a version of 75 Hard that might be better for runners?
With all this in mind, we asked these three wellness experts to help us rewrite the rules if we did want to embark on a challenge—but one that we might actually benefit from and actually stick with, after the challenge ends. The not-so-extreme 75 Hard might look like:
Diet Before: Follow any nutrition plan designed for your goals, with zero alcohol and no cheat meals.
Diet After: Instead of attaching morality to food or declaring something as a “cheat,” “good” or “bad,” follow a nutrition plan designed by a registered dietitian nutritionist (RDN), who takes into account your unique health needs, medical conditions, dietary restrictions, food allergies, food preferences, and budget. Allow for one to two servings of alcohol per week, if desired.
Fitness Before: Complete two 45-minute workouts every day, one of which must be outside.
Fitness After: Perform exercise that you enjoy doing and that makes you feel good, whether it’s going for a run with a pal, doing yoga on YouTube or strength training. Ideally, this would be for at least 30 minutes per day, five times per week. Sprinkle in one to two rest days every week.
Hydration Before: Drink a gallon of water every day.
Hydration After: Drink enough water for proper hydration; your urine should be light yellow rather than bright yellow. Work with a RDN to determine your daily needs for hydration if you’re unsure.
Self-Improvement Before: Read 10 pages of an educational or self-improvement book every day.
Self-Improvement After: Read daily if it relieves stress, or listen to an audiobook or podcast that you find enlightening or entertaining. Or take 10 minutes each day for your favorite self-care activity.
Progress Before: Take a progress picture every day.
Progress After: Track your progress with an intrinsic goal, such as how strong you feel or your energy levels.
The Bottom Line on 75 Hard
“Having done 75 Hard myself, if someone is ever considering taking on this mental toughness challenge, they need to evaluate if this is a good time in life to take this on,” Gatlin says. For example, if a move, job change, family illness or other hurdle might be approaching, hold off. “Ensure that you are set up for success—as much as you can control—prior to starting,” she adds, if you do start.
Keep in mind that this is a true challenge, especially if you follow the original 75 Hard daily tasks. If you try and don’t breeze through easily, know it’s not just you. And you are not a failure.
“With extreme programs like this, very few people will ever be successful because they are set up for people to fail. If a few people make it to the finish line of those 75 days, they may see weight loss, but are they really about to sustain all of these rules for any longer than 75 days? Probably not,” Ehsani says. “It’s best to work on one goal at a time that is a SMART goal.”
Also, know that overtraining can lead to fatigue and pain, and it’s easy to overtrain if you try to follow this plan and start running 90 minutes a day when you haven’t run much before starting. You may also be setting yourself up for an overuse injury, such as plantar fasciitis or runner’s knee.
For a safer, saner option, consult with your own medical care team if you’re interested in making any changes. “Any fitness and nutrition advice should always be individualized and takes into account a person’s personal needs, health conditions, as well as any medications and supplements they are consuming. A full assessment by a professional should always be done first before making any type of recommendations,” Ehsani says.
Karla Walsh is a Des Moines, Iowa-based freelance writer and level one sommelier who balances her love of food and drink with her passion for fitness. (Or tries to, at least!) Her writing has been published in Runner’s World and Fitness Magazines, as well as on Shape.com, EatThis.com, WomensHealthMag.com, and more.
