Joy Rider

ADVANTAGE STAY AHEAD OF THE GAME

JOY RIDER

With the hit song, Riptide, singer-songwriter JAMES KEOGH, aka VANCE JOY, was catapulted from busking and open-mic nights to global stardom. Find out how he went from zero to guitar, sorry, ukulele hero

BY BEN JHOTY PHOTOGRAPHY BY CLAUDIA GROSCHE

A CONFESSION: without being overly familiar with the works of Vance Joy and not previously giving it too much thought, I had assumed that his stage name, an amalgam of two characters from Peter Carey’s novel, Bliss, was his real name. As such, I had a vague image in my mind’s eye of a modern troubadour, a larger-than-life character perhaps given to affectation and flamboyant dress.

What I find when James Keogh materialises on screen via a Zoom call from Barcelona, is a man without any conceits, airs or graces. Instead, I’m greeted by a friendly, humble and down-toearth fellow who reminds me, both in appearance and in his air of thorough decency, of golfer Adam Scott. Nursing a mug of black tea on a couch, Keogh’s curly hair is still damp from a shower and he wears the type of hiking fleece you might pull on after a run. He looks to me like the footy player or jobbing law clerk he might have been in a different life, not a folk singer or a pop star – and not one whose songs have racked up over 5 billion streams and who has toured with the likes of Taylor Swift and P!nk. You’d have to conclude that perhaps he needed that stage name.

FROM SMALL BEGINNINGS, KEOGH’S CAREER HAS BLOSSOMED.

For Keogh, Vance Joy was an attempt to draw a line between his professional and private lives. More simply, it was a name that just rolled off the tongue a little better than Keogh. But today, the boldness of the name he’s managed to wholly inhabit reminds him of a time when he wasn’t so sure of himself. A time when neither James Keogh, nor Vance Joy, meant much to anybody.

“I think I can be quite a shy person at times,” says the 34-year-old, who’s spent chunks of the past two years living in Spain with his girlfriend. “I remember being at the call centre where I was working during uni and people would be like, ‘Oh, so you said you play music?’ And they’re like, ‘What are you called?’ I was like, ‘Vance Joy’. And they’re like, ‘What?’ And you’re like, ‘Vance Joy’. And it’s like, that moment of someone not understanding, asking you again and then you get red in the face as you tell them. Especially when you’re starting out, before people know your music, you’re embarrassed about it. But I think the name felt right.”

It needed to. Success in the cutthroat, highly capricious world of pop music requires levels of grit, determination and sheer bloody-mindedness we more commonly associate with professional athletes or hard scrabble entrepreneurs. “It can be unlikely even to pursue a career in music or to just keep persisting with it,” Keogh says. “I don’t know what that thing in your head you have to have is, but it’s almost like you’ve got to be blissfully ignorant of all the things that could go wrong or maybe that voice in your head that says, ‘You can’t do it’, has got to be a little bit quieter.”

Keogh? On his own, as himself, he might not have had it. He may not have been able to silence those doubts. As Vance Joy, though? There would be no limits to what he could achieve.

MASTER OF NONE

Keogh grew up in Murrumbeena in Melbourne’s east, where he and his mates owned the streets on their BMXs and rollerblades, hitting up the local milk bar and later, a McDonalds. “It was like you have your little neighbourhood and you know all the shortcuts,” Keogh says. “It’s like a little dominion when you’re a kid.”

Keogh’s world would expand rapidly after he transferred from his local primary school to St Kevin’s College, a prestigious all-boys private school that competes in Victoria’s Associated Public Schools (APS) system in sports like Aussie Rules, cricket and rowing. Keogh would become school captain, a position he had secretly coveted since he was in Year 7, perhaps hinting at his vaulting, if largely hidden ambition.

“I was always fascinated by the school captain and the position, because every Monday he would speak at assembly where he’d tell a story and make it entertaining,” he recalls. “And when you’re a Year 7 kid looking up at him, you’re like, wow, this guy is a grown-up man. In that little world they’re the star. So, I was always aspiring to that. Even if it was a secret, I was thinking that was pretty cool.”

As well as an aspirational streak, Keogh’s ascension to the position also revealed his all-round abilities. He was

the jock who was also friendly with the nerds and the musos. “I think there’s a sense that it has to be a guy that does a bit of everything,” he says. “Maybe you don’t have to be the best at sport, you don’t have to be the smartest guy, but you kind of have to be doing okay in every area.”

It would be footy at which Keogh would show the most early promise. He would make the school’s First 18, essentially granting him demi-god status within the school yard, though Keogh often found himself in awe of his own teammates. “It’s almost like the guys that were the best in those teams were heroes,” he laughs. “Even after all this time you go, ‘Geez, Antony Keely, Year 12, against Xavier, taking marks at full back’. Those people leave a big impression on you.”

Looking back, Keogh feels he was too often “in his head” to be a really consistent schoolboy player. “Maybe I’d have one or two games in the season where things clicked,” he says. “But it was almost like if the stars aligned and it just felt good that day. It was always a mystery to me why I played well.”

Typically, Keogh is probably downplaying his abilities. After school finished, he would play for the St Kevin’s Old Boys team before being recruited to the Coburg Tigers in the VFL, which at the time was Richmond FC’s reserves team. “I remember getting a call one day when I was in first-year uni and [coach] Andy Collins goes, ‘How do you feel about playing in the AFL?’ He planted the seed of that, and I was like, ‘Wow’. I didn’t have any idea what I was going to do. I was just studying and I wasn’t the most engaged student. Football was the thing I was most disciplined about. It gave me a bit of identity.”

Keogh took his first preseason with the Tigers seriously, getting in killer shape to contribute to a reserves team that won the premiership. The next year he started in the reserves before being elevated to the ones for the second half of the season, where he again played well. He describes himself as a dour defender who never wanted to draw too much attention to himself. “I remember I wore white boots to training one day and the captain was like, ‘Doesn’t feel right. It’s just not right for you’. And I was like, ‘Yeah, I know’.” As a footy player, it would appear Keogh had a bass player’s temperament.

In his third year he became complacent, he says, often finding himself dreading the weekends, not because he didn’t enjoy it but because of the cocktail of nerves and adrenaline that would rise throughout the week, reaching a crescendo on Saturday mornings. It’s similar, he says, to the nerves he still feels before a gig. “If I had a gig tonight and someone came in right now and said it was off, I’d be relieved,” he says. “But then it’s like, what do I do with all this energy?”

His footy career would peter out. He knew he didn’t quite have it, didn’t want it badly enough, couldn’t turn down his inner voices. Not in footy, anyway. But if he was fading in one field, he was about to soar in another.

TOP OF THE POPS

Chances are you’ve heard Riptide. Even if you can’t immediately recall the tune or the words, the moment you hear Keogh strum the first few bars on the ukulele, you know it. It’s the kind of cosmic earworm that so thoroughly embeds itself in the collective consciousness you wonder if it has always been there. You almost forget someone had to create it out of nothing.

Encouraged by his father, Keogh had been playing guitar since he was a teenager. In the early days he didn’t put in a lot of effort, wagging lessons and essentially going through the motions. “I think my dad always knew, I guess from his own experience, that if I played guitar, I would have it for life,” Keogh says. “But when you’re 14, you don’t really take responsibility for anything. You think, ‘Oh, that will just fade away’.”

He became more enthusiastic when his dad organised lessons for him outside of school and bought him a Fender Squier Strat. He began jamming at lunchtimes with friends in the music room, murdering the latest Metallica riff or playing Green Day songs and changing the lyrics. After school finished, he and some of his more academically inclined mates, including the dux of the school, formed a band called Hypersonic. “I remember, across the board as a band, we all did really well in our English exams,” he laughs. “That didn’t necessarily make us the coolest band. I guess we sucked a little bit, but we did write a couple of good songs.”

Keogh was beginning to fall in love with the problem-solving dimension of songwriting, a feeling he’d previously experienced writing essays. “Sitting in that space of not knowing and trying to figure out if you do this with this, what happens? When you’re writing an essay for school or when you’re writing a song, it’s that same kind of jigsaw puzzle. It’s not necessarily fun, but if you find the enjoyment in that, then you might just get addicted to it.”

Keogh would study law at Monash, but while he finished his degree, the law certainly wasn’t calling him. He went through the motions of applying for summer clerkships, “just because everyone was doing it”, but he was far more excited about the handful of

JOY REVISION

Keogh cycles and skates to stay in shape on the road, while prioritising stretching to combat back pain brought on by songwriting sessions on Zoom. He uses this 7-minute stretching routine to keep his body on song

Hold each stretch for 30 seconds each, rest one minute then repeat.

1/ Cat Cow

2/ Bird Dog

3/ Tabletop crunches

4/ Low plank Knee drops

5/ Superman

6/ Push-up

7/ Beetle

songs he’d written and begun to perform at open-mic nights.

Among them was Riptide, a song he’d first started writing while at uni in 2008 and thought, “this is nothing”, before returning to it a few years later. Looking back now, Keogh feels the song’s subsequent success lends its protracted creative process something of a mythical quality, like it was always meant to be. “Everything probably takes on a bit more significance because you link it all back with hindsight,” he says. “I remember being excited about it. It was the satisfaction you get from just cracking the code of a song. Just by putting the right word in the right place, without really thinking about it too hard, the song is created in front of you and you’re like, ‘Oh, how did I do that?’ It’s rare when that happens, but when it does, that’s the best thing.”

Keogh was working at the call centre and doing a bit of gardening work on the side and decided to use his earnings to pay for a day in the studio to record the song in 2012. He then put it on SoundCloud, like so many budding young songwriters do, many of them lucky to get more than a handful of listens. What happened next is the stuff of folklore. Hell, it’s basically a fairy tale.

“I put it on SoundCloud before having any experience in the music industry and knowing anyone or having a manager and it had like, a thousand listens after a week,” he recalls. My friend was like, ‘Dude, this is crazy’. I think you can gauge a song and the way it’s received pretty quickly, just from the people around you.” Later it would be uploaded on SoundCloud by record label Liberation and had 40,000 listens in a day. It would go on to claim the No.1 spot in the 2013 Hottest 100 and become the second-longest charting song in the US Billboard Hot 100 at 43 weeks. To date it has racked up over a billion streams, while being used by companies to push everything from insurance to automobiles.

Keogh’s career was put on a steep trajectory. Not surprisingly the sudden success left him reeling. “It’s hard to prepare for it,” he says. “Even if something like that happened again, it’d still be wild. But I think I’d probably enjoy it a bit more now, because I would have more context about how unlikely and rare it is to do.”

Indeed, the success of the song would create something of a rod for Keogh’s back. “I definitely felt pressure,” he says. “My first meeting at Atlantic Records, I went there to play a couple of songs for the top dog, Craig Kallman. And I remember he was like, ‘If we had a few more Riptides that would great too’. And I was like, how am I going to write one of those? I don’t even know how I did it. I’ll try.”

His goal, which continues to this day with the release of his third album, In Our Own Sweet Time, became to surround this towering hit with enough songs that can also stand on their own two feet. “They might not stand as tall and might not have the same impact as that song but that’s so out of my hands,” he says. At the same time, Keogh still has the drive to solve the puzzle again and capture that lightening in a bottle, even as he grapples with the confounding, sometimes ephemeral nature of songwriting. Like he said: it’s addictive. “I look at other artists like Ed Sheeran or Adele, and they really can do it again and again,” he says. “I’m always trying to get better. And sometimes I think, is it better to try more? Or just to relax and be a bit more Zen about it? I’m still a little bit mystified as to how it all works.”

INNER HARMONY

After our chat to today, Keogh will head out onto the streets of Barcelona to shoot some footage to accompany the new album, capturing some of the things he likes to do to unwind: ride bikes, shoot hoops, skateboard and read books. He began writing songs for the album in 2019 and continued through COVID, linking up with regular collaborator, Dave Bassett, who lives in California, on Zoom.

“The thing about doing it online is it’s much less impact on your body,” Keogh says. “Just less travel, but maybe you miss out on that little bit of magic of being in a new place, new sights and smells. But the songs still came. I always like writing from the perspective of hanging out with someone you care about and you’re in a timeless space where you forget about things and you’re really present in the moment. And I feel like that feeling kept showing up in most of the songs on this album.”

A film and book lover, Keogh likes to use movie dialogue to inspire lyrics, even bad movies. “You can get inspiration from any movie, it doesn’t have to be a serious movie,” he says, telling me he’s recently watched a lot of Adam Sandler films. “If you’ve got your antennas up, you end up catching these lines.”

You need to have your senses attuned in your personal life, too, he adds, though he often worries that he’s not doing enough. “You always think, are my senses prepped and ready? Am I really making the most of what’s available to me? I used to be trying to get everything down on my phone and then not let any of these voice memos slip through the cracks, because there’s probably 200 or more. I’m more relaxed about it now. I feel like the good ideas will come and promote themselves and stay in my head.”

Keogh’s diligence and commitment to his craft are revealing. While he remains uncertain about the exact alchemy of the songwriting process, it does seem there’s some mathematics – effort x volume – as well as magic going on. In that respect, it’s perhaps telling that when I ask him for his motto in life, he offers not some words of wisdom or metaphorical flourish befitting an acclaimed lyricist, but instead falls back on the most utilitarian of aphorisms: just keep chipping away. “People would often say, ‘What are you doing?’ And I’d be like, ‘I’m just chipping away’. It was a way of deflecting, but also just keeping disciplined and controlling the things that are in front of you. It can be hard some days. Maybe you feel like you’re not doing good or you did something you’re not so proud of. Maybe a song isn’t doing as much as I wanted it to, but it’s just like, the next thing you do, whatever it is, you’ll have an opportunity to do something great. So, just keep chipping away.”

I’m not sure about you, but to me, that’s not something I can imagine a bloke called Vance Joy saying.

KEOGH HAS COME TO ENJOY THE ADRENALINE RUSH OF PERFORMING LIVE.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN

…I DON’T WARM UP?

02 Your coach isn’t trying to irritate you with his insistence on limbering up before launching into a full-throttle workout. Here’s why the extra effort counts

05

MON: 10:09

01 03

01

BRING THE HEAT

“A warm-up does exactly that,” says exercise physiologist Tom Cowan. “It increases the temperature of the working muscles, which improves high-intensity exercise performance.” Active heating – warming muscles through movement – helps generate more force and makes better use of muscle glycogen. Passive heating – a heat pad, for example – has some impact, but won’t offer the full range of benefits.

02

PUMP IT UP

At rest, the muscles receive 20 per cent of blood flow, with most directed to your organs. In maximal exercise, 80 per cent can go to working muscles, says Cowan. Go in cold and your body is playing catch-up as it tries to make circulatory and metabolic adjustments. “Research suggests that active warm-ups lead to less reliance on anaerobic energy systems,” he adds. This could mean less fatigueinducing muscle acidity.

LOOSENING UP CAN BOOST YOUR RESULTS.

03

HAVE SOME HEART

“Going from 60 beats per minute to 120 is a big jump in workload for your heart,” says Cowan. And this is combined with an increase in blood pressure, another side effect of exercise. A steady rise in both through a graduated warm-up may make your training session a little bit longer, but it will also make it safer and better. 04

04

JOINTS VENTURE

Dynamic stretches can improve range of motion, as well as priming muscles. Plyometric moves such as box jumps need powerful contractions, so it’s important your body gets fair warning. “Evidence suggests that dynamic stretching may boost power output,” says Cowan. Think inchworms rather than a standing hamstring stretch – save the latter for your cool-down.

05

TRICKS OF THE MIND

“Your warm-up is when you can switch off from what you were doing and turn your full attention to the workout,” says Cowan. It generally has a positive effect on your confidence in your ability to perform. “It’s also a chance to practise sport-specific movement patterns or skills.” Aim for 10-15 minutes of motion before the real work starts. Now, go get ’em.

IT’S PALEO! IT’S VEGAN! IT’S . . . COMPLICATED

This doctor-built plan claims it’ll help you maintain muscle and torch fat. ABBY LANGER, author of t, weighs in

WHAT IT IS

Pegan is a mash-up of paleo and vegan. On the diet, you can eat whenever you want and as much of anything as you want – as long as you’re filling your plate with 75 per cent plant-based foods and 25 per cent sustainably raised animal products. (So, yeah, not really vegan.) Dr Mark Hyman developed the diet – and wrote a best-selling book about it. THE PROMISE

Hyman says his pegan diet can reduce inflammation, prevent chronic disease and promote weight loss while also taking care of the planet. Because you can still eat meat, fish and eggs on pegan, you don’t have to worry about protein intake, a common concern with a vegan diet. WHAT YOU CAN’T HAVE

Quite a lot, actually: non-organic produce, vegetable oils, dairy (except for organic sheep or goat milk), gluten, more than a half cup of cooked grains or legumes daily, and soy, plus MSG, artificial sweeteners, additives, preservatives and dyes. Whew. THE GOOD

Eating more plants is always beneficial. Fruits and vegetables house disease-fighting antioxidants as well as fibre, which helps you stay full and feeds good gut bacteria. Also nice: there are no kilojoule or macronutrient (fat, protein, carbs) restrictions on the pegan diet, and – grains and legumes aside – you don’t have to measure portions, which is tedious. THE NOT SO GOOD

Hyman states that dairy is linked to cancer (not true), gluten causes obesity (also not true), and grains and legumes can trigger autoimmune disorders (sigh). There is no solid scientific evidence that suggests any of the foods he excludes from this diet, in moderate amounts, can cause poor health.

THE VERDICT

Plant-heavy diets have a studied history of reducing disease and helping people maintain a healthy weight. But pegan is too restrictive, excluding foods based on overblown or outdated claims. A varied inclusionary diet remains the best way to eat well, manage weight and have a healthy relationship with good food.

CLASS WARFARE!

Back-to-school jitters are real – and your children might be the ones who conquer them for you

BY KEVIN SWAN ILLUSTRATION BY MADISON KETCHAM

I’VE ALWAYS BEEN proud to be the product of public school. After all, public and state schools are part of the backbone of our country. My kid would follow in my footsteps, I had decided. And by footsteps, I mean tyre tracks, because I have ALS and use a wheelchair.

If you aren’t familiar with ALS (amyotrophic lateral scelrosis, also known as motor neurone disease), it’s quite the shit sandwich. Not only did it put a dampener on my golf game, it has a life expectancy of three to five years. Fortunately, I’ve been an outlier – I’m in my tenth year living with the disease – and this past year was a doozy.

Last spring alone, amid COVID, my wife and I bought our first house. We decided to move to a new house in a new city, an hour away from any friends and family. My wife started her own business, and because of the pandemic, I had to pull the plug on the foundation I created to raise awareness about ALS – which is a pretty bad pun considering I need a ventilator to breathe. Oh, and I also became a stay-at-home dad for a few months until we could find a preschool for my three-year-old daughter, Elliott Monroe.

Despite being completely paralysed, with the exception of the little piggy that went to market on my left foot, I tried especially hard during those months to be as active and present in Elliott’s life as possible. Instead of me making her breakfast every morning, she crawled into bed with me with some orange juice and a little box of raisins. There we’d watch an episode of Paw Patrol on my tablet before my caregiver would start moving my legs to get the blood flowing. Then the rest of our day we spent at parks and playgrounds. This time became increasingly special with every box of mac ’n’ cheese we shared at lunch. It was idyllic – but her going to school loomed. Like any responsible parent in a new town, I had Googled “best preschools near me”. One result had caught my eye. The only problem was that it was a private school. And this private school represented everything I was against. Did I want to be a private-school parent? It would be a stretch on our finances. Would our daughter be not only the poor kid among the wealthy but also the poor kid with the dad in a wheelchair? My mind raced through decades of insecurities, ranging from not having enough money to never being quite smart enough for honours classes. Sure, the private school offered a great education, but could I deal with picking her up in my wheelchair-accessible van among the parade of Porsches? I was a nervous wreck. What was I thinking? So, I emailed the private school’s admissions director and spilled my guts. Unfortunately for my ego and fortunately for our daughter’s future, the director was lovely. My wife, who grew up in the bush, was supportive. And so we scheduled a tour. I was relieved to find out that the students were, in fact, diverse in background and class. We enrolled her, despite whatever commitment I had made about where and with whom she’d go to school.

I expected inner turmoil; instead I found relief. For all my own issues about joining a community that I had judged from the outside, it was a personal victory. Our job as parents is to put our kids in the best situation and surroundings to succeed, all the while not letting our own baggage get in the way.

As for my fears about Elliott having to deal with a dad with disabilities, she quickly squashed those. During the first week of school, she decided to ride through the preschool’s quad on my lap. The other kids were so impressed by my hot wheels that Elliott was waving like she was already on a homecoming float.

Considering that we just managed to get Elliott potty-trained in time for preschool, homecoming seems like eons from now. And despite this annoying “fatal” disease, I will be there.

THE POWER OF HIGHER POWER TRAINING

Meet the man who is leveraging the strength of spirituality to crush tough workouts – hunger, exhaustion and busy days be damned

BY LINDSAY BERRA PHOTOGRAPHY BY THE LITTLEST BOOMBOX

ONE DAY LAST year, a Virginiabased trainer named Faris Khan posted a unique kind of workout video to Instagram: he wore an elaborately embroidered Muslim prayer hat and vest while completing a set of complicated plyometric Superman push-ups with claps and spins in his living room.

It was April 12, 2021, the first day of the sacred month of Ramadan. For Khan, who is better known as @BrotherFaris to more than 200,000 followers on social media, this 30-day period of devotion meant fasting from sunrise to sunset without coffee or even water. But every few days, he posted another video or story of himself doing impressive calisthenics and acrobatics to inspire his fellow Muslims to stick with their exercise programs.

“To me, the connection between faith and religion and overall health is huge,” says Khan, who sees Ramadan as a time to test himself mentally, physically and spiritually. “It makes you learn about your body and what you are capable of. If you want to cheat and go in the closet and eat food, no one will know, but God can see, and building that discipline makes you strong.”

Khan, 29, is poised to do the same thing every year, seeing Ramadan as a time of spiritual discipline that purifies the body and brings one closer to God. (It also includes five set times for prayer each day as well as special night prayers.) As Khan sees it, your workout can be its own kind of devotion, a challenge that not only pushes your limits and builds strength but leaves you with a sense of accomplishment that keeps other stresses and values in perspective.

Already lean and ripped, Khan dropped three kilos during Ramadan last year while seeing improvements in his body-fat percentage and overall musculature. He’s one of many pious people spreading the gospel of fitness on social media, including @Kazmanaught (iconic strongman William Kazmaier) and @FatherCapo (the jacked Catholic priest). All generally advocate for something medical experts have only recently begun to explore more deeply: one of the best ways to stay healthy or improve your fitness may be to view any physiological challenge from a religious – or at least spiritual – point of view.

Last year, several hundred people signed up for Khan’s training-while-fasted program, which included detailed workout and nutrition guides. The testimonials began rolling in

UNLOCK

YOUR INNER STRENGTH BY FASTING & STAYING FIT

Each Ramadan, trainer Faris Khan, fasts from dawn to dusk for 30 days – and still crushes intense workouts. Follow him on Instagram @BrotherFaris for more tips. Here are a couple to keep in mind

on day one, with someone raving about the “unique and challenging exercises” and a breakfast plan that “helps me keep energy throughout the day”, and continued through day 30, when one user felt “definitely stronger all around”.

Given the popularity of fasting as a life hack, Khan suspects some clients weren’t Muslim. Either way, the idea of joining a fitness community as a way to seek personal growth or enlightenment sits perfectly within our modern obsession with the cult of wellness. As researchers at Harvard Divinity School have reported, we live in an age when millennials especially are walking away from the often politicised climate of traditional churches. At the same time, many people are embracing CrossFit and SoulCycle as places not only to find community but to reshape their lives. Khan certainly agrees that treating your body as a vessel is important. “In the Koran, a strong believer is better than a weak one,” he says. “That can mean strong spiritually in connection with God but also physically.”

Many religions have some hurdles for staying active. Orthodox Jewish men follow modesty rules and avoid extensive exercise on the Sabbath. The Amish see bodybuilding as vain, and going to a gym isn’t permitted. Practitioners of Buddhism, Christianity, Judaism, Taoism, Jainism and Hinduism all undertake fasts as a means of self-sacrifice or cleansing.

Yet many athletes seem to appreciate these challenges as a way to add even more value to their lives. Take current NBA prospect Ryan Turell, who is Orthodox Jewish and skipped playing D-I basketball to build D-III Yeshiva University into a powerhouse. Or former Boston Celtics center Enes Freedom, who has said that competing during Ramadan gives him next-level focus. In the MLB, Jacob Steinmetz became the first Orthodox Jew to be drafted last July. And plenty of competitive Amish marathoners race in their long pants and suspenders.

Some forms of fasting can deprive your body of necessary nutrients and energy, so it’s often an obstacle for people who are serious about their faith and fitness. But Khan is deliberate in how he begins and ends his fast and how he exercises in order to maximise his energy and gains. To avoid dehydration, he drinks three litres of water overnight, and he concentrates on hitting his daily protein goals by eating large but balanced pre-dawn and post-sundown meals. He takes catnaps throughout the day to catch up on sleep and focuses on shorter bodyweight workouts instead of longer sessions comprising set after set of weightlifting.

Each day, he’ll spend 30-45 minutes with a specific focus: lower body, upper body, core, speed, agility or mobility. These workouts are all done without equipment and include calisthenic skills like planches, handstands and push-up variations, which he practises outside at his local parks. “They are mostly lower rep, but you put out max effort,” he says, “or as much effort as you can give at the moment without going to complete failure, because that will exhaust you if you are training fasted.” He usually works out one hour before dinner so he can be ready to feed his muscles.

Richard Bloomer, the dean of the College of Health Sciences at the University of Memphis, says that if people are mentally prepared and develop an appropriate plan of action, they should be able to complete a successful fast while still maintaining their usual activity levels, including strenuous resistance and cardiovascular exercise. The idea that faith may boost resilience has gained traction in some academic circles, too. About a decade ago, researchers at Duke University compared more than 3000 studies from around the world and concluded that people who consider themselves religious or spiritual typically have better mental health and have shown the ability to overcome physical health issues more quickly than those who don’t. Other studies show that a spiritual mindset may help you cope with work stress and burnout or slow the progression of some diseases. Khan’s workout plans unite people who – religious or not – are willing to go through something hard together. One obvious payoff? “I feel fresher and stronger, with an increase in strength-to-weight ratio that translates directly to weightlifting,” he says. But that’s not the biggest benefit. “So many people in this world are praying for a small fraction of the blessings we have. We have to remember to be thankful.”

FUEL UP SMARTLY You’ll have to wake up early to hydrate and eat a nutritious meal, but can catnap later if you need to.

WAIT TO WORK OUT You can avoid crashing by exercising about an hour before you power back up with your nightly meal, Khan says.

THE NUTRITION SNOB’S GUIDE TO SALAD GREENS

A leafy lunch shouldn’t be an emblem of self-denial, but rather a stimulating element of any satisfying, nourishing meal plan. Savour these green giants

1TURN OVER A NEW LEAF Contrary to popular belief, the cooler months – not summer – represent peak salad season: leaves grow better when it’s cooler, says Neil Campbell, head chef at Fitzrovia’s Rovi. The best salads are simple, but quality ingredients are paramount. Buy from small producers, who often “pick crops that morning”. Here are Campbell’s go-tos…

A

Pea Shoots

“A great crop,” says Campbell. Keen gardener? Grow a pea plant and trim the tops for a continuous supply of salad, even before the pods are ready. They’re a strong source of vitamin C, too.

B

Baby Kale

“Tender and palatable” Red Russian is Campbell’s go-to. Kale is a top source of vitamin K – excellent for heart and bone health – and sulforaphane, which supports detoxification. Some useful pub trivia for you there.

C

Rainbow Chard

Chard is in season year-round, and you can spot this variety by its colourful stalk. It’s a true vitamin powerhouse, in particular when it comes to dishing out vitamin A for robust immunity and eye health.

D

Spinach

We’ll spare you the Popeye jokes, but this leaf – at its best between April and July – supports muscle function. As well as helpful minerals, its ecdysterone is linked to increased strength. 2 THE SPIN DOCTOR

Limp greens won’t inspire you to explore your culinary creativity. So, the first step to a crisper salad is storing your leaves. Campbell advises sitting them in cold water for five minutes, then drying in a salad spinner. Don’t be overzealous. ‘“A bit of moisture is good,” he says. Store your greens in a zip-lock bag. Few gizmos are needed, but a mandoline can make quick work of slicing, from carrot ribbons and rounds of onion to thin apple slices.

3

PRESENTATION POINTS

Now to put your theory into practice. It’s not just the quality of your fresh ingredients that counts, and a well-stocked pantry goes far: Campbell favours Belazu for oils (“I prefer a light olive oil, something floral and not too bitter”) and vinegars (“they stock about 10 different types, from sweet to musky and appley ones”). These four recipes from Campbell and the team at Rovi are bursting with flavourful nutrient-rich ingredients to brighten your workday lunches and weekend barbecues alike.

DRESS UP

A good dressing does more than enhance the enjoyment of your greens – it adds bonus nutritional benefits, too

A

Elderflower-Lime Pea Shoot lderflowerLimePeaShoot & Burrata

SERVES 1-2

• 150ml elderflower cordial • 5 limes, juiced • 1 tbsp chardonnay vinegar • 50g fresh peas • 50g sugar snaps • Handful of almonds • 1 burrata • 10g pea shoots • Basil and mint • Aleppo chilli flakes

METHOD

Whisk the cordial, lime juice and vinegar along with a pinch of salt and 5½ tbsp olive oil for a dressing. Blanch the peas and sugar snaps (boil for 1-2 mins, then refresh in ice water). Toast the almonds at 180°C for 5 mins, cool and slice. Cut open the burrata and season. Combine the peas with the shoots, add some torn basil and mint, and lightly mix with a glug of the dressing.

B

Yuuzu-App Apple Kale p & Radish Radish h

SERVES 1-2

• 1 tsp yuzu kosho • 1 tbsp apple vinegar • 1 tbsp olive oil • Salt and sugar • 160g baby kale • 6 radishes with tops • ¼ cox apple • 1 ½ tbsp creme fraiche • Nigella seeds and pickled chillies

METHOD

Combine the kosho, vinegar and oil with a pinch each of salt and sugar (sub in lemon, lime and grapefruit zest if you don’t have kosho). Massage into the kale and leave to tenderise for 20 mins. Slice the radishes, reserving the tops. Core and dice the apples. Toss the ingredients with the creme fraiche. Campbell likes this with roast chicken.

Healthy Fats

Low-fat dressings might keep the kilojoule count down, but there’s a trade-off: oils such as olive and avo help you absorb illness-fighting carotenoids.

Vinegar

When added to carb-based meals, even a small amount of vinegar can curb blood-sugar spikes, keeping your energy levels steady for longer.

Citrus Juice

The vitamin C in your squeeze of lemon improves the body’s absorption of non-haem iron: the kind found in grains, legumes and your leafy greens.

C

Braised Chard with Garlic, Tomato & Lemon

SERVES 1-2

• 150g Swiss or rainbow chard • 3 garlic cloves, sliced • 3 tbsp olive oil • 2 ripe tomatoes, chopped • Salt and pepper • ½ lemon, juice and zest

METHOD

“I don’t believe a salad always has to include raw leaves,” says Campbell. Separate the chard stems and leaves, thinly slice the stems and tear the leaves. Fry the garlic in oil until golden, then add the tomatoes and stems. Lightly season and cook for 10 mins, then add the leaves. Keep on the heat for another 10 mins. Finish it off with lemon juice and serve at room temperature as a side dish – or transform it into a pasta salad.

D

Freekeh with Spinach, Orange & Walnuts

SERVES 1-2

• 100g freekeh • 1 orange, juice and zest • 1 tbsp currants • 60g large-leaf spinach • 30g parsley • 2 tbsp walnuts • 1 tbsp olive oil • Salt and pepper

METHOD

Boil the freekeh in salted water for 15-20 mins; strain and cool. Bring the juice and zest to a boil in a pan, then remove from the heat and add the currants. Soak for 20 mins. Pick the chunky stalks off the spinach and parsley; wash in ice water. Then put through a spinner, if you have one. Toast the walnuts for 5 mins in the oven, then roughly chop. Mix everything together adding oil, salt and pepper.