Why You’re Always Tired, and What 42 Days Can Actually Do About It

If you’ve been telling yourself you’re just tired because life is busy right now, I want to gently push back on that.

I spent 23 years as a critical care nurse before I owned this gym. I’ve watched a lot of people run themselves down to nothing while insisting they were fine. What I’ve learned since is that the exhaustion most of my members walk in with isn’t a scheduling problem or a character flaw. It’s a physiology problem, and physiology responds to input.

That’s the entire premise behind our 42 Strong Fall Challenge, which starts Monday, September 28 and runs through November 8. Here’s the thinking behind it, and what’s new this round.

Energy isn’t something you find. It’s something you build.

We talk about energy like it’s weather. Some days you have it, some days you don’t, and there’s not much to be done either way.

But energy is a downstream result. It comes from things that are honestly a little boring:

• Enough protein, spread across the day, so your blood sugar isn’t riding a roller coaster
• Enough muscle, because muscle is where your body parks glucose instead of leaving it circulating
• Enough sleep, consistently, not one heroic nine hour night after five bad ones
• Enough daily movement to keep circulation and mood steady
• Enough recovery that your nervous system gets to come off high alert

None of that is exciting. All of it works. And every single item on that list is built through repetition, not intensity.

The one habit to start with this week

If you do nothing else after reading this, do this.

Pick one anchor habit and commit to doing it on the day you least feel like it. Really, that’s the most important part, on the day you least feel like it!

My favorite starting point is 30 grams of protein at breakfast. It steadies your blood sugar for the whole morning, blunts the 10am crash, and makes the 3pm decisions much easier. If that feels like a lot right now, walk for 10 minutes after dinner instead.

The habit matters less than the repetition. What you’re actually training is the part of you that follows through when it isn’t convenient. That’s the muscle that changes your life, and it’s the one most fitness programs never bother to work.

What the 42 Strong Fall Challenge actually is

Forty two days. Six weeks. One structured season where the guesswork is removed and you just execute.

Every day you’re tracking a short list of habits: training attendance, nutrition consistency, hydration, steps, sleep and recovery, and a brief mindset check in. Simple enough that you can complete it on your worst day, structured enough that you always know whether you won the day.

A few things we’re deliberate about:

Behavior over perfection. You’re scored on what you did, not on what the scale said. The number on the scale is a lagging indicator that responds to about nine variables you don’t control. Your daily actions are the thing you actually own.

Community as the engine. You’re doing this alongside people who are in the exact same season of life. Career and kids and aging parents. The shared experience is not a bonus feature. It’s a large part of why people finish.

Coaching that’s active, not passive. Our coaches check in, adjust, notice when you go quiet, and celebrate the small wins out loud. This isn’t a PDF you download and never open again.

What’s included in the 42 Strong Fall Challenge

We’ve put more into this round than any one we’ve run before. Here’s the full list.

Four one on one personal training sessions

This is your chance to learn the foundational movement patterns and get genuinely good at them, instead of doing them approximately and hoping that’s close enough. Hinge, squat, push, pull, carry. Everything else is built on top of those five, and most people have never had someone teach them properly.

It’s also our chance to learn you. Every body is different. Once a coach has spent that time with you one on one, they know how your hips move, where your shoulder catches, what your history is. So when we see you in a group class after that, we’re not guessing at your modification. We already know it, and we have it ready before you have to ask.

Our coaches carry the highest education and experience standards in this industry, and they’re paid accordingly, because a fair living wage and benefits package are a vital part of our core values. When you spend an hour with one of them, you’re spending it with someone who has trained for this seriously and has a career mentality.

Unlimited access to all group classes

For all 42 days, come as often as you want:

• Strength training, which is the foundation of everything, including your metabolism and your bone density
• Metabolic conditioning, which is your aerobic and cardiovascular work
• Recharge on Sundays, our take on mobility and flexibility, and the class people are always surprised they love

An InBody body composition analysis, before and after

The same scan on day one and day 42. This is how you see what actually changed underneath the number on the scale. Muscle gained, body fat lost, hydration, and how it’s distributed. The scale weight alone is a poor storyteller. This tells a more complete story.

A VALD ForceDecks assessment

If you are a data nerd like me, you’ll love this.

VALD ForceDecks is a dual force plate system used by professional sports teams, universities, and rehabilitation clinics. You stand on a pair of plates and perform a few simple movements. A squat, a sit to stand, or just quiet standing to test your balance. The plates measure ground reaction force at high resolution and tell us things you can’t see with the naked eye:

• How much force each leg is producing, independently
• Your left to right asymmetry, expressed as a precise percentage
• How quickly you generate force, which is what “explosive” and “reactive” actually mean
• How well you absorb force when you land
• How steady your balance is

The whole assessment takes roughly 30 minutes including the conversation about your results.

It’s also how we find the thing that’s been nagging you. If one leg is quietly doing 15 percent more work than the other, that imbalance is very often the story behind the knee that aches on stairs or the hip that flares up after a long day. We’d much rather find that on the plates than find it the hard way six months from now.

Sources on the technology, if you’re curious: VALD ForceDecks and an independent overview of what a ForceDecks assessment involves.

The Train With Me app

This one sounds like a small line item and it isn’t. The app is where the community actually lives.

It’s how we hold you accountable, because your coach can see whether you logged your day. It’s how you encourage the person on your team who went quiet on day 19, and how someone does the same for you on day 26. And it’s how you can ask your coach a direct question on a Tuesday night, when you’re standing in your kitchen wondering whether that counts as a serving of protein, instead of holding the question until you’re back in the gym on Thursday.

Six weeks is long enough that willpower runs out. What carries people through the back half isn’t discipline. It’s the group support.

An in person orientation and welcome kit

You’ll come in before day one, meet your coaches, walk through exactly how the challenge works, and leave with no unanswered questions. You’ll also leave with your welcome kit:

• Your reading material for the six weeks, because we’re working on the mindset alongside the training. I’ve chosen one of my personal favorites, “Awaken the Giant Within” by Anthony Robbins.
• A DSC t shirt so that you can rep the best gym in NH!
• A cookbook written by one of our own members, a professional chef and former bodybuilder who trains right here alongside you. Real recipes from someone who understands both flavor and protein targets.

If you’re reading this thinking “I’m not ready for that”

Look into my eyes (haha), you’re the person this was built for!

Most people who walk through our door for the first time are scared of something specific. That they won’t be able to keep up. That they’re carrying more weight than everyone else. That their back or their knee or their shoulder will act up and they’ll be embarrassed. That they don’t have the time, and that making themselves a priority feels selfish when everyone else needs them.

Here’s how we handle all of it.

We know every member’s injury and limitation status before they ever train with us. Our coaches always have a modification ready, and our modifications are never about making the work easier. They’re about making it safer. We protect the injury while still training the same muscle group we programmed, unless your injury specifically rules it out.

Nobody is watching you. Everyone in that room walked in scared once too.

This philosophy is why we keep getting named Best of 603, the Nashua Telegraph’s best fitness gym, and the Union Leader’s best circuit gym and CrossFit gym year after year. It isn’t the equipment. It’s how people are treated when they get here.

The math

Forty two days from today it will be November. You’re going to arrive there regardless.

The only real question is whether you get there having built something, or having spent another six weeks waiting to feel ready. Nobody ever feels ready. The people who change their lives are just the ones who started before they did.

We’d love to have you.

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P.S. Want the full details first? Everything about the 42 Strong Fall Challenge, including the daily habits, how scoring works, and what’s included, is right here:

P.P.S. Ready to go? Claim your spot for the challenge starting September 28:

Dynamic Strength and Conditioning is a group personal training gym in Nashua, New Hampshire. If you’d rather have a conversation before you decide anything, book a free No Sweat Intro and just talk to us: