Peak Power
Book offers science-based methods to boost performance
If you’re looking for another hack-this, drop-10-poundsfast, juice-cleanse-yourway-to-happiness book, turn the page. Right now.
“This is no ‘quick-fixer,’” Brad Stulberg says of his book “Peak Performance: Elevate Your Game, Avoid Burnout, and Thrive With the New Science of Success” (Rodale, $24.99), which he co-wrote with Steve Magness.
“There is so much hype in the ‘performance and self-help’ book category, and we didn’t want to be part of that,” he said. And he means it. Stulberg was a consultant at McKinsey & Co. management consulting firm, and Magness was a high-performance runner (ran a 4:01 mile as a high school runner) who learned the hard way what it’s like to crash and burn early in their careers.
“We wrote this book for us,” Stulberg said in a phone interview just before the June 6 release of the book. “We had both been at the burnout stage pretty early. … We hoped it didn’t have to be that way. And we set out to figure out how others survived and thrived so we could help others do the same.”
Magness currently serves as a coach to professional runners, is the head crosscountry coach at the University of Houston and a lecturer of strength and conditioning at St. Mary’s University in London.
Stulberg is researcher and speaker on health and human performance topics and is a columnist for New York and Outside magazines (among others).
In “Peak Performance,” the two provide a thoughtful (and sciencebacked) approach to taking your performance to the next level without wrecking your home life.
I started reading Stulberg’s reporting of health and the science of human performance in Outside magazine several years ago when I was sitting solidly in my athletic comfort zone. His stories on a variety of topics, from mental skills and athletic performance to interviews with world-class performers, helped me to systematically get myself unstuck and to do things I never thought I could do, all while having a ton of fun.
In “Peak Performance,” Stulberg and Magness provide tools to help readers explore everything from meditating and resting to prioritizing and working in manageable blocks. They spell out principles for sustainable success.
If there is one take-away Stulberg said he hopes people get from the book is this simple equation: “Stress + Rest = Growth.”
“This equation holds true regardless of what you are trying to grow,” Stulberg said.
If you’re looking to be able to draw your road map better so you can drive it, get this book. And read it several times.