Lockdown was hard on all of us. Especially those of us who enjoy active physical lifestyle and huge amounts of exercise. This is my account of how I used Vitality from Discovery to keep my physical activity up, and how that may have improved my health. I was not only able to improve my health. I also sorted out my driving and my banking. This is a personal account.
Healthy Living
When Lockdown was announced on Thursday 26 March, I went for my last run on the mountain. At that point I had been training quite hard since 1 January, working on fitness and endurance. I had already run 5 good races in 2020 and things were looking good. But I did not know how lockdown would affect my running and fitness. I felt cheated, and in desperation ventured out of the first day of lockdown. But it was not much fun running in the shadows at 5 am, dodging the ADT Security Guards. At that point my fitness level as measure by Strava’s Fitness and Freshness tracker was a lowly 40 points, but still up from January 2020.
Then started my career of driveway running. The whole country seemed to be on driveway running. I set out a course of 120 metres around the pool, the garden and up and down the driveway. In the first week of running, 5 kms per evening on my home course was total hell. I must have run into the same fynbos bush over 400 times, and it was getting really boring. But I kept it up.
Thankfully Discovery arranged some amazing Zoom sessions about being all-locked up. And after I heard NASA Astronaut Capt Scott Kelly talk about about spending 520 days in space, most of that at the International Space Station, I didn’t feel so bad about running in my own garden. Capt Kelly was locked up with a Russian Cosmonaut, who drove him totally nuts counting down his days. Capt Kelly explained that you need to keep yourself busy with your work, your hobbies, and your exercise. Keeping physically active was the key to staying sane and fit in space, so I got to work improving my home course in my space. I worked hard at expanding the home route, tied back the crazy fynbos bushes, and got the track up to 240 metres, while staying behind locked gates. There was some progress as I could now get up to 7 kms in a session, with destroying my mental wellbeing.
Healthy Thinking
Discovery also arranged our CEO Adrian Gore to talk to us and inspire us. Those of us who have had the privilege of dealing with Adrian Gore will know him as a successful, intelligent thought-leader. The leader of his generation, but without any sense of hubris. Adrian Gore gave us a lecture on maintaining structure during lockdown, the key points being;
- Daily routine in work and making sure to set daily goals to get things done
- Connecting and engaging with people
- Physical activity
- Practicing some competency such as your own hobby
- Maintaining the “We of Hope” as opposed to the “I” of my own problems
Following this fine advice, I took the points to heart, and embarked upon;
- Making sure that I got things done, in the business per a list every day. Never less than 2 major items to be done per day
- Phoning, Phoning and phoning clients, friends and members and talking to them about how they were. And were they coping.
- Making sure to shut my home-office at a reasonable time, each afternoon.
- Plenty of Running in the Garden, 7 kms per day to make Vitality target, then chill down.
- Cleaning up my workshop, rekindling my competence in woodwork, and enrolling in an online-language course
- Volunteering to run our local community’s weekly Zoom-A-Thon, that connected members our community with each other.
Healthy Rewards
Shortly after that Vitality allocated Discovery Miles for every Vitality Point earned, and at that point a lot of us suddenly realised that we would be able to run up a positive banking balance . The game was on. To this day, I still don’t know whether the Vitality even realized how much I used that benefit ! and loved that benefit.
In the month of April 2020 I was able to maintain full daily activity running at home. I was making my Vitality targets and earning Discovery Miles. The month of April 2020 was peculiar, since my car only did 8 kilometers the whole month, yet I ran 140 kilometers. I am sure that was many other people’s experience during the crazy month of April 2020. Our running club were able to arrange a virtual running of the two oceans marathon in a relay format . Every person completing their own 5.6 kilometers in their own driveways. This was a wonderful way to keep spirits up over a very dark and dreary month. My Zoom skills as Virtual Zoom DJ served us well. By the time lockdown was partially eased on the 1st of May, I was proud to say that I hadn’t lost any fitness at all. In fact measured fitness was increasing. Keeping fit just felt like the right thing to do.
On the day that lockdown eased Friday 1 May, I headed straight up the mountain , mostly to attempt to cure my cabin fever. I completed an epic run, that took in the views of Camps Bay from above. May started well and I continued to run inspired by Vitality’s wonderful benefits, that was transferring Vitality points earned into spendable Discovery Miles.
Exercise as an antidote to Sickness
Our CEO of Vitality Dinesh Govender, gave a wonderful Zoom lecture, in which he pointed out that highly-engaged Vitality members had stayed highly engaged throughout lock down. And he had the data from SA and the UK to back him up. In fact very few highly-engaged members had seen any reduction in their physical activity levels.
Our Health CEO Ryan Noach, highlighted the claims figures for Covid-19 members who had sadly been hospitalised over the period both in SA and the UK. It was apparent very quickly that fitness and exercise provided at large degree of protection against the chances of being hospitalised and the outcomes once in hospital, for a full recovery. This is not to say that people who exercised didn’t get sick, but there was a certain degree of protection that fitness and exercise afforded . Discovery’s Vitality Age measure was a significant predictor of COVID-19 related hospitalisation risk. Members with a Vitality Age lower or equal to their actual age were 11% lower risk when compared to those with the Vitality Age 4 years older than their actual age. Vitality Ages also indicated by stopping bad habits such as smoking and excess alcohol consumption and obvious healthy behaviours such as increased physical activity and healthy eating.
Fitness Levels Increase
The benefits to my own lifestyle, fitness and ability to keep fit were immense. During May as lockdown eased, I was able to get my running up to 321 kms for the month. And a lot of it straight up and down the biggest hills I could find. My measured fitness went from 40 to almost 80 as measured by strava.com fitness tracking. During the whole period I was able to keep fit and healthy, carry on earning Vitality points, and to turn those points into spendable Discovery Miles. My weight came into BMI range, having shed 5 kg. Suddenly I discovered that I was good at keeping fit – I used that fitness to fully-fund brand new iPhone and an Apple Watch from the Apple store, using the generous and intelligent benefits from Discovery Bank and Vitality.
Great Driving
One of the crazy benefits of lockdown was the lack of kilometres driven in my car. As I said earlier during the whole month of April, I only drove 8 kilometres. This made me a much safer driver ! Suddenly my Vitality drive measurement increased from its Bronze level to Gold, due entirely to lack of kilometres driven . I had suddenly become an expert driver due to lack of driving . But more importantly I realised that it was it would be possible to become a great driver – I just had to put my mind to it. I started paying attention to the way that I was driving , making sure that I wasn’t texting while driving , and not doing and repeating all the silly habits that I was accustomed to on the road . This could not could not have come at a better time for me , since Discovery Insure launched Vitality Drive 2.0 during Lockdown. Vitality Drive 2.0 made the attainment of daily Vitality Drive goals much easier, due to the intelligent application of loss-aversion incentives. Instead of trying to achieve the goal, Vitality Drive assumed you already owned the goal, and my only task was to not loose. Much easier. Suddenly I was an expert driver , proud of my Gold Vitality Drive status, and determined to keep it. This sudden increase in my Vitality Drive status meant that I could almost fully-fund new tyres from Tiger wheel, via Discovery Insure’s Insurance Funder Account. I did not loose the opportunity of getting a full new set of great tyres, and I allowed Discovery Insure to pay for them !
Healthy Banking
Since I had a bit of extra time on my hands over lockdown, and had got so good at Vitality and Vitality Drive, I figured I would give my Discovery Bank Vitality Money a run for their money. Vitality Money is a Vitality behaviour modification rewards programme Healthier Banking via a 5-point programme of;
- Maintaining Savings Balances
- Paying off Property Loans
- Having Sufficient Insurance
- Proper Debt Management
- Proper Retirement Funding
Having migrated my banking over to discovery bank a few months before , I still didn’t have a good vitality money status . I used some of the spare time to familiarise myself with the objectives of the programme and went about completing the easy exercises, and tweaking my finances. Suddenly my Vitality Money status from bronze to diamond status. I suddenly realised that I was going to be good at this too, and all I had to do my maintain those new good habits. That had the immediate effect of supercharging all my existing benefits Vitality discounts and Discovery deals . An example for me was that through Sportsman’s Warehouse I was able to get a brand new set of Ascics Gel Nimbus running shoes , 50 % funded by Discovery. By then really needed a new pair of running shoes, having by then worn out my poor old Ascics due to all the running listed above. Another of the benefits of Discovery Bank Vitality Money, was able to better arrange my banking and open up targeted-savings–accounts for specific reasons. I had lowered my cost of banking, increased my ease of banking and had gained greater control of my personal finances . I did not come as a surprise to me that Forbes.com magazine carried a full-featured article on the benefits of Vitality Money for Financial Literacy and Inlcusion.
Summary of all my Vitality Benefits
In summary Vitality was my partner through the whole of lockdown . Vitality for health kept me fit and I believe inoculated from the physical and mental effects of the pandemic. Vitality Drive kept me safe on the roads , made me a great driver , and showed me how to take some joy in driving in a safe and intelligent manner. Vitality Money changed the way I bank , lowered the cost of my banking , changed my financial objectives, and increased and supercharged my existing benefits .
We all learned a lot of things during lockdown , and some of the things I learned were how to keep healthier, how to become an even greater driver, and how to bank healthier . None of this would be would have been possible without the incentivised Vitality rewards programme. And I’m sure that my modified behaviour will stay with me long into to the future.
If you want to find out more how Vitality Health, Vitality Drive and Vitality Money can work for you, please contact me and I’ll be more than willing to share my examples my experiences and my insights with you.
