Simon Ingram, 70, is Chairman of Fulcram financial services company. He also runs a golf academy in Spain and is on the board of several companies. He is divorced and has three children. Interview by Victoria Young
It is hard to point to a single cause for good health. But for me, the four pillars are to move properly, sleep properly, eat properly, and think properly; a positive attitude is important. I avoid negative people and refuse to surround myself with negative energy because I think it harms you.
I am half Italian and come from a big family. Growing up, we did not have much money, but I went to a good school. My father was a publican and, after he died, I worked with my mum in the pub before starting my own financial services company in 1979.
Seven years later, I had built it to 3,400 people. When you come from nothing, you are continually insecure and I drove myself into the ground. I worked too hard and was constantly stressed. I was slightly out of my depth all the time. I would go three days without sleeping, just napping on the couch. It nearly killed me.
Financially, the consequences were good. I was a good dad and I think I was a good husband, but I was not a very good specimen of a human being. I was tired, always in a hurry and never feeling well. I used to drink and smoke and I had incredibly poor digestion, bad sleep, and a bad diet.
I trained really hard, running at 5.30am in Hyde Park or doing weights in the gym because I knew that by expending physical energy, I felt better. But I never felt good.
I had a chauffeur and a Bentley and when I was being driven home at 1.30am one morning, I saw the reflection in the window of an old man smoking a cigarette. I was 34 but looked 54.
A few years later I had an epiphany. I wanted a better climate. I wanted not to be in London; to be out of a city. I wanted to walk more slowly, to stop and talk to people on the street, to be more reflective and not always in a hurry.
I sold the business. I moved to Spain and started working in a very different way. I had chosen not to follow my previous purpose and had a year or two of total withdrawal. It was like going into a monastery and it was quite scary.
I started focusing on my health, trying to work out what made me happy rather than doing what I “should” do. I stepped up my exercise and made it more yoga-based. I started playing golf for the first time, which was part of the therapy. I got really good at it, practised constantly, and was very competitive. Then I realised that I was getting more stressed playing golf so I stopped being so competitive and I now just play for fun with my sons.
My key interests are my family: my three children and six grandchildren, who are great. Then I fill the other parts of my life in the right proportion and in the right way for me. Now I spend four months in Spain, five months in Switzerland and three months travelling.
I stopped drinking completely two years ago. I used to drink wine at weekends but wearing a Whoop tracker showed me how much alcohol disrupts sleep. And it’s essential to have good-quality sleep or none of the other stuff works.
I have focused on getting my whole system into sync. I’m guided by my Whoop fitness tracker, which measures my heart rate variability (HRV) to determine whether I’m in sympathetic or parasympathetic mode. Sympathetic means my body is saying “move, move”; parasympathetic means my body is saying “slow down” and switch to recovery mode which includes stretching, walking, an early night and eating earlier.
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I used to train three times a week. Now I train pretty much every day. I focus on two things: VO2 max (cardiovascular fitness) and movement. I do one hour of high-intensity training like sprinting or the steady bike. And I do three hours and 20 minutes of lower-intensity training such as fast walking or slow jogging. I also do a minimum of four weight sessions; normally five or six.
In the morning I will go to the gym, walk fast, jog and then sprint for 30-45 minutes. Then I will do ATG exercises for 10 to 40 minutes. ATG is an American athletic system that trains ankles, knees, hips, wrists, shoulders and elbows. It focuses on joint strength and flexibility rather than just bulking up large muscles. I also do yoga to improve flexibility. My movement does not just happen in the gym; sometimes I play golf or go walking. Since increasing my activity, my energy levels have increased shockingly. A calcium score via MRI gave me a heart age of less than 35, while a GlycanAge biological test estimated my age as 38.
Once a month, I go to a London clinic called HUM2N which helps me with feedback and understanding around longevity. I do therapies such as VO2 max training, IV super nutrient drips with zinc, vitamin C, NAD (Nicotinamide Adenine Dinucleotide, which is a vital coenzyme found in every living cell, crucial for energy production, DNA repair, and metabolism) plus a shot of the antioxidant, glutathione.
I also use an infrared sauna and cold plunge. And, whenever I can, I spend 45 minutes in a hyperbaric chamber, which is a decompression chamber used by deep-sea divers. You wear an oxygen mask and the pressure flattens out the red blood cells, increasing their surface area. Breathing high-grade oxygen with increased surface area massively increases oxygen absorption, which reduces inflammation, increases healing and has anti-ageing properties. I spend about €20,000 (£17,421) a year in total on these procedures
Blood testing has helped focus on how my body is reacting, using longevity principles. For example, I have a hiatus hernia. The standard treatment is proton pump inhibitors (PPIs), which reduce stomach acidity, and which I took for years but still had real issues with my digestive system, including reflux, gas and discomfort. Blood tests, stool tests and gut barrier tests helped to identify ways to calm the gut down without PPIs, which dilute stomach acid and can create Small intestinal bacterial overgrowth (Sibo), where absorption happens. That leads to malabsorption, meaning you can eat very well but not absorb nutrients properly.
Tests also revealed that I had a parasite, which is quite common and a big gut disruptor. I started using more natural methods, such as slippery elm to calm the acid, and mimosa to tackle the parasite. To address the Sibo in the small intestine I stopped PPIs completely. The whole process was unspectacular, but I feel so much better.
My diet is not massively complicated. In the morning, I have lots of different coloured fruits with Greek yoghurt, natural honey, nuts and seeds. Lunch is light; usually a three or four-egg omelette. Dinner is a piece of meat or fish linked with the season, depending on where I am. In Spain, I eat more fish because I am by the coast. I have three zero-meat days, such as risotto, lentil soup or pasta, and four meat days when I’ll have a steak, some good lamb or veal, seafood and white fish. Two days a week I will have carbs like sweet potatoes and the rest of the time I have salad, broccoli or cauliflower.
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I pretty much avoid all sugar, though I might have the odd tarte tatin with cream at Selfridges or some good dark chocolate. And I fast for 24-30 hours once a week. I always try to eat before 6pm but on Sundays I have lunch between 2pm and 4pm and then do not eat until Monday evening. Fasting causes ketosis and autophagy, which is when the body starts repairing itself.
I have a winding-down protocol. I stop drinking coffee at midday. I completely get rid of phones in the evening. After 6pm I use red light only in the house, and have no white lights at night, which disrupt your circadian rhythm. You need white light in the morning so, to help my circadian rhythm, I go outside early, barefoot, to connect with the ground, and look at the sun for a few minutes. By 7pm I will have eaten and had a hot bath. I keep things calm and soft. I use a sleep mask, earplugs and have no TV in the room, which is fully dark. These small things really improve sleep.
I have a girlfriend, but we sleep in separate rooms. I love her – she is great – but if you share a bed your sleep is poorer. And I believe that you do not have to do what you think you should do in life; it is much better to do what makes you feel better and more well. Luckily she is totally on the same page as me.
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