Sohrab Khushrushahi trains every day for 40 minutes because that is what his schedule allows. “I was a lawyer for 15 years. That time, my schedule gave me 20-30 minutes to work out and I would do it. For me, it is more about the quality,” said the man behind SOHFIT. Visit his Instagram page and you will be hooked to the movement-based exercises that flood his feed. On his CV are the likes of Alia Bhatt, Kiara Advani, Angad Bedi and Ranbir Kapoor. He is “obsessed” with cricket and his dream is to get involved with the Indian team some day. In this chat, the Mumbai boy talks straight from the heart.
Fitness is all about moving. Tell us about your journey with movement...
It goes back 25 years to be honest. I started training and getting serious about my health and fitness when I was about 13 or 14 years old. That’s when I was playing cricket and I wanted to play cricket seriously. I was playing at the U-16 and U-19 levels. For me, it was all about my sport. I was obsessed and am still obsessed with cricket. As every kid growing up in the ’90s and watching Sachin (Tendulkar), you thought you could make it to the Indian cricket team. For me, it was about trying to get better at my sport.
Years into training and being there for 10-15 years, I enjoyed what I was doing, but, I was getting bored. I am also someone who needs to be constantly engaged, always looking for something new that is going to challenge me and I honestly believe that if you are not going to be learning something new every day, you are not going to survive because people will get bored of you and your methods. For me, it is about trying to evolve as a person and as a result, you got to keep learning things.
Along the way, I discovered movement. To me, it is more than just lifting weights. It’s helping out in the house and cleaning. Try mopping the floor for 30 minutes and discover what it does to your legs. Try running around with your four-year-old and five-year-old with the energy they have. That is movement as well.
I was lucky enough to get an internship with Kelly Starrett who I think is one of the biggest guys when it comes to mobility. I am obsessed with what he does. I am a level two coach with him.... I am also obsessed with Ido Portal who is all about movement and understanding how your body works. I did a two-week internship with him. When I went there, I thought I was fit. I came out battered and bruised. We were training nine hours a day. There is also a guy called Da Rulk, again all about using the body. I am doing his level ones and have done his workshop series. He is the RFT guy. I have got hooked on to the raw functional training movement in the last year or so. And, because of him, I crawled a mile on the streets of Bombay last year in February.
I have got this comment a lot in the past, ‘oh you are not as big as the gym trainers’. I don’t want to be. I want to be someone who people aspire to be without the fake things. No steroids. Eat clean, move. At the age of 38, if those guys can crawl a mile on the roads to Bombay, I’ll be impressed.
There is no end to what you can do with your body. Period. You can crawl, do push-ups, jump... you can find different things to do and that helped people during the pandemic, right? I spent six months just training with my body. Maybe I had a rucksack or a backpack and I would use that to make it more interesting.
Of course you cannot build massive muscles. You will need some external weights, but, if you want to stay fit and agile, I think you can do a lot with just your body.
How many times do you go to the gym?
My building gym has opened (since lockdown eased). I go there three-four times a week if not more, but I will do a lot of stuff on the ground, go on the grass and crawl.
Has the concept of fitness changed for you over the years?
It has evolved over time. When I was a kid and a teenager... going through college, fitness was about having muscles and showing off. I was a naive kid. We didn’t have people to coach us at that point. There is nothing wrong with that (vanity). As I grew older, I realised my body couldn’t take a beating every single day. I have been someone who has always wanted to do things for the long haul. At the age of 50, when my son is 15 and I hope he takes up cricket in his life, I want to be playing against him on a cricket ground and kick his ass! Today I am 38 and I can outrun 17-18-year-olds. To me, that is huge. It is about educating people to do the right thing.
How did the #TheSOHFIT40 Day Challenge begin?
People’s concept of fitness and their idea of what they should eat and how they should train is so warped because of the stories they are told. I was one of these kids who was told these stories, like have protein powder to get muscle. For me it was about giving people the right tools and teaching them the right things and bust as many myths as we possibly can and tell them the truth. At the end of the day, fitness is hard work. There is no quick fix to it. We wanted to reach as many people as possible.
There is an overload of information on the virtual space. As a layman, how does one navigate?
As kids, it was trial and error and we had to learn on our own. At that point of time in Bandra, there were two-three gyms. We made mistakes, got injured and learnt again. Today, I am very happy if people think they are coaches, but you’ve got to have knowledge and experience. Just because you were a fat kid and you made yourself thin, doesn’t give you the right to play with other people’s lives. At the end of the day, you look for someone who has the experience.
