Turn Weakness Into Strength - Be Fully Prepared For Spec Ops Selections

Pic from McTeams Instagram / Book

It takes time and hard work to reduce weaknesses and smart programming to maintain your strengths at the same time. Every athlete who seeks to serve will start this process with a few strengths and more weaknesses than they may realize. Assess your strength and weaknesses!  Depending on the job they want to do in the military, some preparation training will take longer than others. If an athlete seeks to serve in regular military jobs (not special ops), the transition may not require a significant transition time as most people in decent shape and a good athletic history can join most branches of service and be ready to go. However, the US recruiting pool does not look like a large group of former athletes - quite the opposite actually. 

It is now more difficult to enter into the military and meet the height / weight standards than it is to have a high school diploma, pass the ASVAB, or not have a criminal record. Not that this is a source of pride nor has anything to do with this article, but guess which generations had the most difficulty with criminal records - Gen Xers and Boomers baby! Well not anymore - it is height and weight standards - time to get moving folks EVEN IF you do not want to serve. 

Do Not Get Too Fat to Fight

Joining as a deconditioned and non-athletic candidate will lead to multiple issues typically with overuse injuries (tendonitis, rhabdomyolysis, shins pain, etc) when enduring boot camp, basic training, police/fire academies. You do not have to be an athlete to be above average fit but you have to work hard to get conditioned - like your life or your buddy's depended on it. The time it will require to build a decent foundation of fitness so you do not get hurt during training and able to meet the standards will take a few to several months for this subset of the population.  Though the level of fitness requirements are different between the regular military and special ops, the time preparing the deconditioned for the military will be similar to the time it takes an athlete to develop strengths out of weaknesses capable of handling more physically demanding special ops selections. 

Typical Transitions of Weaknesses That Must Occur

Special Ops Selection are specifically designed to expose weaknesses and they usually get exposed near immediately as a failure to meet the standards or the individual getting injured is the usual outcome for underdeveloped weaknesses. You can avoid this issue by preparing on a cycle or two focused on your weakness.  These are the typical weaknesses serious performing athletes have when preparing for any spec ops pipeline:

Strength / Power Athlete - Typical lifters, football players, and other power athletes, need more Endurance (run, swim, ruck) and quite often less mass (football linemen). The lifter lacks muscle stamina to crush high-repetition calisthenics tests and workouts as well as the cardio endurance to run and swim for long periods of time and fast timed run / swim events. If on the bigger side, the ability to run faster and do obstacle courses (grip strength / endurance) can be seriously challenged. 

However, rucking, load-bearing, log PT, and equipment/boat carry is usually not an issue - well, at least these bigger folks do not get crushed by the weight like some lighter / less stronger athletes will. Maintaining strength is easier for most even without adding a lift cycle to a full year of training. My advice for this athlete is go straight into calisthenics and cardio with these progressive programs as many lack the ability to run timed runs at a fast pace (6-7 min miles) for 1.5 - 5 miles. In fact, anything over 100m is considered long distance. Many need to learn how to swim PERIOD so that can be some time just focusing on that. High rep calisthenics are not an issue for a set or two, but multiple sets and high volume workouts will crush them if they are not used to longer workouts outside of the weight room.  (Consider Calisthenics and Cardio Workout, Navy SEAL Phase 1, Complete Guide to Navy SEAL Fitness,  Stew Smith's Spring Summer Cycle)

Endurance Athlete - Need More Strength / Power / Mass(?) - Typical endurance athletes come from varying backgrounds but all are similarly challenged in needing to add strength, power, and mass (sometimes).  Focusing any of your preparation getting even faster at your competitive events (running, swimming primarily) is a waste of time as most of you will be the best in the class at runs and swims.  However, runners typically lack upper body strength and load-bearing ability. They may need to work on calisthenics at higher reps first, which is usually a fast transition; however, the strength and mass may take a cycle or two focused on getting bigger and stronger. (Consider Tactical Fitness, Tactical Strength, Navy SEAL Weight Training Workout, Weight Vest Workout,  Stew Smith's Fall Winter Cycle).  

Swimmers / H2O Polo - The competitive swimmers typically have running impact weaknesses and lack ability to do load bearing and agility (logs, boats, o courses).  (Consider Tactical Fitness, Tactical Strength, Navy SEAL Weight Training Workout, Weight Vest Workout,  Stew Smith's Fall Winter Cycle but also progressively build running into higher volume with Navy SEAL Fitness later). 

Other Endurance Athletes - Depending on the sport, the heart and lungs maybe developed, but there are imbalances when they involve any strength training. The good news is that high-rep calisthenics typically comes quickly, so mastering a PST is not that difficult IF they can swim, but the muscle mass and load-bearing activities of selection may be a challenge if not fully prepared in the weight room with at least a season of weight lifting. (Consider Complete Guide to Navy SEAL Fitness / Navy SEAL Weight Training Combo, Warrior Workout Vol 2, Special Ops Prep - Seasonal Periodization Trilogy, and Spring, Summer, Fall Winter Combo.)  

Hybrid Athletes - Multi-sport athletes, decathletes, some middle distance runners, lacrosse players, soccer/rugby players, higher level CrossFitters, and wrestlers that get a good amount of fast-paced running, hard work in anaerobic zones, and a combination of strength training are usually well-rounded athletes. If these athletes can pick up swimming quickly and do not injure themselves with increased volume of calisthenics and running miles, the process is relatively short. 

All of the above athletes need special focus on New Skill Technique / Work on any water weaknesses (Swim, tread underwater, diving) to specialize in many of the events they have not done during their years of athletic training.  

(Consider Navy SEAL Fitness, Navy PST Workout Phase 1, Navy SEAL Workout Phase 2 - 3 , Navy SEAL Workout Phase 4 Grinder PT - Four weeks before Hell Week depending on initial PST scores.

All Athletic Types Make It - IF You Prepare and Want It Bad Enough

All these types makes it! If they improve on their incoming weaknesses. Remember there are THREE phases of Tactical Fitness no matter what program you use. 

For Those Beginners Seeking to Serve 
- Start Here - 

Boot camp or basic training can build up most recruits, but spec ops candidates will get out of shape at most basic training programs.  See the programs below so the transition from recruit to active duty is not riddled with failures and injuries that prolong your first few months: 

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