Is PT a part of your personal firearms defense strategy? - Page 3

smince · April 11, 2011, 07:03 PM

Quote:

even 30 minutes a day is enough to develop or maintain healthy muscle tone and cardio conditioning.

Yep. I've lost about 40lbs in the last year doing 20-30 minutes daily.

MLeake · April 11, 2011, 07:17 PM

... there's a book I'll recommend. An acquaintance of mine wrote it, and it's been selling well. It's about how to workout with virtually no equipment, using bodyweight and household / hotel room furniture. There are two or three exercises that would require light dumbbells, or similar, but the vast majority of exercises in the book require little more than the right attitude.

http://www.marklauren.com/

For background, Mark is a former USAF Combat Controller, who helped design the fitness program currently in use by the Air Force for Combat Controller training. You can find reviews of the book pretty easily via google, and even those that criticize Mark's writing style seem to praise the actual exercises.

And the really nice things about it, in my opinion, are:

1) As noted, you can do most of this stuff in your home, or at your hotel when on business. You don't need a gym, or special equipment; and

2) Mark has provided ways to increase difficulty for each exercise; he has also set things up to allow design of effective 20-minute workouts.

I have a signed copy, and I highly recommend the exercises in the book.

Tactical Jackalope · April 11, 2011, 08:35 PM

Uh-oh.....I feel another type of pictures coming along..

Can we post progress pictures? Before and After?

We can turn this into a bb thread! I was with the forum.

Benched double my weight 6 months ago. And worked out three years straight before that...all went great..However....haven't in 6 months. Work -__- too much over time.

Now...YES! I felt more comfortable shooting then, than now..

MikeNice81 · April 12, 2011, 07:55 AM

I concur with MLeake. Mark Lauren has one of the best books out there. His book gives you enough information to customize your own plan. If you don't fell comfortable with that, he has multiple fitness regimines in the book.

I customized my own plan and in just a month I was remarkably fitter in every way. One of the reasons is that Mark focuses on functional fitness. His excercises work multiple muscle groups. Your body learns to use muscles in unision to help with real world situations.

Even some of the most basic looking excercises can be monsterous. Try doing the bear crawl. I like to do it as modified tabatas. I like a 40 second sprint followed by a 20 second "walk." Do that for ten minutes. In days you will see improvements in your upper back, shoulders, chest, arms, and cardio.

You can find numerous "easy" excercises that will tone and tune your body. My first day I did 30 rear lunges per leg. I over did it (Mark warns about that) and it hurt to sit down or walk for two days. In about a month I could do a one legged squat. Not everybody will get those results. However, you will be astonished at how fast you improve.

Sorry to sound like an infomercial. I just fully believe that with Mark's book you can achieve an amazing level of fitness. You just have to be willing to sacrifice 30 minutes a day 5 days a week.

MLeake, try doing "the roof is on fire" with a 10 pound weight in each hand. I tried doing it and cut the "lifts" from four to two. If you can reach 7 (14 lifts) you are doing awesome. If you make it past 10 (20 lifts) you are a god among men. That would put you over 57 (114 lifts) total. I was lucky to reach 4

(It is like a ladder, only you keep progressing instead of coming down.)

nefprotector · April 12, 2011, 01:24 PM

I just started back exercising last week. Walking briskly for 2 miles now. I began by walking 1 mile in 30mins, 2 miles in an hr. Today I shattered my time by walking 2 miles in 35 mins. I couldnt believe it myself. But that's what my watch said. Or it could have been the big dog chasing me that made me walk faster. =) I can really tell a difference in my endurance and confidence. But for the range time. Ill have to wait until tomorrow and see if it has had any impact on my training.

Maximus856 · April 15, 2011, 05:04 AM

Quote:

The ability to run three miles is a start but hardly enough. In AIT 5 miles is a standard run and you will run further. Don't worry if you are out of shape, after boot camp, you won't be. If you are a Marine, an Infantry man or a Navy corpsman; you will then go to advanced infantry training(ait) after that you will have little trouble running 3 miles or 5 miles; assuming you are healthy of course. So what does running three miles have to do with the military? Nothing if you are lucky enough to avoid deployment over-seas; everything if you aren't!

I assume you mean after bootcamp a Marine with an infantry contract will go to SOI (School of Infantry)? They won't let you out of bootcamp if you can't pass a PFT so you really shouldn't be out of shape. Also, PT runs are few and far between in SOI. You simply don't have much time for it. It's approximately 2 months long, and I think we ran a total of 7 or 8 times. Is it enough? No. But, there's too many other things going on such as ranges and forced marches.

For the record, I hate running with a passion. I'm not good at it and if I slack for even a bit my time suffers. However, I do understand the need for the 3 mile test. In 2008 or 2009 (right around the new year) I found myself running about 4-5K back to the COP in Iraq. I was doing a mission only a few kilometers out right on the Syrian border. We ended up taking fire from a vehicle when we were on our way back, and the best course of action was to simply get the hell out of there. It wasn't without stopping once or twice to to keep accountability of the patrol and make sure the two civilian contractors were still with us. Like I said, I'm not a big fan of the 3 mile run and enjoy the CFT much more then the PFT. Having the ability to run 3 miles though definitely helped that night in Iraq.

I saw earlier someone mentioned a female Sgt 1st Class and that combined with the talk of marches reminded me of why I hate the battalion I am in. We were going to do a SHORT hump with the battalion, maybe 6-7 miles at most. A female LCpl complained to her MstSgt that she was too short to carry her M16A2 and wanted a M4. Unfortantely she got it. Then, a female 1stSgt complained that she as well was too short so needless to say she got an M4. I often wonder how they got through bootcamp where the standard issue is an M16A2. Sorry to go off track with that, but at least it's firearms and PT related

-Max

Jim243 · April 16, 2011, 11:13 PM

Sorry guys, but at 68 I let Smith and Wesson do the heavy lifting, with the help of John Browning.

Jim

smince · April 17, 2011, 06:25 AM

Like one of my instructors told me:

Quote:

What good is it to survive a defensive encounter, only to die of a stress-induced heart attack while waiting on the police to arrive!

April 11, 2011, 07:17 PM	#52
MLeake Senior Member Join Date: November 15, 2007 Location: Outside KC, MO Posts: 10,128	Since we are talking about quick and efficient workouts, now... ... there's a book I'll recommend. An acquaintance of mine wrote it, and it's been selling well. It's about how to workout with virtually no equipment, using bodyweight and household / hotel room furniture. There are two or three exercises that would require light dumbbells, or similar, but the vast majority of exercises in the book require little more than the right attitude. http://www.marklauren.com/ For background, Mark is a former USAF Combat Controller, who helped design the fitness program currently in use by the Air Force for Combat Controller training. You can find reviews of the book pretty easily via google, and even those that criticize Mark's writing style seem to praise the actual exercises. And the really nice things about it, in my opinion, are: 1) As noted, you can do most of this stuff in your home, or at your hotel when on business. You don't need a gym, or special equipment; and 2) Mark has provided ways to increase difficulty for each exercise; he has also set things up to allow design of effective 20-minute workouts. I have a signed copy, and I highly recommend the exercises in the book.

April 12, 2011, 07:55 AM	#54
MikeNice81 Senior Member Join Date: August 17, 2010 Posts: 579	I concur with MLeake. Mark Lauren has one of the best books out there. His book gives you enough information to customize your own plan. If you don't fell comfortable with that, he has multiple fitness regimines in the book. I customized my own plan and in just a month I was remarkably fitter in every way. One of the reasons is that Mark focuses on functional fitness. His excercises work multiple muscle groups. Your body learns to use muscles in unision to help with real world situations. Even some of the most basic looking excercises can be monsterous. Try doing the bear crawl. I like to do it as modified tabatas. I like a 40 second sprint followed by a 20 second "walk." Do that for ten minutes. In days you will see improvements in your upper back, shoulders, chest, arms, and cardio. You can find numerous "easy" excercises that will tone and tune your body. My first day I did 30 rear lunges per leg. I over did it (Mark warns about that) and it hurt to sit down or walk for two days. In about a month I could do a one legged squat. Not everybody will get those results. However, you will be astonished at how fast you improve. Sorry to sound like an infomercial. I just fully believe that with Mark's book you can achieve an amazing level of fitness. You just have to be willing to sacrifice 30 minutes a day 5 days a week. MLeake, try doing "the roof is on fire" with a 10 pound weight in each hand. I tried doing it and cut the "lifts" from four to two. If you can reach 7 (14 lifts) you are doing awesome. If you make it past 10 (20 lifts) you are a god among men. That would put you over 57 (114 lifts) total. I was lucky to reach 4 (It is like a ladder, only you keep progressing instead of coming down.) __________________ Here's my credo: There are no good guns, There are no bad guns. A gun in the hands of a bad man is a bad thing. Any gun in the hands of a good man is no threat to anyone, except bad people. Charlton Heston Last edited by MikeNice81; April 12, 2011 at 08:10 AM.

April 16, 2011, 11:13 PM	#57
Jim243 Senior Member Join Date: January 5, 2009 Location: Just off Route 66 Posts: 5,067	Sorry guys, but at 68 I let Smith and Wesson do the heavy lifting, with the help of John Browning. Jim __________________ Si vis pacem, para bellum

April 11, 2011, 08:35 PM	#53
Tactical Jackalope Senior Member Join Date: December 5, 2010 Location: Miami, Florida Posts: 6,429	Uh-oh.....I feel another type of pictures coming along.. Can we post progress pictures? Before and After? We can turn this into a bb thread! I was with the forum. Benched double my weight 6 months ago. And worked out three years straight before that...all went great..However....haven't in 6 months. Work -__- too much over time. Now...YES! I felt more comfortable shooting then, than now..

April 12, 2011, 01:24 PM	#55
nefprotector Junior member Join Date: December 3, 2009 Location: SE Alabama Posts: 701	I just started back exercising last week. Walking briskly for 2 miles now. I began by walking 1 mile in 30mins, 2 miles in an hr. Today I shattered my time by walking 2 miles in 35 mins. I couldnt believe it myself. But that's what my watch said. Or it could have been the big dog chasing me that made me walk faster. =) I can really tell a difference in my endurance and confidence. But for the range time. Ill have to wait until tomorrow and see if it has had any impact on my training.