ami training for bud/s (navy seal)

11/2

11am
Easy run 30min
*hr was high fir this pace, though still easy range. Resting hr coming back only ~5bpm higher than normal. 85 deg at time of run, so pretty warm, though not much warmer if any than its been these last weeks. Finally feel my energy rushing back to me today id say 80% of feeling 100%, so taking the weekend off was good. Im going to run the rest of my runs easy this week with some strides and depending if i feel like im rec will do TTs at end of this week.

3pm-
Push ups
2,4,6,8,10,10,12,14,16,18,20,20… back down > 2
6x split squat b/w pyramid sets
Then
10x (pull up x 5, sldl x 10, abs x 65)
Then
Iso back ext x 3 x 50s, band ext rot x 100, neck beidge 2 x 30-40s ea

  • deload week- cals stepped back to week 4- i can definately say been adapting to caks just fine. Running sessions seem to have got me last wekk, though was feeling fine the week prior, maybe was just off by a week and should have deloaded week 5, esp after signals from my body starting tues of week 5.

11/3

6 set throughout day (push up x16, pull up x 3, flr x 40s, 8cnts x 7, flr x 40s)

5pm
Pool
1800m easy 41.10- (50 yd fast,50yd easy last 400yd)
*felt goood

1.5hr later

3.91miles easy 50.30
Hr avg - 138, Hr max - 147
*worst run in my life. I couldnt run slow enough to keep my hr under 140 (75%), pace felt horrible. Similar as yesterdays run.
Compare this to 10/17 -4.3 miles 11.18 pace hr avrg 137- my pace on todays run was 1.5min slower with higher hr…???

I feel like im getting slower, on top of already being slow to start out with.

I dont know if its because im still in the hole with fatigue (yesterdays cal and todays swim felt fine). Or my training schedule is terrible for me and im becoming slower(everything felt like it was going fine untill tues of week 5 i felt pretty drained, then tryed finishing out the week which was a bad call on my part). Aggregating to say the least, i dont know how i van be doing this much running and feel like im getting worse. Especially after having way better times and having not run for years my times should be droping like flys. Shit the first time going through i just winged it and got exelerated scores within 2-3months of training.

Im gana stick to all easy runs this week and see what happens. If i was overdoing it youd think my swimming and cals would feel just as bad. If i was just overdoing running would i runni mg just be generally affected. Any thoughts or advice would be greatly appreciated.

How are your sleep/rest/nutrition/hydration ?
Regeneration ?

Resting heart rate - is this elevated/very variable ? If so it indicates general tiredness, if in a reasonable range your tiredness may be specific to running sessions.

It does not look as though you have increased your weekly mileage at too high a rate - is that your perception of the trend in weekly volumes.

Backing off to do easy runs is sensible. A mental technique is to run for time not distance for a while to avoid continual monitoring of performance.
I also think you have started some of the interval type work a bit early. I usually recommend people get comfortable with running 30-50 mins on a regular basis and covering around 20mpw before starting any of the interval pace sessions. In order to build an aerobic running base. This appears to contradict my view that training should generally contain a range of paces and train all systems concurrently - however people need a base of running before adopting that model.
At the moment I can see you are finding the 3-4 mile runs are taking around 50 mins and feeling hard. Combined with your planned interval sessions it means almost all your runs are hard. This means you are effectively exceeding a model of 2 or 3 hard runs per week.

Nutrition/hydration/sleep has been good

As i said the first 4 weeks of loading went well as far as sessions not feeling overly hard. Then beggining week 5 mondays vo2 session felt good, tuesdays swim in the am felt good then blamm tuesday mile repeats i felt exhausted. I thought it was just a bad workout and wanted to finish out the week, then deload week 6 as planned. The rest of week 5 i felt all the signs of fatigue. Wed 400s at mile pace i hit the time fine (though didnt feel as easy as previous weeks) and friday morning was doing threshold 1000s and called it after the 3rd rep (just felt drained). Took the rest of the weekend off. Felt my energy coming back everyday since. Ive been sticki g to easy running to get back to 100%. The easy runni g on monday and tues though is about 1.5- 2min/mile slower with alittle higher hr then easy runni g has been all the previous weeks. So my best guess is its built up fatigue from trying to push through the rest of week5 digging myself a hole.

Resting hr has been co.e back to normal. Though it was 10bpm higher sat morning (which was when i first looked at it this whole cycle). It dropped to normal over the next day or 2. Will be monitoring this freq now.

Weekly mileage increase i feel has been fine. Like i said about mid week 5 i felt drained though.

I get what your saying about my exceeding 2-3 hard sessions/week. Even though everything felt fine going up until early week 5, with my level i agree i have to many hard runs. Maybe i hit a volume my body couldnt keep up with or i was just a week off in estimating my deload and should have deloaded week 5 instead.

Plan moving forward…

Easy runs the rest of the week maybe even 2 weeks of this with some strides once i start feeling normal the test to see where im at. Im going to monitor hr and hopfully my easy pace will come down back to normal within easy hr (<75%). If that goes well im tjinki g something like this along the lines you suggested earlier.

M- easy run
T- 3mile tempo (tt every now and then)
W-rest
Th-easy run
Fri- 400s at mile pace (start where i left off, 5x 400m and build to 10 and then increase speed
Sat-rest
Sun- easy run longest of the week

3:1 load:unload

Build mileage through easy runs and long run besides increase on 400s…
What do you think?

Sounds like typical tiredness that emerges during a tougher training block. You caught it early and took rest/easy days so should recover soon. With luck you will rebound within 7-10 days. One day you will be out training and feel like tou are flying.

Training prgm and approach looks ok. Easy runs + a small dose of 400s is ok. Longer reps may be a bit tiring in the next week or two.

If you want to keep up a bit of sharpness work just do an easy run of 30 mins followed by 10 mins of 10x100 strides. Stride length of a football pitch and walk the width.

Awesome oldbloke, words cannot describe how great full i am for your input. Thank you

I was trying to post up some files i had (mostly distance running/swimming) telling me file too big. Anyone know how to get around this?

11/4

3pm
6x (decline push up x 40, lat lunge x 12,pull up x 9,hydrant x 12, abs x 108)
Then
Iso back ext x 3 x 50s, ext rot band x 100ea, neck bridge x 2 x 30-40s ea

8pm

30min easy run
~2.5miles
Hr avg 135 (73%)
*still slow as dirt. But felt regenerative. Legs felt much better. Everyday i feel energy coming back to legs. Brought my gps and hr but didnt use during just wanted some info when done ti get a better look internally. Gps died anyways 3/4 thru run.

Also been static stretching for ~20min before gym session for last week or so. Then do a bw specific warm up. Ian king inspired

11/5

Today only did acouple sets spread throughout the day, busy all day with work and family

(Push x 16, pull up x 3, flr x 40s, 8counts x 7,flr x 40s)

11/6
Fri

5x (top push up x 40, pull up x 8)
5x (static lunge x 16, gb x 15)

Then work

*energy has been really coming back well, i should be well rec by the end of this week. Ill have a better idea from how my legs/running has been coming along as far as rec Going for a 3mile easy with strides tomorrow then a 5 miler easy sun.

11/7- sat - 1pm - 86 f

3miles easy*
36min
legs still feel heavy/slow, its been a week of easy running for me and besides over all energy back to normal, my runs still feel like crap in general. I sure hope im not just loosing fitness as opposed to shedding built up fatigue

*pretty hot today

6x spread throughout the day
(Push up x 16, pull up x 3, flr x 40s, 8count x 7, flr x 40s)

Ive been using it more to provide feedback. And i feel its worked well on easy days to make sure im not going to hard.

When talking about zones say 70-75% hr max is easy zone. When applying this, is the avrg hr rate of the run supposed to fall in this range or should your hr not exceed 75% the whole run. I say this because ive noticed on all my easy runs, more so my longer ones. The first 10-15min hr is say about 70% then by half way through the run about 75% then then itll slowly climb towards alittle under 80% all at an even pace through the whole run. So basically its slowly climbs.

I know you said you did like hr training because the strap would fall off, but i was curious as to your thoughts

My HRM use was limited but I did use it sometimes to keep the easy runs under control. I never bother using an HRM for hard runs - I do them via target pace/times.

Idea of the heart rate range is to keep mainly between the upper and lower ranges for as much of the run as possible.

Upward drift on a hill is to be expected and I would not bother including that in an average. If you can stay in range for say 25 mins and lose the range completely for 5 mins on a hill it does not matter. I have seen people slow to a walk on a hill during a race but that`s too obsessive for me.

Upward drift (on a level course) over distance covered is a different matter - it shows there is more room for aerobic improvement. If you are less fit the Hr drifts upwards.
EG : You run 3 miles in 30 mins at Hr of around 70 -75% but it drifts upwards to 80% plus after 30 mins. This shows you are tiring at this point.
With greater fitness you might cover the 3 miles in 28 mins at Hr 70-75% and not start drifting upwards until you have been running for say 40 mins - or a mixture of the two parameters…
So a slower Hr for a given pace/distance shows improving fitness.

This last week of deloading ive been doing easy 30-50min runs. And hr has been drifting upwards for sure in these runs at 12-13min/mile pace.
Today for example sunday (8th day of deload)
4miles
50min (12.30/mile)
Hr definitely drifted towards high 70s by end of run, it was pretty evenly paced. Legs felt heavy/slow still. But i def feel way better than i did at the beginning of deoad.
Compare to…
Considering data i collected in week 3 of a sat long run, avrg hr 137 74%, 11.18/mile 4.3mile run. (Unfortunately i believe this is the only hr data i got from loading weeks, ill look thru my loggs tho)

Do you think i still need deload before testing. Or am i loosing aerobic endurance. Perhaps from to many hard interval days during load weeks and then overdoing it week 5, killing my endurance, or from taking too many easy pace days.

Im leaning towards im still in the hole from hard traing cycle and need more recovery as far as running, maybe even another 1/2 - full week (with strides to keep speed) before implementing test week.
If so should i just wait untill my pace and hr come down to something like my week 3 run data above, and this shows im rec from my hard cycle and my fitness has gotten back to base line, and as you said one day on a run ill just feel great.

I would follow your suggestion above.

Using a single hr value from an early stage of training may not be very precise since it is only a single data point. If you start feeling good when running take that as a signal to do tts.
Remember these are tts not actual races or selection events. So you are not aiming for a complete peak to take the readings - just a comparison…

Other thing is the model you use to calibrate your max hr, and hence a big influence on training intensity. Do you use 220- age, the Karvonen variation that accounts for resting heart rate ?? Have you tried taking hr during the hardest interval sessions ? There are some suggested max hr testing methods but rates during interval sessions are a useful guide.

In terms of your general aerobic fitness. Some who are strongly built runners, who are fast twitch dominant, always the fast kid in sports at schools will respond less well to standard endurance training methods.
The Jack Daniels model, or a simple approach of 2 steady runs, 1 long run and 2 hard runs (threshold/interval) are all industry standard to improve over distances of 5K and above. Most people also find their 1 mile time improves off the back of this aerobic development. But there are some decathlete types that can run a very good 1500m off 400m training/tempo work. However they would struggle over longer distances.
Do you think you are in this category ??

Yes yes. I agree with using a single hr data point is not precise to judge off. But.i do have several data points as far as longer weekly sat longer runs as far as running speed combined with the rpe of these. Theyve all been 11-12min/mile, and these felt better than my recent deload.easy runs for sure and these have been 30s- 1min slower. Though i can say my week 4, sat 5mile run easy long run was not feeling like previous runs of this type. I should have takin this as a sign perhaps to back off perhaps. Because
week 5 for me besides mondays vo2 workout was a downward spiral.

Hr max found by running 1 mile all out. And really pushing it the last kick. 186 was the result. Ive been using straight %s of hrm.
Ie
< 78% EASY

HR reserve tends to be 2-3 bpm higher for each zone, for both the lower and top end. From everything ive read % of max seems to be the way togo. Theres also % of threshold, maffetone (180- age, top end of aerobic building hr), and several other ways.

Yes and i say this because of these:
-I do have a bigger build, gain muscle pretty quick. 6ft 3in, 225# (beentryin to slowly lose weight)

  • ive always been power/speed type. When i do speed stuff it just clicks with my body, cant explain well, it just feels right. Even doing distance interval sessions feels way better than slogging down the road to me. Im not sure if its past training, never focused on distance oriented events untill training for bud/s. Swimming lsd does feel food to me though.
  • my times drop pretty quickly the longer the distance i race. Definitely not hitting horwills 4 sec rule as distances double. As to where im at right now, i really couldnt tell you, thats why i want to see some tt’s over several distances. Id say no faster than 6sec-8sec rule

So yes i do feel i fall in this category. Unfortunately for my sake this needs to be reversed as much as i can for bud/s. Thats why i am aiming for higher standards in the wvents at bud/s. This is my second time going through i am older now, and will be one of the older candidates in my class, more leadershipis expected of these guys at bud/s. So i want to be pushing from the front at bud/s. As well i have higher aspirations and would like to screen for team 6 after some time in the teams, god willing. So i beed to be well above par on everything

As well i also asked thomas schwartz about my hr drift here is his response. Awesome guy. Really helps the community and very very knowledgeable. He runs therunzone.com, heres his response

(((((Heart rate drift is common; it’s due to dehydration. So, yes, the pace that elicits 70% early on (when you are not hot and dehydrated) will rise to 75% and then eventually, if you go far enough/long enough and/or you are getting hotter, heart rate at the same pace will rise near 80% of max. Heart rate is therefore not a great training tool. It’s okay. It indicates dehydration, among other things, but it should be used with a “grain of salt.” )))))

So i thinks its a mixture of both what you and he are saying. I know im weak aerobic wise as well alot of things effect hr (weather esp heat, nutrition, stress, terrain).

Because of this i can’t get caught up harping on hr. Just use it as an extra took to analyze training i suppose

Try this page for several different ways of calculating max hr. http://www.brianmac.co.uk/maxhr.htm.

Your test value of 186 is in the right ball park. And as you say, with other factors such as dehydration being relevant, hr training is only a guide not a rule.

I decided to share your pain and did a part of the selection test. I havent swum for years …
press ups = 49
sit ups = 43
pull ups = 8 :adoration:
1.5M = 10.28 I did this on a treadmill so just set it to 7 mins per mile to target 10.30.

Background to achieve this:
Press ups and sit ups : trained 2 or 3 times per week. Few sets of 3x10-15 press ups and 20 sit ups. So no specialist training here. Usually done as rest during a weights session or before a rum
Running : ran 200/400 track in the summer. 2 weeks rest and a recent block of about 5 weeks of running 4x per week. Typical week is (i) 40 mins steady (bit of fartlek if feeling ok), (ii) 50 mins easy, (iii) 30mins steady + 10x100, (iv) 30 mins steady + 10 mins of short hill sprints. No intervels, threshold stuff yet. Will start this next week to race some 5k, 5M, x country runs.

Heart rate on todays test : used the treadmill non connection scan so probably not spot on for accuracy but most of time was at 168bpm during 1.5M time trial.

I am nearly 57, so according to hr models this 168 is very close to my max heart rate. But felt I had some spare capacity.

Well damn oldbloke. Great job. And at 57 this is incredible. This shows me alot. Ive been doing wayyy to much for what i can handle /need at the moment to make gains. This has always been a problem for me. Even at pre bud/s and bud/s and whilst training prior with seal motivator i was always doing extra workouts. Which thinking back this was crazy to me. I need to get gains from easier stuff first.

I dont know what the treadmill non conection scan is. But if its the handles you grab and hold, from experience these are usually off by a good bit

11/9- mon

3.30pm
Oldbloke inspired me to test these and see where im at. These were all done to navy standards. All on a bowl of cereal
Cal tests:
Push ups- 85
Sit ups - 70
Pull ups - 15
Then
Push up ladder. 2, 4 , 6, 8, 10, 10 , 12, 14, 16,16 ,14, 12 ,10,10, 8,6,4,2
Static lunge x 6 between rungs
Then
4x (pull ups x 5, sldl x 16, abs x 65)

  • planned on doing pull up curcuit 7-10 times, but decided i needed some food instead

May go for a run later…

11/10-tues

Didnt run last night. Just couldnt find the time

Sets spread throughout day
6x (push x 16, pull x 3, flr x 50s, 8counts x 7, flr x 50s)
1pm

Swim easy 1800yd (50 easy, 50 fast last 400yd)
40.41
*feeling good