How To BULLET PROOF Yourself for Special Operations

One of the most common issues I see in athletes training for special operations is a lack of full-body resilience and strength to be successful. As a consequence, those candidates display physical deficiencies, which then manifest in mental limitations of what they believe their body can and cannot do.

In this article, I’ll share the best workout program to bulletproof yourself for special operations including walking you step-by-step through the movements you need to master, the muscle groups you should bias your training towards, and how to organize them in a weekly routine that builds you not only physically but also mentally.

How To Become Fitter

A bulletproof athlete is someone who is strong, physically resilient, and possesses an antifragile mindset.

The first on physical strength is simple. This involves being able to push, pull, and pick up heavy objects.

To be physically resilient means you’re not just performant while fresh. You can do a hard session with heavy logs, and then quickly bounce back to hit a timed 5-mile run, long ruck, and then do it all over again the next day.

The final component is an antifragile mindset, which may be new to you. The term was coined in 2012 by a Lebanese essayist and mathematical statistician Nassim Taleb. 

In his book, draws a distinction between resilient systems (which recover to their previous state after stressors or failure), and then what he calls the antifragile system (which actually increases in capability as a result of stressors or failure).

And while as humans, we have limitations of what our body can and cannot do, you can choose to have an antifragile mindset in which you view difficult workouts or obstacles not as a punishment or setback, but actually a challenge in which you will emerge stronger and better than before. 

Stretching Myth

Before we talk about how to become bulletproof. I want to shatter the myth of stretching and mobility. Because, you are not going to stretch your way to becoming bulletproof, in fact, your stretching could be doing more harm than good.

Here’s why:

Stretching lengthens your muscles which enhances their range of motion. But, if you’re doing this stretching, you’re assuming increasing your range of motion is actually a good thing. What happens during impact or under stress in these stretched positions?

If you’re merely stretching a muscle through its range of motion without resistance or strengthening it, you’re setting yourself up for a major weakness and vulnerability in those positions. This lack of strength at the end range of motion can lead to injuries.

Let’s use powerlifters as an example. They typically don’t stretch, especially for muscles like the pecs which are heavily involved in the bench press. Their limited range of motion actually works to their advantage, offering a stretch reflex and additional tension, which increases their maximum strength and power. It is no surprise that static stretching has been shown to impair strength and power prior to testing.

Now, while you certainly want to be more nimble than a powerlifter- what advantage do you have at selection by being able to do full splits or having extreme flexibility? In my view, stretching beyond the range of motion required for your core pressing, squatting, pulling, and other selection movements is unnecessary.

The more effective alternative is training your muscles through their full range of motion, but with resistance. Exercises like Bulgarian split squats or deficit Romanian deadlifts are excellent examples. These not only provide a deep stretch to the target muscle but also develop strength at the same time. 

These are the kinds of exercises I’ll recommend. Before I talk about those exercises and the specific workouts, let’s discuss the demands of selection.

The Demands of Special Operations

There are five categories of exercise you have to perform well at to be successful and this is true across all branches

Heavy Load Carriage

This is moving boats, or heavy rucks from point A to point B. Where many go wrong is assuming that just because you’re rucking 12 miles they think it’s an endurance event, when in reality your upper back, traps, and legs can easily fatigue and give out well before your aerobic conditioning does.

Weighted Carries (Grip)

You need to have an iron grip. And no matter how fast you are it doesn’t matter if you can’t pick up or grip the weight.

Unweighted Running

Running is not just for your timed four or five-mile runs, but you also need to be comfortable and efficient at low-intensity paces for long durations day after day, especially when transitioning between events.

Multipurpose Calisthenics/Strength

This is a catch-all category for your calisthenics sessions, obstacle courses, or any other multipurpose set of exercises. For this, you need to be well-rounded and have a high level of strength endurance.

Swimming and Water Confidence for Special Operations

If you’re already training the first four categories and in good shape, all you need to do is master the technique. The master guide to swimming and water confidence will teach you everything you need to know about swimming techniques.

What Body Parts Matter Most For Special Operations

Across those exercise categories, there are three body parts I bias my athletes’ training towards to maximize their chance of success

Legs (Squatting and Hip Hinging Movement Patterns)

First is the legs. It’s possible to get selected without squatting or deadlifting, but where all else is equal stronger is better. And there is no muscle group that takes more of a beating across running, rucking, and load carriage than the legs.

The best way to train the legs is through heavy squatting and deadlifting. Pistol squats and bodyweight lunges do not come close to the stimulus you achieve when hitting deep full range of motion romanian deadlifts or squats with 225 or more pounds.

Back 

The back is the second most important body part. Weighted pull ups and heavy rows are staples of my athlete’s back training. Not only do these improve your pulling strength and have the nice side effect of training your grip, but we’re also improving static back strength, which is often overlooked. Static back strength is critical, so when you’re on mile 9 of your 12-mile ruck, with 65lbs on your back, your maximal back strength is so strong that the 65lbs feels relatively light.

What many people with this strength take for granted, is that even if that 65lbs feels heavy in those final miles, imagine how much heavier it would feel if you just did bodyweight training or never touched weights. It would be a lot harder.

Forearms and Grip Training For Special Operations

The next muscle group is your forearms and grip. There are a lot of ways you can train grip, and it’s not just through targetted training like dumbbell or trap bar farmer carries. Heavy DB rows, deadlifts, and pull-ups all train the forearms. And I also like static holds which can be combined with abdominal work like leg raises and toes to bars.

How To Become Bulletproof

What I want you to understand is that to become bulletproof means you need to get out of the comfort zone of your calisthenics, rucking, running, and swimming, and develop the base strength and muscle mass to become physically resilient.

There is a reason why a study of 795 candidates at Army Special Forces assessment and selection found muscle mass was the greatest predictor of success. The candidates in the top quartile of muscle mass had six times the odds of getting selected than those with the least muscle mass.

Even if you’re maxing the PST, IFT, or APFT today, if you don’t have experience under heavy weight, your central nervous has never felt or acclimated to the stimulus and fatigue that comes with heavy strength training. 

But it’s not only strength gains you’re losing out on with resistance training. When you do it, you’re also building up your ligaments and tendons, increasing your bone mineral density, which reduces your odds of injury. This is well documented that candidates with higher bone mineral density have greater odds of selection success. Just look at the chart

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The Best Workout Program for Special Operations

But, this doesn’t mean you need to train like a powerlifter or even train strength more than 3 times per week.

Here’s a simple 2 day per week full body workout to train both strength and strength endurance, which leaves you plenty of time to focus on running, rucking, and nonimpact cardio.

Both workouts begin with 3 to 4 heavy compound exercises with an extra focus on the back and legs. You will notice each day includes a single heavy pressing movement – overhead press on day A and close grip bench press on day B.

Following the compound exercises, you will jump into a multi-round circuit. I’ve chosen exercises to bias muscle groups which are especially important at selection, however, you should adjust these workouts based on your strengths and weaknesses. 

How To Organize The Workout Split

To become bulletproof, you also need to prioritize your endurance and have experience being on your feet for long periods of time. This means hitting your long 2-hour or more rucks and 9+ mile runs.

This workout split includes our two heavy strength days, 1 calisthenics session, a selection-specific workout, and 4 running or rucking sessions.

High-Intensity Training Day

What you’ll notice about this routine is that is that we begin the week with our high-intensity strength session and hard running or rucking intervals all on the same day. To many, this is counterintuitive. But, here’s why it makes sense.

Since they’re both taxing the same muscle groups and both workouts will require a significant amount of time to recover, it’s better to condense your lower and interval sessions into a single workout and day, so you’re not destroying yourself twice in the same week. By combining them, we can follow up this session with a low-intensity day on Tuesday.

Whereas if we split them up, then there are just not enough days in the week to allow for two low intensity days, a rest day, and hit the other planned workouts for the week.

Training Your Mindset For Selection

I want to highlight the importance of mindset and effort. Two identical twins can perform this same workout routine, and if twin A is going through the motions while twin B is training hard and focused, then twin B is going to see way more progress.

Never forget that the most important variable in your training is not necessarily what you do, but it’s the effort and how you do it that will make or break your results.

Every week, you should have a few workouts that you feel a healthy amount of anxiety about because you know they’re going to be hard. You need to embrace the antifragile mindset and acknowledge that it’s in those workouts that you test your limits, and you may even fail to meet your own expectations. But that’s ok if that happens. Come back the next day mentally stronger with an understanding of what it takes to be better.

I also want to point out, that every session should not be max effort. That’s why when you look at the workout routine I shared there were two high-intensity days and not seven. 

If you’re training to max effort every day, I’m sorry to say either you’re not doing that or it’s not a routine that’s sustainable for more than a few weeks.

Bonus Tip

Remember not to overthink your training too much. There are a lot of variables that you can juggle and think about in your training. I want you to look at your routine, and just do it. Do your best to eat well, sleep well, and train hard. That’s where the progress is going to come from. Focus on mastering the big blocks of your training and getting them right, rather than on micro-optimizations that won’t make a big difference either way.

If you enjoyed this article, I know you will enjoy this article on The SMARTEST Special Operations Workout Program.