Green2Blue TB Log

[Green2Blue]

01/21/17
Mini-Block 1
Week 4 (deload)
Day 1

Rest

M|WOD
Completed

Notes

[Green2Blue]

01/22/17
Mini-Block 1
Week 4 (deload)
Day 2

M|WOD
Completed

Notes
-I was supposed to do a deloaded HIC today but I forgot my running shoes. I can easily fit it in tomorrow.

-Day two of my deload week of my deload block... I feel like the guy in one of those classic scenes; crawling through the desert in search of water. But in my case all I want is to lift some heavy iron lol.

[TangoZero]

The following is complete brain vomit. Its just something that's been on my mind a lot lately and I wanted to get it on paper. It's pretty much just something I wrote to myself. It's a plan I am going to start implementing, once I am done with this recovery phase, because I'm tired of spinning my wheels. Feel free to ignore it.

Goal Based Training

When you're a multi-domain operational athlete, and you want to be good at everything, it's easy to lose focus. Most of us know that training multiple domains at once makes you mediocre at all of those domains. However, once we start seeing progress on programs like TB that do such a great job balancing multiple fitness domains, it's easy to lose sight of that.

Not surprisingly TB actually covers the issue:

"First, Base-Build. Then, advance high priorities and maintain low priorities. Build general strength and endurance first. After base building, prioritize your fitness domains. Start training certain attributes less, and others more, based on your goals. Some attributes you will do the bare minimum to maintain, others you will actively attempt to advance."

With all of the great information in TB it's easy to lose sight of that. I want to highlight that statement and take it a bit further.

Climb the Rope

Training multiple fitness domains at once generally makes you mediocre at all of those domains. The body only has so much ability to adapt to training stimuli. Focus on one particular attribute produces greater results.

This is especially true for trained athletes. If you're untrained it's a lot easier to get up to par, aka "newbie gains". If you're new to training you might be able to go full steam ahead on multiple domains. If you're farther along in your training age, in any particular domain, the less ability your body has to adapt to training stimuli.

Maintenance is different. Maintaining physical performance, once you have it, is easier for your body than improving that performance.

So how do we go from mediocre in multiple domains to good, or even great? Improve in one domain at a time, and maintain the other domains. Just as the above quote from TB II says.

Climb the rope. Hold yourself in place on the rope with one arm, your non-priority domains, and maintain. Then reach up with your other arm, your priority domain, and pull yourself up. Not the best metaphor, but hopefully you get the point.

1. Base Build

TB II goes into great detail on why you should base build. I'm not going to get into it too much. If you don't have any strength or any endurance to start out with, then you have nothing to maintain.

2. Choose Your Domains

Not every domain is important to everyone. Pick a handful that matter to you most. If a domain doesn't matter, then don't pick it. Chances are that domain will get hit indirectly by a related domain.

I think domains can really vary. They might be generic like muscular strength, strength endurance, anaerobic capacity, or aerobic endurance. I think they can also be slightly more specific, such as distance running, sprint speed, traditional barbell strength, kettlebell strength endurance, or GC's.

Domains only matter because they help you choose your baselines for maintenance. No need to think too hard about them.

P.S. If MS isn't a domain you're interested in progressing or maintaining then you're kind of missing the boat, and you probably aren't doing TB.

3. Establish Baselines

This is where maintenance comes in. A baseline is a metric of performance you should be able to hit at any given time under adequate conditions. Baselines are not PRs.

An excellent example of a baseline that TB already uses is a 90% Training Maximum.

What the TB books don't get into is baselines for other domains. If your domain focus is muscular strength, and you're going balls-to-the-wall maximum effort on every HIC, your performance increases on muscular strength may suffer. So pick a few baselines within your chosen domains.

Baselines should be within your chosen maintenance domains, specific, and performed regularly.

For example: lets say the domain I want to focus on is my MS, but I want to maintain my short distance running speed and my distance running. My maintenance baselines for short distance running speed might be 5 rounds of Hill Sprints in 15 minutes, and 6 rounds of 600m Resets with a 2:30 pace and 5:00 rest. My baseline for distance running might be a 20:00 Fast 5 and a 10k LSS.

Choose a baseline you'll perform with regularity. If a 10:00 1.5 mile is your baseline, but you only run a 1.5 mile once a month, it isn't doing you much good as a measuring stick for maintenance.

Choose a couple baselines within the domain so you can change things up. I think it's ok to throw in things that aren't baselines, like an occasional GC in our example, but you should be performing a baseline or two every week.

The goal here is performance maintenance. It's hard to know if you're maintaining performance if you don't have a baseline to measure with.


3. Set Goals

Now choose goals within the domain you want to improve. SMART goals are a great way to go about this. SMART goals are Specific, Measurable, Action-oriented, Realistic, and Time-based.

Examples are:

-Taking your bench press from a 160lb 1RM to a 170lb 1RM in 2 blocks.

-Reducing your 2 mile run time by 1 minute in 3 blocks.

-Going from 15 to 20 pull-ups in 1 block.

One goal is best. But sometimes it's reasonable to set more as long as they are in related domains and they don't interfere with each other. Increasing your max reps of push-ups and air squats by a specific number at the same time is reasonable. Improving your 100m sprint time and 800m sprint time by specific numbers at the same time is less realistic. That's not to say your deadlift won't go up if your main goal is your squat, but you may see more success by focusing on one.

Just remember that the more goals you set, the harder they will be to achieve.

Just an opinion here, but I think 2 standard blocks for any specific goal is going to be your sweet spot. Anything shorter doesn't give you much time to adapt to stimuli. Anything longer and it's easy to lose sight of your goal.

4. Create a Plan

Create a training plan based on your goals. If your main goal is to improve your bench, then Fighter Green might not be the best choice. If you want to improve your bench but really want to maintain your distance running, maybe go Operator Black Pro.

Same goes for any assistance work. The vast bulk of assistance work should support your primary goal. Like the bench example, maybe choose floor presses and dips. If your main goal is the 100m then maybe do bounding instead of bicep curls.

5. Execute and Achieve

Enough said. Stick to the plan!

6. Re-Assess

Reach your goal and want to go for a new one? Set new baselines based on your new fitness level, make a new plan, and charge ahead. Didn't reach you goal? Take a look at your training plan, change if needed, and dig in.

Conclusion

The above method is completely untested. It's simply a plan based on what I know from my education and experience, and a desire to be better than what I am. I didn't achieve a 3xBW DL while training for a marathon, and I didn't run a half-marathon while pushing barbell PRs. If you're like me and you're tired of spinning your wheels by trying to do everything at once, give this a shot and let me know if it works for you.

Great read, and I think you're bang-on for the most part. One thing I'd like to add is the definition of "maintenance". I don't believe maintenance means stagnation. I take it to mean you progress at a slower pace. If I'm a marathon runner I choose Fighter template with a minimal cluster because strength is a lower priority domain. It doesn't mean I'm not progressing my strength over the course of the year. It just means that my running/roadwork is getting more of my love and attention. Someone doing Operator is progressing their strength faster and adding 10lbs every block...meanwhile I'm in "maintenance" mode and only adding 5 to a smaller number of lifts. When I finish my bucket list marathon, MS is back in the cross-hairs.

Another thing you touched on which doesn't get stressed nearly enough; not every domain is important for everybody, and not everyone needs every domain. If and when I leave my team for a plainclothes gig, you can bet your ass I'll be drastically reducing the amount of SE I do. I may not do ANY SE whatsoever outside of what I get through HIC/GC/FUNRUNs. Same with Base Building. When I no longer need to have a tactical-grade gas tank, I won't be doing any E sessions over 30 minutes. This allows me to push MS and other domains higher up and the list.

Please keep the brain vomit coming, makes for good discussion and serves as a reminder for many of the principles in the books that are easy to forget. This is the kind of talk that should be going on in the General Fitness forum.

[Aelian]

Agreed why isn't this in GF Forum? This is good stuff!! My turn for a little brain vomit (that should be a sub-forum...."Brain Vomit"...KB?) ;

"First, Base-Build. Then, advance high priorities and maintain low priorities. Build general strength and endurance first. After base building, prioritize your fitness domains. Start training certain attributes less, and others more, based on your goals. Some attributes you will do the bare minimum to maintain, others you will actively attempt to advance."

Agree with both of you, this kind of says it all. I'll offer a different way to look at it which I think I got from one of the older (now gone) TB articles if I remember correctly.

1. Decide why you're training (goal).
2. Decide what domains you have to be proficient in for your goal.
3. Assess your own strengths and weaknesses. Areas you need improvement, areas you don't.
4. Pick template + protocol to meet those goals.
5. Execute until goals are met.
6. Re-assess and start over.

So let's use two SWAT members. Member A is a diesel, Member B is a thin runner type that could do with a little more strength.

Member A's strengths = Max Strength (big SQ/BP/DL #s)
Member A's weaknesses = E & SE (slow 1.5 or Coopers, say mid 9 and up. Maximum 50 push-ups, not bad, not great).

Member A would be well suited to a Black Professional + Fighter/Bangkok. All HICs should be running based, like 5k Tempo, Hills, and most of the track work. His weekly E should be a run or Fun-Run. Member A has max-strength in maintenance mode by doing Fighter. His weekly energy is freed up to work on his cardio. He's SWAT, so he doesn't need Green protocol unless he belongs to a team that really stresses endurance for some reason.
End Result = MS in Maintenance mode (Fighter Template)
= More free time and energy to work on E (aerobic system) & SE (Black Professional/Bangkok)


Member B on the other hand, (and we all know a Member B). Annoyingly fast on the 1.5, but looks like he's being suffocated when he's geared up ready to go on a call. Give him the breacher pack on top of it all....no way; his spine will snap under it all.

Member B Strengths = E (aerobic system)/HIC
Member B Needs Improvement = Max-Strength

IMO Member B would be best suited to Operator + Black Standard/Black Pro. Op gives him the opportunity to bring his max-strength up to speed. He's already a good runner, so the HIC/E gets put in "maintenance" mode. Still improving, still being worked on, but not progressing as fast as his max-strength work.

Which brings me to the genius of Op I/A. After member A & B have worked on their weak links, Op I/A is the perfect transition. I don't know if it was meant for this, but it's the ideal way to self-regulate after you bring yourself to a baseline of equal strength & conditioning. On I/A you might feel the need to prioritize max-strength at certain times, so you might increase set volume and decrease days in-between sessions. Alternatively you can expand days in between sessions, minimize the set volume and increase conditioning load....

[Green2Blue]

Great point on improving maintenance domains TZ. I agree completely. If you notice your baselines are getting easy, there's no reason not to move them up a notch (although I'd wait for a new block).

Good example Aelian. I agree about Op I/A, great template.

Thanks for giving your opinions on the matter guys. I thought about posting this in GF, but I didn't want to clutter things up with my ramblings.

[Green2Blue]

01/23/17
Mini-Block 1
Week 4 (deload)
Day 3

SE: Tango

Push-ups: 55, 45
Box Jumps: 19, 18
Inverted Rows: 45, 40
Plank: 1:00, 1:00

M|WOD
Completed

Notes

-Honestly, these numbers are embarrassing. I almost didn't post them. Beyond pull-ups, I've always been terrible at SE (particularly push-ups, like my bench). It's been a low priority as well, but I'm not sure which caused the other. Granted, this is a deload and I didn't go 100%, but I was pretty close. I guess it's good I'm doing SE during my deloads, even though it's only a maintenance domain for me.

[Green2Blue]

01/24/17
Mini-Block 1
Week 4 (deload)
Day 4

Rest

M|WOD
Completed

Notes

[Green2Blue]

01/25/17
Mini-Block 1
Week 4 (deload)
Day 5

SE: Tango

Push-ups: 50, 50
Air Squats: 50, 50
Inverted Rows: 40, 40
Plank: 1:00, 1:00

E: LSS Deloaded
3 miles

M|WOD
Completed

Notes

-I'm behind. I need to get 2 deloaded HICs done and I've got 3 days left. Two of those days I'm out of town for training. I rarely miss any training days but it may end up happening. At least it's just during my deload.

[Green2Blue]

01/26/17
Mini-Block 1
Week 4 (deload)
Day 6

I wrestled 4 of the biggest pigs we've ever raised into the trailer for slaughter. Almost broke my hand. I think that counts as a HIC.

[Green2Blue]

01/27/17
Mini-Block 1
Week 4 (deload)
Day 7

Nuthin. Was out of town on training.