Our USMC PFT Training Plan is not a general fitness training plan. Rather, it has a laser focus on increasing your performance for the 3 events of the PFT (pull ups, crunches, 3-mile run), regardless of age, gender or incoming fitness.
Program Design
The plan deploys the PFT Assessment three times – beginning, middle and end.
The follow-on pull up, crunches, and running progressions are based on the athlete’s most recent assessment results. In this way the training plan automatically “scales” to your incoming fitness and continues to “scale” and push you as your fitness improves during the plan.
Here is the Weekly Schedule:
- Week 1, 3, and 6:Monday: (AM) PFT, (PM) Pull Ups/Push Ups, Crunches
- Tuesday: Running Intervals
- Wednesday: Pull Up/Push Up, Crunches
- Thursday: Running Intervals
- Friday: Aerobic Run, Pull Ups/Push Ups, Crunches,Week 2, 4, and 5:Monday: Pull Ups/Push Ups, Crunches, Running Intervals
How To Use the Plan
This plan is designed to be completed the 6 weeks directly before the official AFT.
Many Marines members continuously train to the PFT events during their regular PT time. We feel this is the wrong approach.
Training continuously for the PFT means athletes are always doing push ups, sit ups and runs for PT – which can lead to boredom, staleness and overtraining.
Also – the PFT events don’t well represent the real-world fitness demands of a deployed Marine or field training where heavy loads, rucking, relative strength, stamina and chassis integrity (mid section strength and strength endurance) are needed. Training continuously for the PFT means training for these demands is pushed aside, which leads to poor downrange or field exercise physical performance.
Rather, we feel military athletes’ day to day fitness should build and maintain these real world fitness demands. Then, when an PFT is on the horizon, athletes can step away from this base training to focus 6 weeks on specific PFT programming using this plan.
After the PFT – go back to the balanced “base” programming.
Required Equipment?
- Stopwatch, preferably one that can record lap times and has a timer. (Timex Ironman is best, smart phone will work)
- Pull Up Bar
- Running area (track or other) with known 800m and 1 mile distances.
Changes to the updated USMC PFT Training Plan?
We updated this plan in May 2017. Here are the changes we made:
– Simplified the training plan in terms of administration, and deployment. Also reduced the equipment required to a track and stop watch.
– Standardized the weekly programming schedule across the plan
– Decreased the complexity of the running training to focus on 800m, 1 mile intervals and a long easy weekly run on Fridays.
Questions?
Email coach@mtntactical.com