Train Hard - Fight Easy
The more you sweat in peace the less you bleed in war
I recently had the chance to help out with weigh-ins for a Norwegian Foot March. The NFM is a military readiness test adopted by the Norwegians before WWI.
It has since been opened up to other militaries and organizations.
The test consists of covering 30 Kilometers with an 11 Kilogram (25-lb) ruck in an age-graded time of roughly 4 miles per hour.
As the ruckers filed through to weigh in, I noticed quite a few with rucks well over the required dry weight.
-By dry weight, I mean with any water of food removed.
Some were up to 10 pounds over the minimum weight.
When I asked them why, some simply didn’t have a scale at home and couldn’t weigh the ruck beforehand. Others wanted to challenge themselves with additional weight, and still others were just worried about meeting the standards, so they threw in a few extra pounds.
Later, some of those with extra weight in their rucks failed to make the prescribed time.
I am a fan of getting in extra training, but not at the expense of failure.
I thought of this while watching Johannes Hoesflot Klaebo crush souls and win 5 gold medals for Norway during the Olympics.
Do you think he had an extra ten pounds on him just because? Fuck no.
Because he is a professional.
During training, it is great to go heavy. That is the training equivalent of sweating in peace so that you don’t have to bleed in war. But when it is time to compete, even if that is just against yourself, you owe it to yourself to pare down to the minimum.
Ounces make pounds, and pounds slow you down.
While I’m sure you can use your bathroom scale to weigh your ruck, I found a great hanging scale on Amazon for about 30 bucks that I use. If you need one, check it out.
The key is to train heavy, race light, and have a plan to always meet the minimum standards.
While an event like the Norwegian Foot March is not a race per se, it is always better to be faster than slower.
The metrics that will be recorded are:
Make weight Yes /No
And Time
And as always, it pays to be a winner.
A cool RTFU shirt weighs almost nothing. Grab a few.
Until next week,
Ruck The Fuck Up.
John
Life is Hard. Be Harder.
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+1 yes, +2 maybe...insurance is one thing, stupidity is another.
That sounds like fun