Your health account, your bank account, they’re the same thing. The more you put in, the more you can take out. Exercise is king and nutrition is queen. Together you have a kingdom.
I truly feel that one of the biggest shortcomings in the gun-owning world is a lack of focus on physical capability. When you look at it, though, our physical fitness underpins nearly every activity we do. Strength helps you carry heavy loads for hunting and hiking. Cardiovascular health helps you be more accurate and recover quicker from exertion during a hunt or match stage.
Muscle mass helps you survive longer when the situation grows dire.
Since the Everyday Marksman community emphasizes taking action, I want to make sure you have the resources and tools to own your physical fitness and improve upon it. Here you will find all of my articles, podcasts, and challenges related to your physical capabilities.
If you haven’t tested yourself against a Marksman Challenge, be sure to check one of them out and lets us know how you did over in the community forum.
/// Test Yourself
We all need objective standards to hold ourselves to, it gives us a direction to train for and a yardstick to measure our progress. And as part of promoting a more capable type of citizen, I thought it was important to develop a set of standards for the community. So here they are! Think of them as a progression as you improve and develop your personal capabilities.
/// Fitness Archive
I Did Kettlebell-Only Training for 12 Weeks; Here’s What Happened
I took a training detour away from barbells to focus on nothing but kettlebell work (with a bit of cardio) for 12 weeks. So what did I learn? Did kettlebell-only programming live up to the hype? Do I think it's a good fit for you and other marksmen? Let's dig in.
How Much Should You Actually Weigh for Martial Success?
In what might be the most controversial post I've ever made, I'm going to tell you about how much you should weigh. In my own quest to figure out a personal journey towards health and performance, I've read a ton of articles, research papers, and training logs. Add to that a healthy dose of self-experimentation. Through all of that, I think I've landed on a formula for figuring out about where someone engaged in a variety of performance activities should be. Let's dig in.
The Giryathlon Race: Demolish Your Weak Points
For this post, I'm drawing from Lebe Stark's recent video introducing a kettlebell race that involves both running and a variety of exercises. Combined together into a single race, I think this one is a serious butt kicker for not just a single event, but as a recurring workout you can build upon over time.
The 200 Rep Kettlebell Snatch Workout
For this challenge workout, we're tackling a classic kettlebell test. The first goal is completing 200 total snatches, but the next level goal is doing it in less than 10 minutes. Let's dig in.
Four Years from Friday: Approaching Your Training Life in Seasons
Let's talk long term. Too many people think that success is just a few weeks or months away, when that is far from the truth. In reality, success is a culmination of long term effort often years in the making. In this piece, I take a little known two day challenge and show you how I would break it down into a series of seasons and blocks that could be repeated over and over again, always driving closer and closer to success.
Workout of the Month: Sandbag Brutality
For June 2024, the workout of the month is a sandbag complex I recently wrote up for myself in my own programming. It's a killer example of "real world" strength and conditioning. Let's dig in.
Thinking Beyond the Drill, or the “Teaching to the Test” Fallacy
I've got a little bit of a bone to pick with how a lot of the shooting culture talks about drills. Much like weight lifting and gym bro culture, it seems a lot of shooters are more interested in flexing their egos than actually using drills as a way to improve. But how, exactly, should we approach that?
The Martial Marksman Physical Fitness Hierarchy
In this post, I outline the physical training hierarchy for Martial Marksmen- or really any prepared citizen, first responder, or military member. What are the most important to least important things to worry about when building up your capability? Let's get into it.
The Home Gym Compendium: Is the Juice Worth the Squeeze?
Late in 2022, I made the leap to abandon the commercial gym memberships I'd used for decades. Instead, I committed to turning our garage into a gym suitable for my continued journey towards my goals. I've learned a few lessons along the way, and thought you might be interested in the pros, cons, and the weird.
The Martial Marksman’s Training Philosophy: Simple, Not Easy
In the last episode, I discussed the Martial Marksman ideal and how it relates to the various topics I talk about here. One of the challenges that anyone going down this path quickly runs into is the fact that there is a lot of “stuff” to learn and practice. It’s one thing for a professional soldier to do these things, but it’s a very different beast for Everyday Marksmen like you and I.
AAR: Tough Mudder 5k and the Value of Generalism
As a team building event for my day job, I joined a Tough Mudder. After finishing, I decided to jot down a few thoughts about how it went, how to train, and why I think it's a decent approximation for "real life emergencies."
Virtue in the Crosshairs: The Martial Marksman Ideal
Every year, I tend to focus in on a “theme” to pursue. Sometimes it’s personally, sometimes it’s got a bit more to do with the site. For most of 2022, the key phrase was “Minimum Capable Citizen.” The idea was around a set of standards and baseline targets that I think any prepared citizen should strive for. Eventually, the idea fizzled out a bit when I felt like there wasn’t much more to write. I’m not interested in “minimum.” I believe we should strive for excellence, and minimum doesn’t cut it. In 2023, my goals turned personal, with a heavy ...
Introducing the Rifleman Pentathlon: A Game for Martial Marksmen
For a while, I've been kicking around an idea for a new type of competition. I enjoy all the various disciplines I've played in, but also think that each of them in isolation is missing something. Today, I'd like to tell you about my vision for a "complete" type of match that I think covers all of the foundations of Everyday Marksmen, and it does so in a way that lets all of us have an objective to train for. Let's talk about the Rifleman Pentathlon.
Radically Simple Strength Development: Consistency, Not Variety
This is both my review of a new book on strength training as well as an interview with the author. Over the last year, I've built up a library of strength and conditioning books, and I think I've settled on the one to suggest to just about everyone who wants to get started. Let's dig in.
The 2023 West Virginia Gun Run: The Retrospective
Months of prep time, new gear configurations, and a lot of articles. I finally ran the West Virginia Gun Run this past Saturday. Here's some notes on how it went and what I'd do differently in the future.
The Four Corners Approach to Unlocking Peak Performance
Today I'm discussing a concept that's been brewing in the the back of my brain. While working on the book, I've needed a way to illustrate how different things we do relate to improving the whole and take use to new levels of performance. I think I've figured it out, and this is my first go at explaining it.
