CONTENTS
Cover
About the Book
About the Authors
Title Page
Dedication
Forward! by John T. Carney Jr., Colonel USAF
1 · Mission Success: Lean, Strong, and Confident
2 · How I Got Here
3 · Why Bodyweight Exercises?
4 · Why Strength Training?
5 · So What Is “Fitness,” Anyway?
6 · Nutrition
7 · Common Strength Training Myths
8 · Motivation
9 · Intensity
10 · Training Tools
11 · The Exercises
12 · The Program
Appendix 1: Household Equipment
Appendix 2: The 6 Necessary Training Principles
Behind Any Successful Fitness Program
Appendix 3: The Science Behind the Program
Copyright
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorized distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
Version 1.0
Epub ISBN 9781473503618
www.randomhouse.co.uk
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
Vermilion, an imprint of Ebury Publishing,
20 Vauxhall Bridge Road,
London SW1V 2SA
Vermilion is part of the Penguin Random House group of companies whose addresses can be found at global.penguinrandomhouse.com
Copyright © Mark Lauren and Joshua Clark 2010
Mark Lauren and Joshua Clark have asserted their right to be identified as the authors of this Work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
First published by Vermilion in 2015
First published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House Inc., New York in 2011
Originally published by Light of New Orleans Publishing, LLC in 2010
www.eburypublishing.co.uk
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 9780091955427
Outdoor photographs of Mark Lauren: Laura Wong
Female exercise demonstration model: Shea Garrison
Shea Garrison’s athletic wear provided by Varsity Sports – www.varsityrunning.com
The information in this book has been compiled by way of general guidance in relation to the specific subjects addressed, but is not a substitute and not to be relied on for medical, healthcare, pharmaceutical or other professional advice on specific circumstances and in specific locations. So far as the author is aware the information given is correct and up to date as at January 2015. Practice, laws and regulations all change, and the reader should obtain up to date professional advice on any such issues. The author and publishers disclaim, as far as the law allows, any liability arising directly or indirectly from the use, or misuse, of the information contained in this book.
In Memory of
Major William “Brian” Downs
Captain Jeremy J. Fresques “FS”
Captain Derek M. Argel “AL”
and
Staff Sergeant Casey J. Crate “CE”
by John T. Carney Jr., Colonel USAF
Colonel Carney has received numerous medals and awards for being at the forefront of every mission involving our nation’s Special Operations Forces since the mid-1970s.
I CAN UNEQUIVOCALLY STATE You Are Your Own Gym is a must read for anyone truly interested in their well-being. These principles, exercises, and programs will guide you to your highest fitness potential.
The credibility of all fitness authors comes from the men and women they have trained, typically movie stars and other famous personas. But the fitness of these celebrities is often only achieved through countless hours spent one-on-one with a high-priced Hollywood trainer, while cooks are preparing their meals, housekeepers cleaning their homes, and assistants looking after their every need. Mark’s method, on the other hand, is for real men and women with real lives. You Are Your Own Gym separates itself from all other books by giving its readers the ability to train alone anywhere, any time, without the crutch of personal trainers and gyms.
The Special Operations community has developed the most effective and time efficient methods of training out of necessity. More than thirty years ago I was a fitness instructor at some of the same schools as Mark. I have seen the old and the new, and the methods of developing elite athletes have come a very long way, due in great part to Mark’s leadership. Through the continuous application of the most up-to-date principles in sports physiology, he minimized attrition and injuries while producing faster, stronger, and leaner soldiers.
In my book No Room for Error, I detail the involvement of U.S. Special Tactics Forces in operations ranging from the Iran hostage rescue to more recent ones in Afghanistan. The death-defying tasks that these troops accomplished and the hardships they endured were due to the incredible physical ability that matched their iron wills. Without it, their chances of success and survival would have been greatly compromised. It is only through the use of bodyweight exercises and sound training principles that these elite forces are able to maintain their astounding fitness at all times, regardless of time and equipment constraints.
This book comes to us in an age when, despite their best intentions, most people are too crunched for time and money to devote enough of either to attaining their fitness goals. In this age of information we are bombarded with incorrect advice, useless gadgets and pills, and pure hype. The methods outlined by Mark are proven and time tested. I know because I’ve seen his results. I’ve commanded the best of the best, and Mark’s training has helped make them that way. Now he has honed his program into one for every man and woman.
In the 1970s Arnold Schwarzenegger showed the world the gym’s potential, and it is said that he launched a thousand of them. Now it’s time to harness the body’s potential. This is the new fitness revolution.
I WANT YOU TO UNDERSTAND, unlike many other fitness authors, I do not train movie stars, television celebrities, models, or other personalities whose livelihoods hinge on being fit. I train those whose lives do. For a decade I’ve used bodyweight exercises to create the leanest, strongest, most confident people of our civilization.
I honed the programs and myriad exercises in this book while preparing hundreds of trainees for the extreme demands of the most elite levels of the United States Special Operations community. I have spent years developing new training principles, and observing the results. A stellar record led the top command to buy into my system. The military’s most advanced forces—from Navy SEALs to Army Green Berets to Air Force Special Tactics Operators—use these exercises as the backbone to their strength training, and now I bring them to you. Now, for the first time, men and women outside SpecOps have the opportunity to reach the pinnacle of fitness, with an amazingly small sacrifice of your time. Clear, concise, and complete, I bring these exercises into your living room, bedroom, hotel room, garage, yard, office, wherever you like. They are for people of all athletic ability levels, tailored to suit the needs and lifestyles of today’s busy women and men.
No book like this has existed before. Yet for thousands of years—from Ancient Greece’s Olympic athletes to tomorrow’s Special Operations forces—humanity’s greatest physical specimens have not relied on fitness centers in their towns or dumbbells in their homes.
What if I told you that you already have the most advanced fitness machine ever created? Your own body. And what’s so great about this fitness machine is that it’s always there. It is the one and only thing you are never without. And now you’re holding in your hand all the additional exercise equipment you’ll ever need again. It’s no longer necessary to spend hours and hours at a gym. In fact, you won’t have to go to a gym at all. The time spent training, wherever you may be, will be minimal. Two hours per week. That’s it. With these workouts you will not waste a single moment of your valued time using ineffective training methods. And no longer will you be able to use the #1 excuse for not training: “I don’t have the time.”
Whether you’re a part-time fitness enthusiast, Olympic gymnast, bodybuilder, yogi, or someone who hasn’t lifted anything but the groceries in years, my program will get you into the best shape of your life. You’ll find an incomparable selection of the 125 most effective exercises to work any muscle you want, anywhere you want, for the rest of your life. With these clearly demonstrated and explained exercises you’ll be able to construct your own training programs, catering to your needs and desires, that can be changed and modified in a virtually infinite amount of ways. Keeping your muscles guessing is how you keep them growing.
But for those who want the direction, I’ve laid out 10-week programs for all levels of fitness, programs that will lead to success where others have failed you before. You’ll only workout 20 to 30 minutes a day, 4 or 5 times a week. I strongly recommend at least starting out with one of these programs. They combine the secrets to what made ancient warriors so strong, with the world’s most effective and modern training principles.
These programs will increase the strength of important muscle groups needed in everyday living, keep your muscles and joints supple and flexible, improve the efficiency and capacity of the heart, lungs and other body organs, reduce susceptibility to common injuries as well as degenerative heart diseases, and reduce emotional and nervous tension. The benefits are never-ending. And success in your fitness program will inevitably lead to success in the other aspects of your life, both work and play.
This book can replace all other fitness programs in a person’s life, or be used as a supplement to your regular program, as a way to change things up from the same ol’ borrrrrrrring routine in your fitness center, or even just to take on the road when you can’t find a gym. Variety is the spice of life. Forget about doing the same sets and exercises day in and day out, maybe hitting the same treadmill every day, like a gerbil trapped in a wheel. And there’s no need to change clothes, pack a gym bag, drive, park, find a locker, find an open machine… then, after a long, boring workout, do the whole process in reverse. You just start, whether at home, in your office, or a hotel room, and 20 - 30 minutes later you’re finished.
You’ll find no rhetorical filler in this book. No “before” photos of people pale and frowning with their glasses on, next to “after” photos of them tanned, smiling, flexing, and sucking their shaved and oiled tummies in. The proof has been before our eyes since man became man. In fact, even before that—why do you think monkeys are pound for pound stronger than humans? (Hint: It’s not because they have Gold’s Gym memberships.)
Do you really think that we evolved or were created to require machines in order to stay fit? It’s lack of knowledge about your own body’s potential that drives modern mankind’s endless demand for useless fitness gimmicks. When in fact the solution to ultimate fitness is surprisingly simple. Though it’s up to you to apply it. Free yourself from the dependency on gadgets, trainers, and common misconceptions. They are all crutches, keeping you from getting into the best shape possible. It’s a call back to nature.
Your fitness should be dependent on nothing other than yourself.
MY TEAMMATES WERE SPREAD throughout the length of the pool, ready to pull me up, because I was eventually going to pass out underwater. But for now, I stood in the water breathing and relaxing, getting ready to try to break the military’s long-standing underwater record. I would need to swim underwater, on a single breath, for more than 116 meters. That’s a good deal more than a football field, with the end zones included. Four months before, I could barely make 25 meters.
Everyone in the pool and on the deck was quiet, patiently waiting and watching me as I stood chest deep in the water. I knew this was going to suck, but I was committed. For the first time, I was alone in this, just me, without my team. It was surreal. I was calm, relaxed, aware. I was ready. My anxiety had evaporated. Without a thought, I took my last deep breath, went subsurface, and pushed off the pool wall.
You had to graduate one of the military’s toughest selection courses to get on the record board, and with an 85% attrition rate, weekly evaluations, and an instructor staff dedicated to exploiting your weaknesses, graduation was far from a sure thing. In fact, it had already eluded me once.
My first time around, for 9 grueling weeks I fought tooth and nail to stay in the course. I’d be lying if I said quitting never tempted me. It tempted me every day, especially at the pool and in the mornings when a full night’s rest felt like a 5-minute nap. Every weekend, my precious time off was spent learning to swim with fins and performing the various underwater exercises. At last, my final evaluation consisted of a 6-mile run in 42.5 minutes, 14 Pull Ups, 65 Push Ups, 12 Chin Ups, 70 Sit Ups, a 4000-meter fin swim in 80 minutes, and 7 torturous underwater confidence or “water-con” events. The fin swim was done with big thick rubber fins and booties that could push a large man with uniform and equipment through the water. You could not use your arms since it wouldn’t be tactical for a team to swim ashore with arms flailing and splashing above the water. All calisthenics had to be done with perfect form. Each student’s repetitions were counted and scrutinized by an instructor, and improperly executed reps weren’t counted. Instructors shouted, “Didn’t count, didn’t count… Those didn’t count… Your back is slouching… Not all the way up… Not all the way down!”
Staff Sergeant Pope counted my Sit Ups during the final evaluation, and of all the cadre, he was the most feared for his unreasonable treatment of trainees. “Those didn’t count, Lauren. Your hands are too high up on your head,” he said, shortly before failing me by 2 Sit Ups because of the position of my hands. That was all it took. On the last day of training, I got sent back to the junior class that was in week 1. My original class graduated 4 out of an initial 86. I walked back to the dorm as my team ran by in formation singing a jody about their last day. I seriously considered quitting.
But the last nine weeks had taught me something I would use for the rest of my life. A successful team was one that was made up of individuals that were able to set themselves aside. We were trained to set aside personal comfort for the common goal of the team. And that training applied as much to a team as it did an individual. Success is about you—and no one but you—letting go of everything that conflicts with your goal.
So I started over from scratch. Daily, we got smoked for hours doing exercises in the San Antonio summer sun, on top of the course’s regularly scheduled workouts that consisted of a 60-minute run, 2 hours of cals, water-con, and an hour of finning. But it was always getting started in the morning that was the hardest.
On average, we did an extra 500 team Push Ups throughout the day, but really it didn’t matter. We eventually learned that no matter how tired, stiff, and lethargic we felt, once we got warmed-up again, we were alright. Every time we entered or left the school house we had to do either 15 Pull Ups, 13 Chin Ups, 20 Dips, or 20 Chinese Push Ups. Once we each had to do 1000 team Push Ups without getting up except once for 5 minutes to use the latrine. For three and half hours, as a team, we did 5 Push Ups at a time, resting between sets by putting our butts in the air or slouching at the waist. 1000 Push Ups (+1 for teamwork) for having too much tape on our snorkels.
But bad as any of these smoke sessions ever were, the worst was always the pool. During the first few weeks of training, trainees would joke and chat on the way to the pool. By week 6, the bus rides were filled with silent dread. You could hear a pin drop. It was the pool that caused the majority of the course’s tremendous attrition rate. You could quit at any time. If you decide that it isn’t for you, just say it: “I quit.” In the middle of any event you could get out of the pool and go eat pizza in your room.
Monday through Friday we went to the pool, and trainees could only get out of the pool one of three ways: Successfully complete the events, quit, or pass out trying—in which case you would get pulled out just long enough to regain consciousness before going back in to accomplish the task, quit, or pass out again. Screwing up an event meant that you would have to do it again and each following attempt got harder and harder, especially events like equipment recovery—diving to the bottom of the pool, removing all our equipment and placing it in perfect order on the bottom, then putting it all on again before inspection—or knot-tying—we had to tie three different knots perfectly 12’ underwater—that required you to tread water between dives. We learned to commit, stay down, and get through it the first time no matter how bad it hurt. It was all about being fully committed. Commitment equaled success.
This was INDOC—9 weeks of sucking it up for the team while 9 instructors tried to make as many of us quit as possible. My second time around, a team of 12 made it to the final evaluation and all passed but one. A teammate failed the 4000-meter fin. We would be going back to the pool one last time so he could take his re’eval. My time had come.
I remember sitting on the bus, regretting that I had mentioned challenging the underwater record. I knew my teammates wouldn’t let it slide, and before long, one called me out. “So you really want a shot at the record?” he asked. “You really gonna do it?” I wanted to break his nose, but instead choked out a “Yeah.” I was committed, and he laughed at my upcoming misery. But he was right, it was time to walk the walk.
As our teammate took his re’eval finning for 78 minutes, I sat on the side of the pool relaxing and breathing. I had a daunting task ahead of me. The discomfort of not breathing is overwhelming, and I knew that once I started, I wasn’t going to be above the surface of that water until my teammates pulled me out unconscious. I had committed myself to breaking one hell of a record. A1C Switzer, a 6’ 3” collegiate swimmer, had set the record at 116 meters. When I first got into the course, I remember saying that of all the records, the underwater record was the most impressive. A 116-meter underwater to a trainee that is struggling with 25-meter underwaters seems god-like, and here I was, four months later, at the end of my second class, getting ready to challenge it.
With my feet on the gunnel, I sounded off: “Ready to enter the water, Sergeant!”
“Enter the water!” replied the instructor.
“Entering the water, Sergeant!”
I stood at the side of the pool breathing and relaxing for a few more minutes as my teammates waited for me, ready to pull me out when the time came. I took my last deep breath, went subsurface, and pushed off the wall.
I was utterly alone. After two months of nonstop teamwork, I could suddenly neither see nor hear anyone or anything but myself. My total focus was on my stroke and relaxing. Stroke, glide, relax… Stroke, glide, relax… until finally my body started cursing me for not breathing. But my goal was in place. And my comfort would not interfere.
At the 50-meter point, just as the discomfort was starting to seriously crank up, I had a fleeting thought of standing up out of the water and laughing it off, but I couldn’t do it. Your mind always looks for a way out when things really get difficult. Relaxing, maintaining good form, and pressing on when the body and mind beg you to do otherwise tests your resolve. Stroke, glide, relax… Stroke, glide, relax… Tension, panic, anxiety make massive withdrawals on a very limited and precious oxygen supply. I had to stay relaxed long enough to get through the worst of it. Stroke, glide, relax… Stroke, glide, relax… Eventually the discomfort eases once your brain and other body tissues are starved of oxygen and you become hypoxic. It seemed an eternity before I got to that point, but eventually the lights dimmed, my peripherals vanished, things weren’t so bad after all, and the tunnel got smaller and smaller until…
I woke up on the other side of the pool, pale and blue-lipped. “Did I get it?” I mumbled. I wasn’t able to remember swimming the whole length of the pool, nor passing out just as I reached the wall. I had started sinking at that point, and my teammates jumped in and yanked me out. I began breathing again. I had just set the new record—one I still hold—at 133 meters, after swimming subsurface, on one breath, for two minutes and twenty-three seconds.
I feel your pain. Years later, I became the instructor.
I’LL ADMIT, MY FIRST FORAY INTO FITNESS was driven by nothing more than body image. I was 13, a scrawny, shy kid, and I wanted to do something about it. I set out to change my physique into one I could show off with pride. I had no access to weights, so I did Push Ups and Sit Ups in my bedroom before dinner. Until I could do 75 non-stop Push Ups and 600 Sit Ups. Then I did more. I became a stronger version of myself in every way, and confidence in all I did soared, including winning regional high school bodybuilding titles.
Many years later, at the Pararescue & Combat Control Indoctrination Course, if we weren’t running, swimming, or holding our breath, we were performing some type of bodyweight exercise. Training lasted from 5 am to 6 pm, Monday through Saturday, and by the end of the nine week course there was only a small handful of us remaining, less than 15%. The high rate of attrition was largely due to overtraining. Though the training mentality of that time was amazingly effective at shattering young men’s perceived limitations, it was not ideal for optimal fitness.
Once on team, at the 22nd Special Tactics Squadron, I continued to use bodyweight exercises to keep myself physically fit and able to meet the extreme demands of airfield seizures, combat search & rescue, and reconnaissance & surveillance missions.
Five days before September 11, I left my team to become a full-time Military Physical Training Specialist. It became my responsibility to prepare trainees to meet the demands of immediate deployment into areas of forward combat operation.
After Sept. 11, the demand for SpecOps soldiers went through the roof. The career field needed numbers. The days of graduating only 5 - 15% of the original class had to end. The cadre was forced to look at its training methods. We used to be old school: More is better—run the trainees into the dirt and make them hard, or get rid of them. Changing to “less is more” wasn’t easy, but necessity forced us, and we were in the perfect environment to learn quickly what worked and what didn’t. Every six weeks I got a new shipment of untrained recruits. Most came to me soft and weak. By the end of the course, they were lean, strong, and confident.
By applying the most up-to-date strength and conditioning principles and sports science, I was able to produce better results with only a fraction of the time and less injuries. I experimented with varied volume and intensity, day to day, week to week, and included sensible recovery and progression. I revamped the courses’ physical training programs, and personally tailored these programs and diets to suit the individual needs of candidates, and then monitored their progress.
Amazingly, despite limited space, time, and equipment, as well as larger classes, I was able to cut the course’s attrition rate by 40%. And many of my students went on to capture coveted Special Forces graduate awards. Quite simply, I built a training method superior to any other in developing muscular, lean, physically fit bodies as fast as possible. And now I share it with you.
Embrace the exercises and principles in this book and you will become fitter and stronger than you’ve ever been. It’s in your hands, literally, starting right now.
THE POPULARITY OF TRAINING EQUIPMENT, systems, and fad diets is mostly the result of marketing—not a genuine attempt to help a generally out-of-shape society reach higher levels of fitness and well-being. In this age, when our homes and gyms are cluttered with fitness gadgets, the simplest and most effective method for developing strength and losing fat has been largely overlooked—knowing how to train using nothing more than your body.
Even outside of SpecOps, the efficacy of bodyweight exercises has been proven time and again. Take, for example, Madonna, Bruce Lee, or the USSR’s two-time Olympic gold medalist Alexeev—arguably the strongest man in the world in his time—who was the first to clean and jerk 500 pounds, or Dallas Cowboys running back Herschel Walker who gained more yards than anyone in professional football history (and had a body to match). They, and countless others, primarily used bodyweight exercises to attain their ultimate physique and fitness.
Most weight training exercises isolate only certain muscles, requiring a fairly small portion of your body’s total muscle mass, unlike bodyweight exercises that incorporate many at once. These exercises have the added benefit of being much more demanding of core strength (6-pack anyone?) than exercises that require weights and machines.
Bodyweight exercises also use motions that keep you safe from the many chronic injuries, like joint problems, that come over time with weightlifting and other unnatural exercises which have little functional value in our daily lives. For an exercise or workout to be functional, it must resemble the event being trained for as closely as possible. The performance demands of the average person consist mainly of manipulating their own bodyweight throughout the day. So what could be more functional for developing better strength in day-to-day activities than bodyweight movements? But between couch potatoing and bench pressing—sitting on your butt and lying on your back—we’ve got a nation of functional weaklings. Seriously, when was the last time, outside of using gym benches or machines, that you exerted yourself while sitting or lying down? (While you were alone, I mean. ;-))
For too long these exercises have gone largely unnoticed by popular culture. Other than running and swimming, most people haven’t been raised to use their body alone for exercise. The exploding popularity of yoga and pilates is a great example of the worth of bodyweight movements, although these methods, when used alone, utterly lack a systematic approach to developing all-around fitness.
My program has the advantage of making you proficient at using the one thing that you are never without: Your body. You will develop greater strength, power, muscular and cardiovascular endurance, speed, balance, coordination, and flexibility. Combined with a good diet and consistency, it will reward you with continuous results, challenges, and much greater body control.
The workouts can be done anywhere, anytime, and without costly gym memberships or equipment. With that said, even for those that insist on lifting weights, these exercises are a valuable addition.
You will be training as Achilles did before battle on the shores of Troy, training as ancient warriors the world over knew was best, training as future SpecOps warriors will to meet their own foes. Why? Because it works.
MYTH:
BODYWEIGHT EXERCISES DON’T ALLOW YOU TO ADJUST THE DIFFICULTY OF AN EXERCISE
There’s a common misperception out there that bodyweight exercise options are limited. Push Ups, Pull Ups, Sit Ups—and not much else. Hmmmm…