TACFIT Survival Manual

The Intelligent Solution for Extreme Bodyweight Exercise Strength and Conditioning

master your

Movement master your !

Power RMAX International, PO BOX 501388, Atlanta GA, USA | 678-867-7629 | www.tacfit-survival.com

by Alberto Gallazzi, RMAX European Director TACFIT Division Chief World Survival Jiujitsu Champion, Dignitary Protection Agent Secret Police and Special Operations Tactical Fitness and Combatives Consultant for GIS and Reg. Tuscania Carabinieri Airborne Commando ! RMAX International, PO BOX 501388, Atlanta GA, USA | 678-867-7629 | www.tacfit-survival.com

All Rights Reserved Copyright © 2012 – RMAX.tv Productions. All rights are reserved. You may not distribute this report in any way. You may not sell it, or reprint any part of it without written consent from the author, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review. TACFIT® is a registered trademark of Sconik International, LLC

Disclaimer None of the information contained in this manual is intended to be taken as medical advice. Consult your physician before beginning this program as you would with any exercise and nutrition program. Albeit the information and advice in this manual are believed to be accurate, neither RMAX.tv Productions and its officers and employees, nor any members, assistants, volunteers, assigns, or agents of any type whatsoever acting on or in behalf of the aforementioned entity and persons will be held liable for any injury, damages, losses, claims, actions, proceedings, expenses, or costs (including legal) that result from using instructions, advice or exercises in the manual.

WARNING:  This   eBook  is  for   your  personal   use  only.      You   may  NOT  Give   Away,  Share  Or   Resell  This   Intellectual   Property  In  Any   Way

QUICK START GUIDE!

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How to Use your Survival Field Manual BEFORE YOU’VE MASTERED THE BASICS, ANY IDEA YOU CAN IMAGINE HAS BEEN TRIED, TESTED AND FOUND WANTING OR HAS BEEN INCORPORATED ALREADY.

Read the entire manual top to bottom: even if you’ve walked the TACFIT path before, many new layers and features have been embedded. Read it over again in the weeks to come. This book serves as your field manual, so you need to be totally familiar with it. There are 3 Missions included in TACFIT Survival: • Basic, Intermediate and Advanced. • Download the “Beginner” instructional videos. Study the movements carefully. • Download the follow-along videos. • Print out your choice of 4x7 or 7x4 schedule. It will guide you for the next 28 days. • Upon successful completion of: • Level 1 or (“Beginner”) level, repeat these same steps with • Level 2 or (“Intermediate”), • Level 3 or (“Advanced”) It couldn’t be simpler. Everything has been laid out for you day by day. All you need to do is fill in the blanks... and sweat, of course.

! RMAX International, PO BOX 501388, Atlanta GA, USA | 678-867-7629 | www.tacfit-survival.com

THE KEY TO CORE STRENGTH IS ANTI-ROTATION!

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Much of my training throughout different countries in the world concentrated upon core strength. I studied what we currently understood in science as to why core strength holds such a pivotal key to tactical fitness. The key concept underpinning this regards a neurological blueprint from how we develop as infants to adults, called the “Proximal-Distal, Cephalo-Caudal Trend.” We develop from the spine down and from the belly out to our fingers and toes. Neurologically, your core is grand central station for all of the engines you put on track to perform. But it goes much deeper than this. Though we see the incredible dexterity with which the core allows the spine to move with strength, twisting, bending, arching through space, the core is designed uniquely to protect the spine, because it’s primary function is to allow us to maintain anti-gravitational function. The core evolved to allow us to have mobility without being harmed by movement. In other words, the core musculature evolved to resist rotation. In my travels and study, in particular in Russia, and studying Nikolay Bernstein’s application of aeronautic mechanics to the movements of the human body, I learned that the body moves in

rolling right/left and yawing clockwise/ counterclockwise.

greater complexity than merely three dimensions.

of bodybuilding and powerlifting into the three dimensional world, tactical fitness aims to introduce the 3 elements of rotation into your exercise.

Three dimensional movement only travels across three planes. Tri-planar movement involves passing through the plane cutting you in halves: top/bottom, right/left, front/back. But the human body, in its elegant virtuosity, moves not merely in “translation” (through the 3 planes), but in rotation. Called the “Six Degrees of Freedom” to represent that the body moves through 3 elements of translation (the standard triplanar movement surging forward/ backward, heaving upward/ downward, and swaying right/left) and 3 elements of rotation: pitching forward/backward,

Where functional strength training sought to bring the one- and two-dimensional movements

The exercise selection within TACFIT Survival, and all of the TACFIT fleet of courses, progresses from gross to fine, general to specific, simple to complex movements in order to elicit the maximal fitness benefits from your exercise.

Pitch: Bending Forward/Backward

In particular, TACFIT Survival concentrates on creating the Hollow Body position spoken of throughout martial art, yoga and gymnastics training. The Hollow Body can be thought of as core activation which resists all three elements of rotation.

Roll: Bending Right/Left

When performing TACFIT Survival, the movements create the need for the Hollow Body position in order to perform the repetitions. Since this Hollow Body position resists all three elements of rotation (pitching, rolling and yawing), you maximize your core activation. And since the core is grand central station for all of the engines in your body, you gain the greatest fitness benefits from these specific movements.

Yaw: Twisting Clockwise/Counter

!

RMAX International, PO BOX 501388, Atlanta GA, USA | 678-867-7629 | www.tacfit-survival.com

BUILDING YOUR POWER CHAMBER! The part of the chamber that many have trouble lies with the pelvic tilt and leg drive. The pelvis has a small range of motion. Relax and lay down flat on the floor with arms extended above head. See the body naturally form an arch in the lower back. While laying on your back, place one hand under your lower back. Notice your hand go right under your lower back as if going through a tunnel. The key aspect of the Power Chamber is to press the lower back to the floor so that "tunnel" goes away. In order to do this you must be able to tilt the pelvis, while driving both hips forward into one line, as depicted in the photo to the left, and second photo down on the right. With the pelvic tilt, you must also contract the pelvic wall upward, as you have exhaled to contract the intercostals inward, the diaphragm downward. This muscular lock “crushes the can” of the power chamber, creates a systemic knot of strength.

One of the most important positions that a martial artist, clubbell swinger, football lineman, yogi, kettlebell lifter, wrestler or gymnast learns is the “Power Chamber.” Masters have taught this primal position for thousands of years in yoga such as in mayurasana, in gymnastics is called the “hollow body”, by World War II CloseQuarters Combatives experts simply as “battery position.” To tap into this biologically hard-wired strength, protract (outward) and depress (downward) your shoulder blades, bringing the shoulders into the safest and strongest biomechanical position they can attain: called the “closed, packed position” - or as I coined it in my first book, “shoulder pack.” Pull your ribs downward at the sides, engaging the internal and external obliques as well as quadratus lumbarum (your suspenders). Pull inward your transverse abdominus (your corset) but don’t suck upward, and crunch downward your rectus abdominus (your 6 pack) pulling your chest down to your hips. This creates the strongest core activation possible with exhalation mandatory.

!

Exhale and engage the pelvic floor, drawing it upwards towards your navel. Think of it as the space between the pubic bone and the tailbone. Initially you may need to contract and hold the muscles around the anus and genitals, but you want to isolate and draw up the perineum (between the anus and genitals). Engaging the pelvic floor creates both powerful lift and secure rooting. This is especially useful when jumping, receiving a collision or administering force. Squeeze your abdominals, thighs, and glutes very hard. Grab the floor with your toes and feet, and push the Earth away midfoot while knees remain bent. The tighter - the lighter! There is an anthropological reason for the strength of this position: it is the primal fighting / defensive posture with which we evolved to instinctively protect ourselves. Biologically, it is the most effective position to absorb and deliver force. We are neurologically wired to strengthen this “hollow body.” It is essential to perfecting a proper handstand, a strict pullup, as well as the body lever and back lever, the kettlebell rack position and the clubbell order position. The physical range may not be as dramatic from a handstand to a fighting stance, but it is “resisting rotation” which correctly elicits the neuromuscular efficacy of the power chamber. Make it the focus in every Survival exercise.

RMAX International, PO BOX 501388, Atlanta GA, USA | 678-867-7629 | www.tacfit-survival.com

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HOW DOES TACFIT SURVIVAL DIFFER?! I write volumes on this, but one arena of particularly stark departure of TACFIT from the norm regards: sophistication. When most exercise programs bump you “up” a level, they are adjusting standard variables like intensity, volume, speed, duration, etc to increase the challenge. While you can certainly increase speed with this program, that isn’t the primary goal. Rather, the 3 Missions included in TACFIT Survival specifically progress in complexity: each mission develops neuromuscular efficiency, preparing you for the next higher level. Your nervous systems evolves to become "smarter" and more efficient as you progress. In addition, something called the “complex training effect” (CTE) provides an additional touch of magic. The CTE simply states that when you couple simple movements together, the synergistic effect is greater than if the individual exercises were performed independently. More (and smarter!) bang for your buck. Here, I utilized a Russian biomechanics concept called “Component Learning” which demands that each movement be a building block to the next. This allows “back-shaping” or “reverse engineering” of high level sports skills. The science underpinning TACFIT Survival combines influences from the Russian System of Training (P.O.C.C.) with the biomechanics of Nikolay Bernstein (the father of Russian biomechanics) — in particular this "Component Learning Theory" — which leads you carefully through simple steps leading to more advanced and evolved physical performance.

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merely by adjusting level. The same skill families, the same result, but an incredible advantage in developing team spirit. No one need be left out of the training session, ever again. Due to the conventional exercise community heralding the inviolate nature of KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid) training, I’ve become infamous for stating that most of the fitness world has become SISSified, or Stuck In Simplistic Stupidity. This is the polar opposite of TACFIT Survival training. We don’t just move more — more weight, more time, more frequency — we move better, and we do this by increasing movement sophistication. Bigger isn’t better. Faster isn’t better. Stronger isn’t even better. ONLY Better is Better! When you add in this unique nature of increased sophistication, you don’t merely make the exercises more challenging, you learn a new skill. You stimulate the nervous system to evolve; your brain to become more powerful. You learn a completely new set of tools that you can access in all aspects of your life. You improve the most sophisticated machine that God has ever created. Remember Component Learning Theory? A complex movement chain practiced as a single movement produces a sum total training effect greater than that produced if the individual components are practiced for the same number of repetitions. TACFIT Survival incorporates movements that increase in complexity, so your gains compound as your movement ability develops.

Don’t believe that this means that this will not be functional movement. It certainly will. TACFIT programs enhance “Tactical Fitness.” There can be no fluff: the motions themselves enhance the motor patterns and energy systems that allow the human machine to respond to crisis and conflict. Like the avionics which evolved our understanding of combat effectiveness, the movements contained in such a program must cover all 6 degrees of freedom: heaving (updown), surging (front-back), swaying (right- left), rolling (bending right-left), yawing (twisting right-left) and pitching (bending front- back). This training principle makes it possible to serve a wide range of individuals levels at the same time, regardless of beginning fitness levels, or even limiting overcompensations and repetitive stress injuries. The entire team can train together, from modern ninja to desk warrior, ! RMAX International, PO BOX 501388, Atlanta GA, USA | 678-867-7629 | www.tacfit-survival.com

TO EXHALE OR INHALE: THAT IS THE QUESTION!!

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Hypoxic versus Hypercapnic Breathing Techniques: Near the close of the 19th Century, Russian Physiologist Verigo and Dutch Scientist Bohr independently discovered that without CO2, oxygen remains bound to hemoglobin, unreleased and incapable of being utilized by our tissues. As a result there is an oxygen deficiency in tissues such as our brain, kidneys and heart, as well as a significant increase in our blood pressure. Russian and former Soviet research, such as Dr. V. Frolov, Dr. K. Buteyko and Prof. R. Strelkov surmised that deep breathing serves as the root cause of many illnesses. Deep-breathers suffer from O2 starvation and so they “overbreathe” which begins the cycle called the Hyperventilation Feedback Loop. Notice how a person holding his breath becomes increasingly hyperactive. Over time the level of CO2 increases dramatically causing the rapid consumption of O2. This hyperactivity continues until unconsciousness (syncope) – a method used in martial arts to expedite strangulation techniques. The cause of O2 deficiency is not due to the lack of O2 presence, but by the lack of CO2 retention. Over-breathing causes O2 deficiency. If we inhale too much, we have less O2 in our body. Two methods of breathing developed from this understanding: hypoxic (or lowered oxygen count) and hypercapnic (or saturated with carbonic gas) breathing. Dr. Vladimir Frolov (Endogenous Respiration) concluded from his research that both methods intend the same goal but achieve it through different means: “Buteyko achieved positive results raising the concentration of carbonic gas in the lungs. Strelkov, in turn, obtained the identical result by lowering the oxygen content in the lungs. The paradox solves itself if we compare oxygen concentrations in both methods. It turned out that what united them was an approximately identical hypoxia regime (lower oxygen content).” For many strength athletes, the conventional method of breathing entails the “Power Breathing Technique” - a hypoxic method was researched by a Russian scientist Professor R. Strelkov (popularized by Pavel Tsatsouline in the West). Power increases immediately, but fine and complex motor skills, such as combat skills, suffer. The problem with inhalation bracing lies with the pneumatic pressure it creates intra-abdominally. When you inhale and exert yourself, you literally attempt to move with an inflated balloon within your torso. When moving in 1 or 2 dimensions and short range, that may be acceptable. However, when you must resist rotation in six degrees, you must use muscular control, not pneumatic pressure to withstand forces while remaining mobile. Inhalation cannot do this. Only exhalation can. The optimal method of health and performance lies with the exhalation. The deeper the exhalation, the stronger the core activation, and the more utilization of oxygen at a cellular level. Training happens at the level of discipline, when you must actively exhale through the effort of an exercise. When you find that you’re no longer needing to actively exhale to press through an exercise, and you’re in “flow”, then you’ve adapted to the tempo or complexity of the movement, and it’s time to progress. However, if you find that you’re having to inhale and hold your breath in order to “force” out a repetition, then the tempo or complexity is too much (for that day or session), and it’s time for you to regress down to a lower level complexity (Advanced to Intermediate to Basic), or decrease the tempo until you can regain discipline over your breath. ! RMAX International, PO BOX 501388, Atlanta GA, USA | 678-867-7629 | www.tacfit-survival.com

WHAT ARE THE LEVELS OF CORE ACTIVATION?!

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As just described, the science behind respiratory performance goes very deep. For the purposes of TACFIT, concentrate on three of the 5 levels: force (inhale bracing and pressurized exhalation), discipline (exhale on effort phase) and flow (exhale on compression phase). Avoid having to force, focus on discipline, and when you begin to flow increase the challenge until you must discipline to avoid force. Now on to the depth of the breath. The depth of your exhalation directly correlates to the strength that you can activate throughout your body. There are four volumes to your exhale: 1.Normal: what you exhale when talking. 2.Complementary: what you exhale when you move moderately. 3.Supplementary: what you exhale when you move intensely. 4.Residual: what you cannot fully exhale while alive, but where all high performance floats. Think of these four volumes like levels of a skill. •What is not challenging to you can be performed with a normal exhale. •What is moderately challenging to you can be performed with a complementary exhale. •What is very challenging to you can be performed with a supplementary exhale. •What is extremely challenging to you can only be performed at the end of exhaling all normal, complementary and supplementary volume, called the “Control Pause.” The stronger your exhale, the more powerful you become. Martial artists have known this for millennia, but modern science only now begins to understand this mechanism, as it mysteriously branches into both aspects of the nervous system: the autonomic (what you cannot control), and the voluntary (what you can control.) The depth of your exhale determines how deeply you access the “power chamber” in hollow body position. Physiologically, it is impossible to tap into the power of the core and spine without exhalation. It will not happen immediately. You will need practice daily. As it remains impossible to plumb the bottom of residual breath volume, you can always go deeper and deeper, no matter your age. Strength is not age-dependent: a trained octogenarian can be much more physiologically powerful than an untrained twenty-something. Breath remains the key ingredient to tapping into that limitless potential.

! RMAX International, PO BOX 501388, Atlanta GA, USA | 678-867-7629 | www.tacfit-survival.com

WHAT IF YOU DON’T DO THE REST OF TACFIT?!

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The nervous system doesn’t know the difference between types of tension. It only knows degree of recovery! The above sounds simple enough, but amounts to libraries of research and anecdotal experience.

adaptations. Only recovering from the stress causes you to adapt.

But you don’t NEED to purchase and use the TACFIT fleet to do so. It could be a sandbag, barbell, It works regardless of type of rock, or a club, or just your own tension. TACFIT merely bodyweight. Your nervous system consolidates and distills this into a cannot tell the difference. It only conscious system of application knows how hard it must work to where you become more powerful achieve the technique mechanics. and graceful while minimizing And more importantly... room for error (injury) and maximizing the effectiveness of It only knows how much it has this “wave” of intensity.) recovered from adapting to the work that you keep forcing it to To the right, read an example of do. (You are, for a fact, forcing how to take common activities change. Your body only knows and plug them into this efficiency: it prefers that you don’t biochemical phenomenon of do anything. It doesn’t know that it adaptation called the “4 Day commits suicide a little bit every Wave.” day that it doesn’t experience positive stress.) If you consider the 4 Day Wave in TACFIT, you can insert your bar You adapt to positive physical work into the moderate intensity stress in two ways: by increasing “strength” sessions. muscle developing (by becoming more powerful,) and by increasing As TACFIT Survival builds neuromuscular efficiency (by stabilized strength, focusing on becoming more graceful.) practice at moderate intensity: Some people adapt faster in one • 60-80% heart rate maximum, way than the other, but everyone • 6-8 on a rate of perceived effort scale of 1-10 (10 being the adapts in both ways given hardest effort) sufficiently proper and sustained • Hard or difficult work, but not positive physical stress. extremely hard or difficult. Unfortunately, most people either, don’t give sufficiently high enough Still implement the waving stress for long enough over time, elements of TACFIT, organizing or they don’t consciously reduce other missions in the TACFIT and the stress low enough for long CST Circular Strength Training enough. family can appear like so: (See Right-Side Bar Day 1-4 Example Giving stress doesn’t create these Explanations.) powerful and graceful

Day 1: No Intensity • Mobility, Tai Chi, Light Stretching, Walking, Swimming, Hiking • Strain Prevention, Intu-Flow, Body-Rolling, Band-Ageless

Day 2: Low Intensity • Yoga, Pilates, Core, Deep Stretching, Myofascial Release, Jogging, Biking • Ageless Mobility, Prasara Yoga, Tactical Gymnastics, Stress Conversion

Day 3: Moderate Intensity • Climbing, Mountain Biking, Rowing, Running, moderate Circuit Conditioning • Survival, Spetsnaz Kettlebell, King of Clubs, Barbarian, ROPE

Day 4: High Intensity • Sprinting, Hill Runs, very hard Circuit Conditioning, high intensity weight training, Racing (rowing, biking, etc) • Survival, Commando, Warrior, Accelerator, Drift, Furnace, Pillars

! RMAX International, PO BOX 501388, Atlanta GA, USA | 678-867-7629 | www.tacfit-survival.com

DEFINING TACTICAL FITNESS!

Tactical Fitness “T he ability to change energy state rapidly. To tur n, rotate, or twist faster than your opponent. And most importantly, to sustain that high energy state in the grueling turns that rapidly bleed out an o p p o n e n t ’s s i z e , strength and speed advantages. T he ideal fighter accelerates in rotation the quickest, and moves the fight into this rotation where he holds distinctly superior virtues.”

TIME is the most critical ingredient here. How do we perform repeatedly over time? Time is the top of the pyramid of importance, because it renders the needed energy system of the activity. For tactical fitness, we need the ability to perform at intense task, rapidly recover and retranslate to another intense task. After we establish the appropriate timeframe, then we can select the skills necessary to enhance the mechanics of our discipline. When we understand the mechanics, only then can we choose the tools: the chains of tension, or movements, and the type of tools to elicit those chains of tension. (see the model left.) Recovery is a known term, though frequently neglected activity. All your progress, growth and results happen during the recovery periods between your workouts; never during them. So, for all your hard-chargers out there, if you’re not taking the time to recover, you not only aren’t getting better, you’re getting worse. Each time you exercise without recovery, you’re destroying the body, not building it. Nutrition is king for recovery between workouts and missions. But that’s not the recovery we’re discussing now.; let’s call that recuperation. Recovery regards how to RESET between “collisions” - between rounds, sets, reps and even within an exercise repetition itself (how to recover one part of your body while the other continues in a different movement.) To reset between bouts requires switching the n e r vo u s s y s t e m f ro m a c c e l e r a t o r ( t h e sympathetic) to the brake (the parasympathetic). To recover rapidly you must: • stop moving around, to avoid keeping your foot on the accelerator;

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• on mid-foot, with your body completely relax, chug your body up and down by bending at the knees and hips. We tend to hop on ball of foot and do this, but that keeps the posterior chain tight. Mid-foot keeps the calves relaxed and allows us to “vibrate” the residual muscle tone of the prior exertion. Tension only relaxes when you send it the frequency of its tension, like a tuning fork. The faster you return to full, resting length of a tissue, the quicker you’ll have maximal power output again for the next collision. • find your heart rate and a clock (if possible), because you need to create a bridge from the controllable (your voluntary nervous system) to the uncontrollable (autonomic nervous system). • exhale long, slow and deep into the belly through the mouth, for the longer, slower and deeper you exhale, the quicker your heart rate drops under the radar (heart rate maximum) of excessive arousal. The lower your heart rate, the faster you return complex and fine motor skills to function. If you train only at high intensity, then under stress, that’s what you’ll be conditioned to do; and at high stress >145BPM, you lose fine and complex motor skills. Who recovers fastest wins! If you want your exercise to be tactical fitness, then it must regard this formula: how fast can you recover from high intensity output. That’s your litmus test. Not how big, strong or fast you are. Those are great attributes. But if you can’t recover from the first impact, from surprise, error, or the unknown, then bigger, faster, stronger isn’t better.

Only better is better.

! RMAX International, PO BOX 501388, Atlanta GA, USA | 678-867-7629 | www.tacfit-survival.com

HOW MUCH IS ENOUGH?!

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Programming TACFIT You’ll need to understand two concepts in order to take full advantage of TACFIT. Firstly, understand is the 4 Day Wave. The entire system is based on a 4-day microcycle of waving intensity levels. Next, understand the tool I’ve created over the years to zone in on your intuitive awareness: the internal experience of exercise. I’ve created this tool to ensure you’re precisely target your intensity level for the day without exceeding the discomfort levels and without diminishing the technique levels mandatory for optimal performance and health. Your Compass: the Intuitive Training System Can you say with specificity how “much” is “much” and how “hard” is “hard”? Unfortunately for our internal experience, exercise doesn’t come in denominations of much and hard. What might be considered a difficult session for a couch potato is a breeze for an elite commando, and what might be a “light” training day for said commando might be hell itself for an average recreational athlete. It’s all extremely subjective. How, then, do you train yourself to understand your limits and capacities? You do this by journaling your training and by applying your tools. My Intuitive Training Protocol gives you the ability to differentiate form, exertion and discomfort subjectively, and you can then use this as a determinant factor in progressive resistance. By learning to quantify the subjective, you give yourself an immediate sense of where you stand, and you create a very accurate gauge of your progress. In order to make this tool work for you, you must first learn how to use it. That takes a bit of diligence in the beginning. By journaling your training and by rating these three variables, you will come to a better understanding of your body and you will calibrate your instrument. The skill of rating your performance becomes more finely honed with each use, until eventually you barely have to think about it. But you will have to think about it in the beginning. These are the three variables you will rate after each training session: • Rate of Perceived Exertion (RPE): the subjective evaluation of your effort on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being the hardest you’ve ever worked. • Rate of Perceived Discomfort (RPD): the subjective evaluation of your pain level on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being the worst pain you’ve ever experienced. • Rate of Perceived Technique (RPT): the subjective evaluation of your mechanical performance on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being the best possible form in that exercise.

As you begin to fatigue and become exhausted, your form begins to fail. Without form, you cannot competently hold the force of your exertion, and as a result, you over-compensate with poor form leading to aches and pains. As these aches and pains go unaddressed, injuries appear. Pouring your effort into your technique, instead of the number of repetitions of weight of the resistance, is what brings you great dividends. With deeper concentration on technique, comes greater physiological benefits. Poor technique is as trainable as good technique. Every repetition that you repeat poor technique increases the likelihood that you will embed this. Whatever you repeat, you will adapt to and make more likely, whether you want that result or not. As a general guideline, when you can sustain an RPT of equal to or greater than 8, an RPD of less than or equal to 3, and an RPE of equal to or greater than 6 over the course of 3 sessions, it’s time to increase a variable: frequency, intensity, speed, density, volume, complexity, etc. Each day in the 4 Day Wave includes specific target guidelines that you should be aiming for with each of these three variables. We have also precisely calculated exactly which variable to change, and by how much, when it comes time to move on. All you have to do is rate your performance in terms of the Intuitive Training Protocol, and plug-and-play the program. I’ve taken care of the rest.

If your technique is high enough (greater than or equal to 8) and your discomfort is low enough (less than or equal to 3) you can hold even an exertion level of 10 for as long as your stamina, strength and endurance allow.

! RMAX International, PO BOX 501388, Atlanta GA, USA | 678-867-7629 | www.tacfit-survival.com

THE TACFIT 4 DAY WAVE!

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Your Tactical Fitness missions develop through the signature periodization pattern of TACFIT, which escalates as you work your way through the program. The following combination of “training days” is repeated throughout the program for a total of 28 days per mission. See the specific Program chapter in Part 2 of the manual for the actual program instructions and exercises. That’s how the 4 “training days” of TACFIT shape up. This pattern is repeated for a total of 28 days — or one complete mission. If you are following the traditional 4 wave, your schedule will consist of No, Low, Moderate and High days, repeated 7 times in succession for a total of 28 days. There are no "off days.” Instead, recovery days are factored into the program that involve short sessions of joint mobility and compensatory yoga.

Day 1—No Intensity

Day Two—Low Intensity

1 2 3 4

RPE: 1-2; RPT: 8 or higher; RPD: 3 or lower

RPE: 3-4; RPT: 8 or higher; RPD: 3 or lower

When you reach the No Intensity day, follow along the warmup video. You can also insert in here any strain prevention mobility programs, such as Intu-Flow - a basic and intermediate program available for free on Youtube.

Your task on the Low Intensity day: follow-along the cooldown video to use specific compensatory movements to balance growth and remove the parking brake from your highperformance output and mobility.

Your No Intensity recovery day is one of the keys to the rapid adaptation you’ll experience with this program. Do not skip it.

Insert stress conversion, yoga or stretching routines such as Body-Rolling and Healing Staff included in your dossier.

Day Three—Moderate Intensity

Day Four—High Intensity

RPE: 5-7; RPT: 8 or higher; RPD: 3 or lower

RPE: 8-10; RPT: 8 or higher; RPD: 3 or lower

Now the work starts. Your task on the Moderate Intensity day is to ramp up your output according to the specific mission objectives.

If you’ve been following orders, this will be your peak performance day. What prepared you for today, is the strength you activated yesterday, in the moderate intensity session.

When you reach the Moderate Intensity day, watch that session’s Video Briefing and follow the program guidelines for the specific mission and level you’ve chosen to complete.

Follow along with the TACFIT Survival Basic, Intermediate and Advanced missions included in your dossier.

Repeat yesterday’s TACFIT Survival mission, but go as hard as your technique can hold it. You’ve practiced this now, turn it loose and let the engine run hot!

! RMAX International, PO BOX 501388, Atlanta GA, USA | 678-867-7629 | www.tacfit-survival.com

CAN’T COMPLY TO MISSION RX?!

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What if you can’t commit to the Mission as prescribed? Options for “Fixed Living” schedule You may not live in the utopia where you can train 7 days a week and follow as prescribed. Firstly, stop complaining. You’re infinitely capable to adapt, improvise and overcome. Find out where you can insert this into your life, and slowly reclaim your life from habits. Gain the greatest results by following the mission as Rx. But start where you are, so the plan may not always go as planned. Believe me, I understand lurking Murphy. Don’t Want to Train 4x7 Style? Adhering to the 28 day calendar can be challenging, when you haven’t yet optimized your time tables. Here are three variations for Survival: a conventional 3day split, a 7-day wave in which the training days remain constant from week to week, and the optimal 4-day wave (the 4x7 format). The conventional 3-day Split Only have 3 days a week to train? Better make the most of them! Start with Level 1 or Basic level. Perform it for each of the three days. Only progress to the next mission Level 2 (Intermediate) when your technique is high enough (RPT greater than or equal to 8) and your discomfort is low enough (RPD less than or equal to 3) to move on safely (to Level 3 Advanced). Each mission builds upon the prior. The movements increase in sophistication as your strength and mastery grow. When you’ve mastered Level 1, you’re ready for Level 2, and finally on to the Level 3 Alpha dogs. Scheduling on the “Week Wave” If you feel that you’re ready for all four levels of intensity, then the “week wave” involves No, Low, Moderate, No, Low, Moderate, High, repeated 4 times in succession for a total of 28 days. Scheduling on the 4-day Wave

If you feel that you’re ready to knee-deep into mission proper, then the 4 day wave will consist of No, Low, Moderate and High days, repeated 7 times in succession for a total of 28 days. The Program Chart is formatted on this 4-day wave. This is the ideal choice for Survival because it synchronizes with your nervous system for greatest results. How do you add other sports and programs to TACFIT? Though we appreciate your zeal, focus. If you chase two rabbits, you’ll catch neither. If you focus on this one mission, you’ll achieve all of the results you hoped of and much more once you’re on the other end. Results we can’t describe, as you’ll have to experience them to appreciate what you’re about to develop and gain access to. Candidly ask, “what do I want from exercise?” If you find you don’t have a specific answer, then you may be “cocktailing”; decreasing your results from ALL your activities. Cocktailing is unhelpful because throwing together a bunch of random exercises will get you random results. Better focus on one goal at a time. Go in too many directions at once, gets you nowhere fast. Life often doesn’t give us the optimal circumstances. My schedule of travel around often presents insurmountable problems to routine. Sometimes, you just gut it out and make due with the hand you’ve been dealt. Suggestions for other activities Each day of the cycle is tied to a specific intensity level - waved in order to elicit the 4×7 effect. To make this 4×7 to work for you, then you should align your activity level with the guidelines for RPE. It can be highly subjective, and there are no hard and fast numbers. What may be a light recovery jog for a highly conditioned runner may be a Moderate or High Intensity session for someone with little running experience.

Logging your training and applying the Intuitive Training Protocol to rate your exertion, technique and discomfort will over time give you a precise lens for gauging your output. It will help to determine where your chosen activity falls on this spectrum: • No intensity: such as mobility, body rolling, tai chi, stretching, long walk • Low intensity: such as yoga, pilates, deep stretching, low gymnastics, light runs • Moderate intensity = strength practice, weight training, gymnastics skills, jogging • High intensity = metabolic conditioning, sprinting, interval training, high jumps On occasion, different activities won’t match because your body cannot handle the sum total stress load, and then stress turns to strain. Bad news: over-training, injury and illness often result. If you want to continue with extra-curricular training, you may want to consider either scheduling out the others for the month, or lightening your intensity load of the high intensity sessions. Perform your mobility recovery exercises daily as prescribed, but exclude your high intensity workouts. Keep performing the No intensity programs daily, until your scheduling becomes more permissive of higher intensity workouts. As it opens up, then start back on your 4 day wave as prescribed. Lastly, there may be times when Murphy makes a visit and knocks you off the wagon. Just because you get burned, doesn’t mean that you can’t jump back on. Missing one or two days is fine; just fall back into formation picking up where you left off. Missing 4 or more days means you missed a cycle completely, so restart at the previous 4 day cycle on your calendar to catch up.

! RMAX International, PO BOX 501388, Atlanta GA, USA | 678-867-7629 | www.tacfit-survival.com

THE 4X7 MONTH PROGRAM CHART!

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No

Low

Moderate

High

Intensity

Intensity

Intensity

Intensity

CYCLE

Mobility

Compensation

Strength

Conditioning

1

Program

Program

Survival

Survival

CYCLE

Mobility

Compensation

Strength

Conditioning

2

Program

Program

Survival

Survival

CYCLE

Mobility

Compensation

Strength

Conditioning

3

Program

Program

Survival

Survival

CYCLE

Mobility

Compensation

Strength

Conditioning

4

Program

Program

Survival

Survival

CYCLE

Mobility

Compensation

Strength

Conditioning

5

Program

Program

Survival

Survival

CYCLE

Mobility

Compensation

Strength

Conditioning

6

Program

Program

Survival

Survival

CYCLE

Mobility

Compensation

Strength

Conditioning

7

Program

Program

Survival

Survival

1

2

5

6

9

16

19

22

26

12

15

18

21

8

11

14

17

4

7

10

13

25

3

20

23

24

27

28

(*see the specific Program chapter in Part 2 of the manual for the actual program instructions and exercises) That’s how the 4 “training days” of TACFIT shape up. This pattern is repeated for a total of 28 days — or one complete mission. If you are following the traditional 4x7 wave, your schedule will consist of No, Low, Moderate and High days, repeated 7 times in succession for a total of 28 days. There are no "off days.” ! RMAX International, PO BOX 501388, Atlanta GA, USA | 678-867-7629 | www.tacfit-survival.com

THE 7X4 MONTH PROGRAM CHART!

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No

Low

Moderate

No

Low

Moderate

High

Intensity

Intensity

Intensity

Intensity

Intensity

Intensity

Intensity

week

Mobility

Compensation

Strength

Mobility

Compensation

Strength

Conditioning

1

Program

Survival

Program

Survival

Survival

week

Mobility

Strength

Mobility

Strength

Conditioning

2

Program

Survival

Program

Survival

Survival

week

Mobility

Strength

Mobility

Strength

Conditioning

3

Program

Survival

Program

Survival

Survival

week

Mobility

Strength

Mobility

Strength

Conditioning

4

Program

Survival

Program

Survival

Survival

Program

Compensation

Program

Compensation

Program

Compensation

Program

Program

Compensation

Program

Compensation

Program

Compensation

Program

Routinizing the 7-day Week Choosing the “Weekly” model of exercise - a four week progression (7x4) - your “wave” of intensity is a No, Low, Moderate, No, Low, Moderate, and High days, repeated for four weeks in succession for a total of 28 days. You’ll be on the traditional calendar work week, instead of the four day wave. This allows you to arrange your workouts so that the High Intensity day falls on the same day each week. For example, if you’d like to hit your best effort of the week on Fridays, start with Day 1 (No Intensity) on the previous Saturday. With some good planning you’ll be able to address all of your other scheduling demands and prevent aborting the mission partly through. If you prefer to train on a 7-day schedule, simply follow this alternate Program Chart instead of the 4x7 Chart. ! RMAX International, PO BOX 501388, Atlanta GA, USA | 678-867-7629 | www.tacfit-survival.com

HOW TO TRACK PROGRESS: %HEART RATE MAX!

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What warrior cultures have understood for millennia and what military scientists have rigorously studied for centuries is the reality that whoever can recover faster from error, surprise and failure, and whoever uses the least effort to accomplish the most, wins. One term commonly associated with the highest level of warrior skills or martial arts is “Chi” or “Ki,” which is translated variously as “intrinsic energy” and “maximum results with minimum effort.” It is this latter quality, “effective efficiency,” which concerns us here. “Effective efficiency” means to perform with greater total results (effectiveness) while using lesser total effort (efficiency). You must quantifiably track this to be assured of our results. To do this we use the TACFIT technology of tracking HRbpm during Moderate Intensity efforts. Not high Intensity. (You may track it, but we gauge our ultimate success not my maximal effort, but by maximal "effective efficiency.") You improve your ceiling of maximal effort during high intensity sessions, but the benefit is only shown by improvements in numbers of quality repetitions during moderate intensity sessions. Therefore the target heart rate for the four day wave is: • No intensity: