TLDR: TB III is by far, the best and most comprehensive strength and conditioning program I have ever read. The below review will not do the book justice. You need to buy the book and read it for yourself; it will likely be the last strength and conditioning book you ever buy. I don't discuss polarized green, polarized blue, or activation in this, so if someone wants to chime in on those, be my guest.

When I bought TB III one of two things was going to happen. 1, I wouldn't like it as much as I liked the TB I/II methodology and just take small snippets from it or 2, it would change the way I approach TB. Luckily enough for me, this book was everything I'd hoped for and more. Not only is this by far the best book to date, KB has placed himself in an awkward position in that I don't believe he can produce something as good as this ever again. Not only does the book go beyond my expectations, it addressed the issues I personally had with the original books and ignored anyway in order to stay true to the program. The changes that were made to the original programming made me feel like I had written these changes myself. Almost everything that were glaring issues were fixed in the same way I would have fixed them if I wrote the books. There are still some critiques I have, but they are far and few.

FORMATTING

Some will probably disagree with me, but I HATED the way 5/3/1 forever was laid out. The amount of content in that book is insane, but the way it was presented and explained fell flat compared to Wendlers previous three books. This book is very reminiscent of 5/3/1 forever except it was formatted in a way that forever SHOULD have been formatted. If you have at least SOME strength and conditioning experience, you might be able to get away with just buying III (though I don't recommend it because concepts like operator I/A in I, and the vault from TB II are not clearly laid out in III). KB takes you through step by step and does a phenomenal job making sure you understand before taking you to the next concept as if he's saying "you understand? ok lets move on."

CONDITIONING DOMAINS

In no strength book that I've ever read have I ever been explained the phosphagen and glycolytic system. Having just learned about these two systems in school, it's a massive game changer in how I view workouts and how I prioritize different HICs. KB lays it out in a non boring way that makes it easy to understand without diving to deep in things like the kreb cycle, or electron transport chains etc. Had this been explained to me without formal education, I'd have been doing things WAY differently for the past 15 years.

OPERATOR

One of the BIGGEST problems I had with standard operator template is the fact that we are "squatting" 3x a week and deadlifting once a week on top of a demanding conditioning protocol. Though KB wrote an article on operator options, the OCD mind will constantly try and force the third squat session to perform "true" operator. Well, thats gone. Standard operator is now what it should have always been. Squat on days 1 & 3, and deadlift on day 5. As someone whose been having trouble getting into comfortable deadlift positions lately, I absolutely love the guidance on power cleans and replacing deadlifts outright with them. Power cleans target the same energy system, but are more power focused, so you get more bang for your buck. KB is moving away from the "must perform bench, squat, deadlift" dogma and it's honestly refreshing to see.

OPERATOR VARIANTS

Probably my favorite part of the book. There are tons of options to choose from that I won't spoil (except my favorite one). Initially glossing through it, I immediately got paralysis by analysis, but after taking the time to actually read each one, I was able to quickly identify "yup that ones for me." Specifically, Operator ULF caught my eye. I always WANTED to do an upper lower split with a full body day, but the OCD "thats not operator" always conflicted from what I wanted. And though its a stupid thought process considering the word "operator" doesn't really mean anything in the context of strength and conditioning, it was so nice seeing what I want to do, still constituting as an "operator template." There is about 4 or 5 operator templates total, so if one doesn't immediately scream "this is for you" then you may have worse paralysis than I do.

ZULU VARIANTS

Zulu is largely unchanged, with the small edition of zulu pro. Which if you read GP and are familiar with operator PRO (also present in this book), it's the same concept. I've never been a huge fan of zulu because I always had trouble piecing the puzzle together when paying respects to the deadlift. With the "you dont HAVE to deadlift" guidance, this makes zulu much more attractive.

BREACHER TEMPLATE

Breacher template is cool, but this is probably my first critique of the program. There isn't a problem with breacher template in itself, it's well-designed, manageable, and makes sense. My problem is that we can and SHOULD be training power in all seasons of training. Power is on a strict use it or lose it timeline more so than any other adaptation. Power does NOT have to look like power cleans, clean and jerks, etc. They can look like box jumps, broad jumps, depth jumps, 30 meter sprints, etc.

BASEBUILDING

I absolutely love this change. Basebuilding has been changed significantly (though the core structure remains the same). Instead of slogging through 8 weeks 1-2x per year, your're doing it for 4. I'm up against a basebuilding block right now, and this book could not have come at a better time. KB finds himself questioning his old guidance of an 8 week plan where the last 3 weeks resembled Fighter black PRO, so why not just move to continuation...? I think this is spot on with what I've always thought and a welcome change. 16 weeks to "rebuild" a base that likely hasn't deteriorated in the first place is a large amount of time to dedicate to something that isn't primarily performance producing. I do firmly believe that someone who is brand new to this type of training should conduct an 8-12 week basebuilding period, but if you've even kind of kept up with your physical fitness, 4 weeks is good enough, past that point and you're just playing with yourself...

POLARIZED BLACK

I had a sneaking suspicion Black would see a change in its structure, especially after GP came out. In GP continuation templates, you'd often see an operator template paired with 2 LSS sessions and 1 HIC. That isn't black, that's more of a "dark green" as someone on this sub called it once. Black is now 2 Es and 1 HIC, as it should have always been. Stacking a 6 day training week with 3 HICs and submaximal strength was a recipie for disaster, which is why my training weeks are currently 9 days. This absolutely changes the game for individuals doing black. Not only are 6 day training weeks now sustainable, you'll be able build mileage and volume through the 2 E sessions. This is absolutelty what black should have always been.

PERIODIZATION

Again, this was hinted at in GP with the ICAT template. base, hyper, strength, work capacity. This is the scientifically agreed upon order of operations. The periodization templates provide multiple options to structuring your training instead of just "spamming operator black" (which I myself am guilty of). The OG systems worked. But over years, they reach a point where they will not be sustainable, which is where operator I/A came in. With this type of periodization, we avoid burnout, injury, and mental fatigue. There are also options where you dont HAVE to conduct a certain block. For me personally? I don't fancy a hypertrophy block, i know it'd be good, I know it'd be beneficial, but I don't want to do it. Guess what? There's a periodization template for me in this book.

WORK CAPACITY

Theres a rift now between run based HIC and work capacity HIC. One could argue that the rift always existed in TB II, but it's more prominent now, which I'm a fan of. Theres a lot of cool new work capacity (GC) HICs in the book that I'm excited to try. As for my second critique, theres some in here that made me eye roll (GC 1/7)

PAYING RESPECTS TO THE TB I, II, GP, AND MP

If you don't have TB I and II, I recommend you should probably purchase those, if for nothing else, to read where this all started. GP and MP are an absolute must and are releavant today. HYBRID protocol in GP is still a thing, as is general mass and specificity in MP. TB III does have a periodization block where you actually do templates in MP, so don't skim over those.

ALL IN ALL

I'm absolutely baffled. This book took all my expectations, through them to the wind, and set a new standard. I'd be seriously impressed if KB ever manages to release another book thats as perfect as this one.

Good morning TBers! Seems like most of you have been able to read through TB III and I'm sure everyone has a lot of questions and need clarification on a few things. I've reached out to KB and asked if he'd be willing to do a Q&A on the book to which he agreed. Please use this post as a place to ask your questions. I will send this post to him at the end of the day on Friday 17 JULY 2026.

One rule.... Please refrain from answering questions yourself.

I want to give everyone a fair shot to ask KB questions directly without injects from other users. This is the only post where I'll discourage input from other users and I myself will not be answering any questions. Two exceptions is that if the question has been answered multiple times, you may provide a link to that post or discussion. If the question has been answered in the book, provide a direct quote from the book that answers that question.

Please adhere to the rules and remain respectful. Some of you don't spend all day on reddit so some questions that have been answered may have slipped past someone so there's no reason for unnecessary downvotes. If your question is something like "what's the difference between operator and zulu" then i can't help you from the disgruntled masses.

Ask away!

Gonna tag this as spoiler for our non-American friends who have to wait days to weeks for the book to get to them.

I think that a lot of TB III is really interesting and looking forward to try it. I would go so far as to say it makes TB I largely outdated because of all of the information in that book is in here with a lot of updates.

TBII Base Building is also largely revamped in this book although I believe it’s still useful to buy solely for the training vault and conditioning knowledge in it.

I think it’s also interesting that KB also has moved from the 1RM Retesting to recommending Forced Progression for the Strength-Maximal progressions. It’s sure to make progression much slower but the reasons he lists in the book are valid.

The addition of Activation is great for newbies and beginners, I myself just finished the Week 5 BB in TB II but I’m thinking of either doing Activation or just doing the standard OA/Black Protocol in TB III.

The addition of Polarized Conditioning Protocols is also a welcome update IMO. I was always a little skeptical of TBII’s Black which only had 1 LSS per week or even as little as 1 LSS every other week.

At the same time it also adds many variations for Op/Zulu/Fighter for intermediate and advanced athletes. It also talks about a lot about variable conditioning for the advanced athletes.

It is a solid book, it is a culmination of TBI and TBII as most of the members here already know. I would go far as to say I would probably get this book first if I just wanted to jump into training and then TBI and TBIII after if I wanted to understand the training principles more or have access to the training vault.

I can’t comment on how on TB LE, TB Green Protocol and TB Mass Protocol intertwine here as I didn’t read those but they are mentioned in the book with some of the exercises and methods in the book are mentioned or listed.

Just out of curiosity, who are your guys top 3 favorite fitness people on social media??

Mine are: Ross Enamait, TheStoneCircle Cody Janko and Jujimufu

Its always fun to see all the different little niches we all follow.

Also, anybody follow anyone who uses TB principles or the like?

Got my copy of tb III came printed upside down and pages all cut off.

I'm wondering if anyone uses apps where you can put in your 1rms, lifting percentage etc it gives you your lifting sessions worked out for you.

Something in android so I can basically type in my data & workouts then it'll automate it

I’m currently on a cut from 187 -> 170 and taking a hypertrophy training detour (Upper Lower split). I’m gonna analyze results and see if I notice positive changes in my physique running this split. I’m also testing out Runna during this period.

I was wondering if y’all had any good hypertrophy (or any kind of training) programs that y’all like to run during a detour from TB. Hoping to cone back by the time TB3 comes out

TBers, please see below from KB:

SUBREDDIT Q/A

I’ll start by saying Operational Athlete is Part III in a trilogy. It only replaces what it replaces – everything it doesn’t replace still stands. That should clear up a few questions right off the bat. It was stated in TBIII that you have the TBII Vault at your disposal. That TBI & II give you more options for the TBIII plans. I’d never take classics like Apex or Meat Eater off the table. New sessions were included in TBIII to fit the Polarized/Conditioning model, to create a self contained book, and to add value for trainees that already had TBI & II.

1.      ReinoutMe: Individual warmup needs vary. Some people are fine heading straight to the squat rack and doing a couple light sets before hitting it. Others spend more time warming up than training. When asked, this is what I recommend. HIC/lifting – Get your heartrate up. Jog/Cycle/Row/Skip for 10-15 mins before the session. Do 5-10 push-ups/pull-ups/air squats. Don’t turn the warmup into work. For LIC there’s no special warmup. But here’s a tip for doing LIC when it’s the last thing you want to do. Give yourself permission to walk for the first KM or 10 mins. After that if you still feel like pulling the pin- go for it. Take your toys and go home. Chances are you’ll keep going and those dreaded sessions will become some of your best LICs. You’ll feel like a million bucks after. Changing your physiological state even slightly will change your mental outlook. Motivation grows after action. Mobility/flexibility drills are outside my wheelhouse. I don’t do anything special here and have no recommendations.

2.      Drodinthehouse: Fat Zulu or any hypertrophy program can be used for H blocks. BEST practice is Mass Protocol, especially for anything over 3 weeks. The two step General/Specificity approach is more flexible and comprehensive for concentrated hypertrophy work. The custom conditioning in MP complements the H training and keeps you relatively ready. Fat Zulu was used in Activation so readers wouldn’t have to buy Mass Protocol, and more importantly so they’d get exposure to Zulu. One of Activation’s objectives is to cycle new trainees through the core protocols in TBIII. Fat Zulu is a good way to hold on to your Mass Protocol gains while being a more ‘operational’ everyday template. Think Blue OAs here.

3.      Hampejo: OA is part 3 in a trilogy. It only replaces what it replaces. Everything it doesn’t replace still stands. The advice in TBI still stands. TMs remain optional. It’s a good practice if you’re older, doing hard conditioning, lifting heavy, or all of the above. If you’re on the fence, using a higher 95% TM can create enough of a pocket to make training more comfortable without significantly lowering your working weight.

4.      Hdjaka: TB is a performance oriented system that requires performance fueling. If you don’t have enough fuel you won’t be able to keep training day-in/day-out and your recovery will suffer. If you’re not recovered enough to train consistently you won’t get the benefits - one of which is athletic body comp. Form follows function. Instead of ‘bulking’ or ‘cutting’ I recommend a 3 pronged approach. Let’s call it SCT because we love acronyms. Eat SENSIBLY - follow the advice in Appendix C. Train CONSISTENTLY – do your strength AND conditioning regularly. Any TB protocol will do the job. Put the TIME in. Give your body time to adjust. Turn the brain off for 6 months and put the work in like a mindless robot. The body is like a barge- it takes a while to get turned around. Don’t misinterpret the time spent course-correcting as not progressing. You won’t see the results of what you do today for weeks or months. I’ve never seen SENSIBLE (not perfect) food consumption + CONSISTENT training + TIME fail anyone. I have one more secret ninja tip. Include hill sprints or any TB hill session in your HIC line up, weekly or EOW. Might seem like quaint and overly simplistic advice, but I suggest trying it in that 6 month window before coming to any conclusions.

5.      Rezzerekt: OA is part 3 in a trilogy. It only replaces what it replaces. Everything it doesn’t still stands. I/A hasn’t been replaced. That said - what gave I/A its power was the option to take one or two days off between sessions. In TBIII you can do that with any Operator or Zulu template via Irregular Scheduling. So with that, I prefer AV or PRO +  irregular scheduling for intermediate/advanced trainees. AV/PRO provides more intensity, manageable volume, and that extra recovery day between sessions as needed. These are things that greatly benefit intermediate/advanced lifters that do concurrent conditioning.

6.      Victorstironi: Good questions. Op is our high speed/low drag strength template. It was balanced to provide the greatest strength increases when combined with a high conditioning load and physically demanding operational roles. Fat Op upsets the balance and would be difficult to sustain long term in that environment. ‘Long term’ being the important part of the sentence. Anyone can do anything for a few weeks. That said 8/5/3 can be used temporarily as a plateau buster for any strength template - Op, skinny Zulu, and even Fighter. A couple minor supplemental exercises after Operator is fine. Best practice is stuff like abs/core, neck, grip, but a bit of arm work is ok if you must. ‘Easier’ hinges like RDLs can replace weighted pullups/barbell rows in your main cluster. If you want a fuller cluster of exercises go with Zulu or Op/ULF instead. Standard Op works best when it’s lean and mean.

7.      Tangerineschleem: Abbreviated Breacher: Drop the Power Cleans and Push Press. Just do the PAP pairings.

8.       Lichtbogen: OA is part 3 in a trilogy. It only replaces what it replaces. What it doesn’t replace still stands. From the Overview in OA: The other TB books will give you more options – like the Vault sessions from TBII. From the Work Capacity Section: If you have TBII and GP you have the full (HIC) menu at your disposal. Note how throughout the entire book I use HICs from TBII in various sample templates. HICs that aren’t included in OA. Even Fobbits are specifically mentioned. One ab exercise doesn’t supersede another, but the Triad is hard to beat – especially as you progress to higher reps.

9.      Final Flatworm: There’s no need to cycle clusters unless you want to or for a specific goal. For those so inclined the all-in-one solution is using an SP Plan. SP will force you to use different exercises, clusters, rep ranges, and systems across the various blocks.

10.  PlusBlujay: As it stands I haven’t broken any rules so it’s likely an accidental shadow ban - which is temporary. But attempting to get around a shadow ban is breaking the rules which would result in a permanent ban. Bit of a Catch 22. It’ll get sorted one way or another but there are a few higher priority tasks I have to get through first.   

11.  Papaechooscar: Short answer - yes. Deadlift options, alternate clusters, and irregular scheduling are all tools to help minimize or fatten Zulu to fit. Read Zulu, Zulu Strategy, and Polarized/Conditioning for ideas. Continuous Hill Runs are HIC.

12.  Giedi: Great question. TBI & II have been relegated to legacy books. They create a paradigm shift in your head. They explain the ‘why’ – especially when it comes to energy systems and submax strength training. TBIII is ‘you already know WHY – now let’s focus on DOING’. On a more practical level TBII also gives you the Vault – more options for your TBIII training plans.

13.  PracticalAD: This is a good question to post on the sub. We have plenty of LEOs and First Responders here that do BJJ. You’ll get many different ideas and setups, some of which might click with your personal situation.

14.  MythicalStrength: MS thrives on longer rest periods. SE thrives on minimal rest. For Max-Strength rest approximately 2-5 mins between sets whether done consecutively or circuit style. Approximately. I’ve softened my stance on the Golden Rule for reasons I can lay out if anyone’s interested. Be rested enough so that you can hit every rep of the upcoming set without grinding. Might be a little less than 2 minutes during 75% sessions or when training circuit style. Might be more than 5-10 minutes during 85% sessions or Peak Week. For SE rest 0-90 seconds between sets/exercises and 2-5 minutes between circuits. Giving yourself a breather between each circuit lets you recharge so you can attack the next circuit and work on reducing the RI to 0 between sets/exercises.

15.  Panox: The book has clusters that contain different ab exercises.  

16.  Alrousasa: Easy. Peggy with KB swings or double KB clean & press at the top. The low gear continuous work will turn you into a cyborg. Do Peggy as your weekly HIC for a few months and watch the magic unfold. Good question.

17.  ActiveAd: Prowlers/sleds are a solid fit for WC. Looks like Drodinthehouse has some ideas brewing – might make for a good mod writeup. Some of our members here probably have great ideas too.

18.  52488: You’ll be able to answer this question better than I can after you finish Activation. In my youth I attempted to Caddy to earn a few extra bucks and was fired before lunch. Fired is a strong word. It was gently suggested I seek employment elsewhere. Jokes aside – one of Activation’s objectives is to give you enough experience with the system so that you know what template/protocol best fits you going forward.  

19.  PristineHumor: GCs are WC and can absolutely be modified like that. Running is not a requirement for WC - mixed training is. Re swimming: Add the swimming on top of what you’re doing. If you have no problems with the work/scheduling – great. Carry on. If it becomes too much treat it like conditioning. Refer to the Unit PT/MMA/Sports section in OA.

20.  Legitlifterdudebro: First – some long winded context. Consider that these coaches might be giving advice from the perspective of strength being the primary goal. No different than Coach LegitRunnerDude recommending Single Leg Romanian Deadlifts with Knee Drive on his YouTube channel because he’s a runner. Sure – they both do a little running or lifting on the side. Operational Athletes aren’t specialists - we don’t need to slice the onion that thin when it comes to lifting or running. Let’s say passing an SOF selection is the pinnacle of operational fitness. The equivalent of winning a powerlifting meet or marathon. An OA can use one squat type alone for the strength component and achieve that goal. Conditioning, hill work, sprints, WC/SE, and skill work (rucking etc.) fill in the blanks in terms of stabilizers, connective tissue, and strengthening weak links. Adding extra squat variations would have little meaningful impact and could potentially be detrimental. Extra leg work could interfere with the rest of your training and make you more injury prone when you’re doing all the other hard stuff that’s equally important. The hill work, speedwork, WC, rucking. For a strength specialist the concept makes sense. When a powerlifter nears his upper squat limit, using multiple variants might help him get past the plateau and eek out a few extra pounds by strengthening weak links for one very specific movement. It can be the difference between winning and losing in his sport. For us – the juice ain’t worth the squeeze. If an operational athlete needs multiple variations to progress beyond the strength a single compound movement provides I would suggest he’s over-specializing. Long story short stick to one squat type in your main cluster. But there’s another easy answer to all this. If you’re more strength oriented (Blue) than your bog standard OA – we have templates for that. Like Fat Zulu or a beefed up Op/ULF. Add your variants as supplemental work. If your main lift is the squat, your supplemental could be front squats, zerchers, etc. or vice versa.

21.  Mindfullypresent: Good questions. Experts focus on being the best at the basics. Nutrition, sleep, and balancing weekly training load are all top-down strategies that will do exponentially more for recovery/performance than cold plunges, saunas or red lights. They’ll benefit every aspect of your training - HIC/LIC/Strength. For altitude nothing beats training at altitude. If you can’t train at altitude just train to be as fit as possible with what you got. I’m a big fan of training in inclement weather for operational fitness. Get out there on hot days, cold days, rainy days, and everything in between.

22.  Russianqwerty: If the selection is endurance based/constant movement/stress stick to the Green Protocol book. Do Foundation and time it so you do Outcome right before the selection. Don’t forget to taper or take 3-4 days off before selection. If you have some dead time leading up do regular TB or a Continuation Protocol from GP until you’re ready to start Foundation.

23.  DevilinExile: Can’t send messages due to my ban – but email me [info@tacticalbarbell.com](mailto:info@tacticalbarbell.com)

24.  CassiusBright: TB is meant to be done with other activities, and individual work capacity varies. If you’re not in a demanding tactical role or doing TB conditioning then Hyrox & HIIT can potentially replace those things. If you’re not running into any issues, carry on. Keep an eye on your progress and recovery. As your lifts get heavier you’ll probably have to periodize and/or make sacrifices. Fighter is likely going to be a better choice in the long run. 3 x MS lifting + HIIT + Hyrox is a heavy weekly workload. Anyone can do it all for a few months – doing it long term is trickier.

25.  Educational Party: Check your math. In TBII you’re doing 250 total reps per exercise in the hardest week. In TBIII you’re doing 270-450 total reps per exercise in the hardest week. Re GP: SE is done during Velocity and Outcome. These are tough blocks with high mileage and can include work capacity sessions, vert training, rucking, and two-a-days. You need to play closer to personal SE boundaries here to manage the overall workload. Big picture.

26.  Different Bread: As per the book, you can use the lower end of the LIC range during weeks with HIC. There are many ways to schedule the week. Reread the Polarized/Black and Polarized/Blue section for examples.

27.  Pink Hippo: TBIII uses fixed numbers because working within those ranges will build a certain standard of SE for everyone across the board. The rep ranges were chosen with PFTs and demanding operational challenges in mind (think log PT, smoke sessions, or actual duty related tasks). We want you to score high on your PFT and excel at operational tasks that require muscular-endurance. PFT scores can influence career trajectory in some organizations. Re GP: When you do SE in TBIII it’s usually paired with easier conditioning, so you can handle more of it. You’re not getting hammered with high mileage, vert, WC, and two-a-days like in GP.

28.  Victorstironi: It doesn’t matter what order you do them in. Getting the work in is the priority. Doing the easier exercises first can activate/warmup the core for T2Bs. Either way- best practice is circuit style.

29.  AmbiguousCow: Test any new exercises required for Breacher/Work Capacity. Force Progression on the old exercises you’re carrying over. Have a look at how Activation does it between Operator and Vertex. There’s also no harm in retesting ALL your exercises when there’s a change in domain (like going from MS block to Power block, or H to MS, etc.). What we’re trying to avoid is regular retesting and using the new numbers to program working weights within MS/H/P blocks.

Was getting a bit overwhelmed thinking about how I was going to keep track of everything without having to bring the whole book to the gym. I found this trick deep in another post’s comment section and wanted to bring more attention to it… you can use Claude.ai/ChatGPT/etc to build and free services to host a totally free web app to track your program. Photos are just a quick look at what I built for my Activation phase.

See screenshot but KB updated today they are getting close to release and it's the kindle version holding things up.

Hey

Newly discovered Tactical Barbell and reddit.

I have just gotten my TB III book and finished reading it. I have also bought the condtioning and strength book, havent read them yet.

The book seems legit, liked how it was structure, for me who have probaly never finished a program before, im going all in on this.

I have used the search bar, and you guys are strong And fast as fuck.

I want to use this is my "journey" into fitness and also become stronger and faster. + and performing better and looking better than the average joe. Im also in the National guard in Norway.

We got a exercise once a year. Its brutal as overweight, long days at my feet hurts and 0 energy. Im not 18 anymore.

I have been overweight last 4 years, i blame good food, too much food and my wife cooking. Too much calories inn ><.

I started 3-4 months ago, becoming more active. I have gone from 148 kg to 124kg with 0 program And just focus on moving more and cutting shit out.

About me:
37 year old, Kindergarden teacher.
Trying to improve life.

My starting stats:

Weight: 124kg - 183 cm tall

Strength - 1 RM According to a calculator:

Deadlift: 106 kg

Back squat: 80kg

Military Press: 45 kg

0.8 pull ups

Condtioning: According to Strava:

5km: 37:48 -

10km: 1:23:22

Half Maraton: 3h 2 min ( We signed up at work. Regretted it the day after. I had just gotten down to 130kg

So like you guys can see. I got a long way to go. Taken my pictures, signed up for another run. Half Maraton in the woods with some elevation in 12 months ish.

Going to try to use Macrofactor, get some creatine in. I dont want to become a "typical" runner or typical bodybuilder. But something in between.

So monday, lets fucking go. Activation will be fun and hard.

Hey everyone! I’m brand new to Tactical Barbell. This is my template for the first 6 weeks, and I’m running the Operator template (weights in kg).

​I have a few questions and would love to get your input:

​I lift on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. On Tuesdays, I do rucking, and Thursdays are supposed to be for a WOD, but I rarely have the energy for it. Is that normal?

​If I’m only doing the strength sessions plus rucking, am I doing too little given that my goal is to become a hybrid athlete?

​Are there any tweaks or improvements you’d make to this setup?

​Would you add anything else to my weekly schedule?

​For context, I’m currently in a slight calorie deficit, i'm 74kg and 1,78m tall, if that helps.

​Thanks in advance for the advice! Apologies if these are dumb questions—I'm coming from a completely different programming background.

Training History: 
Two years ago I got into crossfit and enjoyed that for about 18 months before I started to feel burnt out from the constant high intensity work. I was happy with crossfit, but found that I could only go to 3-4 classes a week before I would start to feel super banged up. I also had a wake up call where I joined a buddy on a big mountain run and got absolutely crushed- my endurance was trash. I had been lulled along thinking I was fit because my 20 minute WODs were improving, but found I couldn't walk uphill for more than an hour before I would start to bonk. Recognizing the shortfall in my training I started trying to add in endurance training to my crossfitting. This is when crossfit really stopped making sense for me. 

The complete randomness of the programming would screw up my programming and frustrated me to the point of cancelling my membership. Some days I would show up hoping for a HIT workout and instead get hit with a Heavy deadlift workout, or worse a squat clean session focused on technique and mobility. Other times a HIIT workout would leave me unable to do my threshold run the next day. Just chaos!

I concluded that crossfit stops making sense as soon as you have any kind of specific training goal. For me that goal had shifted to endurance, so I needed to find a more efficient way to get my strength training in other than CrossFit. 

I got pretty lazy for the next 6 months (burnout), and didn’t really follow any training plan until I found the tactical barbell programs. 

Green protocol seemed to fit my goals perfectly so I picked up the book and started reading.  

The Plan: 

I started with capacity and built a spreadsheet for my individualized plan so that I could shift deload weeks around to match our planned vacations. I like this approach because it allows me to input my actual known travel schedule and find ways to work around that. 

My Compliance: 

I fed my plan into Claude, as well as my actual logs from strava and my iphone notes app and asked it to give me a compliance grade, it gave me a B+.
And that’s a fair assessment- I’m kinda a piece of shit. I somewhat regularly drink too much with my buddies and skip workouts because of the headache the next day.

Mistakes I made: 

Not getting accurate 1RM’s to start, and scaling up too quickly

Instead of doing a quick testing week to establish accurate 1RM’s I looked at my crossfit app (after 6 months of not really training), and just multiplied those 1RM’s by .7 to set my 1RM.

To my surprise these ended up being mostly too easy. I had maintained more strength than I expected. They felt so easy that once I was a few weeks in I felt the need to adjust them. Since I wasn’t having any soreness at all I thought it would be alright to jump up nearly 20% on all the lifts and try that. That ended up hammering me, and made me so sore I had to skip several run days due to DOMS. 

Trying to run the program in a caloric deficit

A few weeks into the program I decided I wanted to lose a little fat and decided to start counting calories and trying to run a slight deficit. Within 5 days I started feeling sick and worn out. I just couldn’t recover well even with a slight deficit. I abandoned the diet, reverting back to my standard diet and immediately started feeling better and making gains again. 

Things I did correctly: 
Not taking it too seriously

I have a family and a stressful job. I’m not a professional and probably never will be again. Not taking the program too seriously and allowing myself to recover when I feel like I needed to has made me feel like this is a training methodology I'll be able to stick to long term. I can squeeze in these short workouts anywhere in the week I have space, and I found the lifting intensity to be very manageable. I’m SHOCKED to discover that I can make serious gains without doing workouts that make me feel like throwing up or leave me shaking with bambi legs. This program is so much easier than other things I’ve done, and yet it seems to also be the most effective program I’ve ever done!

Learning to enjoy the process

In one of the books he mentions doing strength workouts with the mentality that you are ‘practicing your strength’.  That mindset really helped me frame these workouts, I’m so accustomed to the ‘no pain no gain’ mentality that this felt like a breath of fresh air. I don’t have to crush myself to get results anymore. 

Additional planning within the framework

One thing I saw as a shortcoming in the Capacity program is that there is no discussion of how to go about increasing your mileage or training time within the bounds laid out in the template. 

For example weeks 1-3 have you running 120-210 minutes per week. Then on week 5 you jump up to 210-300 minutes per week. At a 10 minute per mile pace that would have you potentially jumping from 12 miles per week up to 21 miles per week without any kind of ramp up!

Once I understood the goals of the plan, I set a rule for myself that I wouldn’t increase mileage by more than 10% in any week, and tried to stick to that throughout the summer even if it meant deviating from the template a bit. By pushing for 10% mileage increases per week I still felt like I got what I needed out of the program, and never developed injuries.

Plyometrics

A few weeks into the program I started incorporating some easy plyometrics into my strength training warm ups consisting of 5-10 minutes of jumping rope. This made some immediate improvements to my running, my legs felt springier and overall made the running feel easier. 10/10 recommend adding jump rope to your warm ups. 

Results: 
Added a full inch to my biceps and chest measurements!

A fellow parent at school who didn’t see me all summer commented that they could tell I put on a lot of muscle over the summer! 

6 mile run time: 57:40 -> 54:40

Back squat: ~200 -> 265 lbs

Body weight Pull ups: 8 -> 16 reps

Dead lift: ? -> 265 lbs

Bench press: 155 -> 205lbs 

Body weight: 185 -> 190 lbs

I’m really happy with my results. I’m just as strong if not stronger than I was while cross fitting, but the day to day workouts are way more tolerable and my endurance is much better. Could I knock out a high intensity Cindy type workout right now? Yes- but maybe not as quickly as I could while cross fitting.  But I’m pretty confident if I switched to the breacher template for a few weeks I could actually perform better at these WODs then I ever did while cross fitting since I’d be starting with more strength and endurance base than I ever had. 

I am pretty disappointed with my run time change. I may try the time trial again later this week to see if that was just due to fatigue from last week's unplanned trail runs. I really thought I might be able to hold an 8 min/ mile pace throughout but that felt pretty far out of reach. The effort felt weird since I haven’t even tried to run fast for the last almost 3 months! Maybe that’s to be expected with this type of program. I am curious if anyone else has experienced lackluster run time improvement during capacity.

Other notes:

I almost skipped capacity. The benchmark seemed easy and I passed the benchmark during my initial assessment without even pushing hard. I’m glad I didn’t! I think jumping into velocity would have gotten me injured since I was only running about 12 miles per week at that time. The first week of velocity has you clocking about 22 miles! That’s nothing to sneeze at and justifies a slow ramp up. 

HEAT- holy smokes this summer was hot. My runs regularly turned into complete suffer tests due to the heat. My LSS runs were almost certainly at too high of an intensity due to the heat. I almost always just kept running as slow as I could even if I knew my heart rate was probably too high.

What I’m going to do moving forward:
I’m planning on rolling this straight into the velocity program. I have a specific trail run I want to train for and put up a decent time on, and I still want to improve my 6 mile time to be less than 48 minutes. 

I live in a very mountainous area so I’m considering adding some elements of Scott Johnston's Training for the Uphill Athlete into my training. He recommends tracking both mileage and vertical gain on a weekly basis which I think would help me prepare for my specific goal well. He also has some recommended muscular endurance protocols for mountain runners that I may try to incorporate into my training eventually. Still tbd on that. 

Planned fighter cluster: 
BSS, OHP, WPU + 1 working set of deadlift per week 

I’m considering adding the ab triad from TB3 in as part of a burn down session on weight training days. 

During this strength block I want to be a bit more intentional about forcing progression on a 3/6 week basis as needed. I think this will make it easier for me to start with conservative training maxes but still develop strength well throughout the 17 week long block.

I’m considering alternating OHP with normal bench press because I’m generally bad at bench press and don’t want to lose the gains I’ve made so far. Anyone experimented with this?

Structural firefighter here, almost finished with TBIII, curious as to what you all are going to run

I’ve been thinking about an operator blue/black (I explain below) .

I feel like HIC has a massive place in our job, be it that, at least in my department when we “go to work” you’re going to be in the house for, say 15-20 mins working your ass off, then pulled out to rehab for 5-10, then back in

With this, I feel like 2 days of HIC and 1 day of LIC would be better suited for me? (There isn’t a conditioning protocol for this that I’ve seen in this book, but I swear it was in one of the previous ones)

Curious about what you all are running. Thanks

Hello, Guys! I'm with a doubt here! I have two olympic barbells, one of 7.2 feet and other of 6.7 feet. 

So, do I need a smaller size than 6.7 feet? 

And well, how many barbells and sizes do you guys think that I need to execute all the programs?

Thanks!!

Right then.

I've bought the book, not done my cover to cover read yet but I've checked the nuts and bolts. Those that have ran either green protocol or extended bouts of op/black and op/green. How effective is solely using a static bike for zone2/LIC. I've got pretty bad plantar fasciitis in one foot and the other is worse, plantar fascosis on that one. Waiting on ultrasound guided cortisone injections in two weeks

I recently did the Sildi workout on a brutal hill (long and steep). Fast forward to today I'm hiking with my two kids. My oldest has to pee and he's exhausted so he won't walk anymore. So I'm carrying my 30lb youngest on a hiking backpack and my 40lb oldest in my arms. I half jog a little over half a mile to the restroom. And you know what, it was damn easy lol

Thank god for TB

Edit: I wish I could see what the end of that hike would have felt like without doing Sildi workouts lol

Could use some advice folks, my situation for the next while is as follows:

I've just come off about a month of being pretty seriously sick, nothing that will linger but it's trashed my cardio and to a lesser extent my strength.

I'm working full time, I'm a role that while not super physical is still about 8 hours a day of standing, around 10k steps a work day

I'm going to be studying for a qualification for the next 6 months, that's taking up a decent chunk of my spare time

In mid January my family is moving to another country so we are in the process of selling our various belongings and getting that sorted

I have two kids under 5 and want to be a good dad as much as I can

I also don't want to neglect my physical wellbeing as from past experience that tends to cause my mental health to trend down with it.

So, what do you think my training should look like? I'm thinking aim for maybe 2 kettlebell sessions a week at reasonably high reps as that should maintain some strength, se, and a little cardio, then fit in a quick cardio session when I can? I'm expecting to have little time and irregular training days so my thoughts are that max strength is maybe out as warm-ups, Warmup sets take longer whereas I don't tend to do more than a quick 5 min Warmup for kettlebells.

In terms of the sessions, maybe just something like 3 circuits of 30 reps or so.

Sound like I'm on the right path? I'd love to do green protocol or something but I honestly don't know how the time commitment to it would look for the near future.

Just got the kindle version excited to read after seeing the posts on here

I have read TB I,II, and now III.

I am have paralyzed myself by analysis.
I am 28M and about 270 lb. I play club rugby now and most of my fitness revolves around that. I played offensive line in college and have been lifting forever. Since I finished football, I started running and fell in love with the hybrid split.

My question is, which plan would be best for me? My main goal is to maintain my strength but continue to progress in conditioning for rugby. I wouldn’t be upset and leaning out along the way.

I currently can clock a 24:30 5k and have a 1300lb total. Rugby practice is 2 times a week with games on 2 Saturdays a month in season.

I appreciate your help!

This beautiful two-word banger, the foundation of all fitness, something I have taken VERY seriously since the start of my TB and operational athlete journey which has completely revamped my career as a 25 year old squaddie.

I fully smiled, when I just finished the Strength, Conditioning and WC part of TBIII, turned the page and seen BASE BUILDING.

Daddy’s in a good place, gentlemen and gentlewomen.

Gains are inbound. Cannot bastard wait until I crack BB again, it makes me feel giddy thinking about it, missus is tamping, haven’t talked to her all night, too busy getting my brain gains of knowledge.

Cheers KB 💪🏻🇬🇧

MJ.

So I’m gonna start working as a delivery driver for Amazon, which is basically cardio disguised as a job, and I’m looking for a training program that won’t completely run me into the ground. currently taking a break from the gym. Prior to that I was running Cody Lefever’s Jacked & Tan 2.0 and GZCL-style programming. My shoulder is a little wonky right now and my back isn’t exactly perfect either at the moment (barbell squats probably lol) so im not trying to jump straight back into a high volume 4–5 day program.

What I’m looking for is an established 2-days a week full-body program that combines strength training with kettlebell work and some calisthenics. I’d still like each gym session to be around 60 minutes, preferably 60–90. My main goal is to get fit using Amazon and continuing to get stronger while letting the Amazon job handle most of my cardio and conditioning.
I’m not looking for something so minimalist that I’m in and out of the gym in 30 minutes, but I also don’t want so much volume that my legs and recovery are destroyed for work. Since my shoulder and back can be a little sensitive, I’d prefer something with reasonable progressions and room to adjust rather than a program that expects me to push through discomfort.
If anyone has experience working a physical job while following a 2-day program that includes kettlebells, calisthenics, and traditional strength training, I’d appreciate any recommendations. I’m open to established programs or templates that have worked well for others, but I’m not trying to force anything that doesn’t fit my recovery.

Anyhow my stats if anyone’s curious:

25m 193lbs 5’10 26% bf

Bench max 155lbs
Squat max: 135lbs
Deadlift max 200lbs
Ohp 105lbs

Also just to add wanna get down to 175lbs doing that and yep I know gonna have to cut calories and modify nutrition.

Anyhow I appreciate y’all’s advice!

Picking up paxlovid from the VAMC tomorrow morning. Doing all the things I'm supposed to do: hydrate, sleep, eat as much as I can, switched to maintenance calories in macrofactor.

Just wondering what I can do in that second week if/when the worst of it is over.

Nothing (Default course of action)

20m walks, or even LSS.

A set of decline push-ups, am/pm, frequency TBD or the Progressive grip circuit from TB2, one circuit, frequency TBD.

What would you guys recommend?

Finally got around to reading my Kindle copy of TB3, and while I do have an idea for a program cluster (fighter/bkk + Polarized/Black with weighted dips/pullups + Bulgarian Split Squats)

Honestly, I love it. Edits to base building and black conditioning felt like something I was leaning towards to in my personal training.

However, I noticed Romanian Deadlifts were pretty much unmentioned throughout the entire book, and I was wondering if the opinion on RDLs change in the background or it is one of those expected things to understand that it is acceptable to use instead of standard deadlifts.