High Intensity Continuous Training
Resisted aerobic conditioning for Law Enforcement and Soldiers
The last article hammered the importance aerobic training. I have found many people believe that “conditioning” or “Aerobic” equals running, biking, interpretive dance, etc. Due to this misconception, I will describe a method that does not fit those categories above. In a future article I will review the importance of more traditional “road work,” but I want you to realize what else is out there first.
Joel Jamieson made “High Intensity Continuous Training” (HICT) popular about a decade+ ago in The Ultimate Guide to MMA Conditioning. I used it extensively in my prep before entering the military and later for Ranger School. Mike Robertson has also borrowed this method from Joel, and has an outstanding article on this topic here.
I read about HICT years before entering the military and because I am an idiot I never used it. I just didn’t see the value. At that time I thought high intensity intervals were the answer to everything. That was the era we were in.
When I decided to enlist on an Army Ranger contract, I read some of Craig Weller’s training articles and later hired him for my prep. Craig is former Navy SOF and is an outstanding coach. This was when I first saw a combination of strength and energy system training I had never even thought of, nor did I realize the power of these different methods for training the aerobic system. Like I stated in earlier articles, training for team sports and the like is different than training for SOF selections.
I put some trust into Craig’s experiences. Some of it stuck and some of it just didn’t seem to be that beneficial for me. The huge take away for me was I realized training the aerobic system doesn’t have to make you look like a marathon runner or make you weak. I will describe a method both in Joel’s book and what Craig had me do that was extremely effective. I later tweaked this method just a bit for other applications.
HICT Step Ups/Sled
HICT has one use a high load/resistance and continuously repeat a movement pattern while staying under your anaerobic threshold. This requires patience, as your heart rate will spike when you first try this. Especially if you are not aerobically fit yet. For most, that means keeping your HR around 150 bpm, then maybe in time when you are in better shape let it climb to 160 bpm for the duration of your set. If you go any higher, you are now probably doing anaerobic threshold work. Which isn’t a bad thing but not what we are trying to achieve here. We can talk about that method later and it’s implementation. Remember: build the engine first before throwing on the fancy exhaust system.
A practical movement for this method that will impact your conditioning, hone your ability to safely ruck long distances, and train bouts of repeated power: The step-up. This can be loaded with light dumbbells, weight vest, rucksack, back pack, or any combination. If this new to you, I would suggest starting with your body weight.
Find a step. In your home this could be on your porch or deck, or even a bottom step on a stair case. In a gym setting it could be a low box. Park benches work if you aren’t concerned with looking like a psycho in public.
Don’t make this a super high step up. When starting out, measure to around the height of your knee. When you execute the movement, you will step up on the box forcefully, then drive the opposite knee up like you are kneeing someone in the face. Return and repeat with the opposite leg. Your goal is to rhythmically execute the movement like you are on a metronome (about every 5 seconds or so) for the duration of the set. At first, I would recommend 5-10 minutes. You can do multiple sets, later working up to sets as long as 20 minutes. You could also drag or push a sled following the same parameters. Take good strides and make every step forceful.
I would recommend doing this while wearing a heart rate monitor. For most this will be humbling at first. Keep your heart rate around 150 bpm-155 bpm, and when it goes higher slow down or even stop for a moment. Then return to the set. Don’t add time, your body needs a chance to adapt. In a few weeks you’ll smash through it without stopping.
What are we doing here besides scaring people at the park? In the simplest terms we are teaching our working muscles to generate force over time while staying aerobic. Like I discussed earlier, the longer we stay aerobic as we generate force, the better. Once we start to become more glycolitic everything becomes more finite. Worth noting from the last article, if we do hit those higher intensity zones, it will be the aerobic system that helps us recover. HICT is still in an aerobic training method, therefore we are training this quality.
In these examples we are also using low impact modalities. This typically keeps people’s joints healthier as we work into higher volumes (great for soldier/cop with some city miles on them, or heavier fat loss clients), and has less impact on recovery depending on volume.
HICT Circuit Method
A variation of HICT I surprisingly have not seen is using this method as a circuit. I apologize if it’s out there I just personally haven’t seen it. Myself and others I’ve worked with have had great results combining the concept above with different loaded movements while being cognizant of heart rate.
To stay within the parameters above, you have to keep the reps low, five or below depending on the movement. Example:
All completed with moderate load:
3-5 KB Swings
1-5 KB Goblet Squats
1-5 Hand Release Push Ups
1-5 Inverted Rows
This needs to be done at pace where you keep moving, but not so fast that this turns into a crossfit style throw yourself down a flight of stairs workout. Do your swings, take a moment (5 seconds or so), do your squats, move to the floor for push ups, saunter over to the bar or rings and do your rows, check heart rate, OK I am right at 150-155 bpm, repeat again until timer goes off at 10 minutes.
Complete each movement with some speed/power, and keep moving unless you need to slow down due to your heart rate or your form is suffering. If you aren’t ready for something like this, you can separate the movements. Do the swings and Goblet Squats at first, then do a separate timed set for the upper body work. Or combine lower and upper body movements. Choose your own adventure. If you do it that way, this starts to look a bit like Charles Staley’s Escalating Density Training (EDT) protocols from the early 2000s, which was not really seen as a conditioning method.
Next article we will discuss alactic training and why it complements methods like HICT, and later we will talk about how to combine everything into a training block.
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