Train like a soldier
This article is dedicated to the legionnaires I met when I was a Foreign Legion military instructor and to my grand father, former legionnaire. The ideas are personal and can’t be considered as part of the military doctrine.

For some demanding jobs, soldier for example, being in shape is mandatory. Physical activity is crucial all year-round to stay operational. Most likely you are not a soldier and you don’t want to push your training as far as they do. However, there are some concepts they developed that could be useful to your practice.
Be and last
The objective of military physical training is to maintain soldiers active so they can continue to fulfill their duty for as for many years as possible. This job requires strength, endurance, agility and resistance in tough conditions.
The motto « Be and last » combines the main features that are specific to military training:
- Objectif — Being functional and efficient
- Method — Rusticity and demanding nature
- Human — From the group to the individual
Objectif — Being functional and efficient
There is two objectives related to the physical training in the army. The first one to maintain the troops operational.
To fulfill their duty, the soldiers must be able to walk long distance carrying their gear, climb a wall, swim wearing clothes and sleep outside. All of that in a tropical jungle, arid desert or snowy mountains.
Specific trainings like running with army boots and obstacle course (on the land or in the water) are implemented to reproduce these situations. Military training inspired most of the popular obstacle races.
Learning: Adapt your training to make it functional.
Second objective is to assess the physical level of each soldiers based on the same tests run each year. It gives a baseline to compare the physical evolution through the years on specific criteria (strength, endurance, agility).
Learning: Define your objectives and implement the relevant tests to measure their completion.
Method — Rusticity and demanding nature
Rusticity is an important feature of the military physical training. I like to define it as comfort in discomfort. To swim in a lake during winter, do push ups in the mud and run in the woods carrying a trunk with the boys are different ways to develop rusticity of soldiers.
Technology is everywhere in the fitness game. But sometimes it is good to forget about the connected watch, over-equipped gym, gloves or belt and go back to a simpler training with no accessories. Working on our rusticity develops our mental strength to push further our the training.
Learning: Discover comfort in discomfort.
Common image that people have of military physical training is an instructor yelling at an exhausted soldier. The reality is very different from it. Instructors are exercise professionals passionate about exercise. Usually soldiers don’t need them to push the training hard and go beyond their limit.
Learning: Push your limits back.
From the group to the individual
The army is build upon the notion of group. If the group is strong, the individual strength is not that important anymore. That is why the military physical training integrates the concept of group effort with tests that require the soldiers to join forces in order to pass them.
Learning: If you want to go fast, walk alone. If you want to go far, walk together.
Physical training teaches how to manage the effort, the recovery and to overcome some fears (height for me). To « last and be », the soldiers learn how to train around an injury in order to stay operational all year round. They need to know when to decrease the training volume and intensity to recover. It is not always easy and sometimes requires a paradigm shift from training warrior to self-regulated athlete.
When I was a soldier, I suffered from several tendonitis (tensor fasciae latae and Achille’s tendon). They were a burden and sometimes limited my physical abilities. I trained too hard on small injuries because I wanted to push my physical limits back instead of training around my injuries to stay active without aggravating the situation.
Learning: Self-regulate and know when to push yourself or recover.
Overview
The motto « be and last » guides the military physical training in order to stay operational all year-round. It is built on a clear objective and appropriate methods at group and individual levels.
6 learnings from the military physical training:
- Adapt your training to make it functional.
- Define your objectives and implement the relevant tests to measure their completion.
- Discover comfort in discomfort.
- Push your limits back.
- If you want to go fast, walk alone. If you want to go far, walk together.
- Self-regulate and know when to push yourself or recover.
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M.
