SEAL candidates commonly have the mistaken belief that Hell Week and BUD/S are all about physical strength. Actually, it's as much mental as it is physical. Trainees just decide that they are too cold, too sandy, too sore or too tired to go on.
Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL (BUD/S) training is notoriously difficult, with an attrition rate hovering at between 70 percent and 85 percent for enlisted and over 90 percent for officers, thus making it one of the most selective special operations pipelines in the U.S. military.
Mental toughness and resilience is a key quality in athletes that are revered and successful in their chosen sport. The US Navy SEALs resilience is renowned, they are some of the most mentally tough people in the world.
BUD/S consists of a three-week orientation followed by three phases, covering physical conditioning (seven weeks), combat diving (seven weeks), and land warfare (seven weeks) respectively. Officer and enlisted personnel go through the same training program.
Hell Week is a right of passage for all Navy SEALs. It is the hardest week of the hardest training program in the U.S. military, Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL (BUD/S) training. It always falls during First Phase of BUD/S — in the modern era, anyway — though it has moved around a bit within First Phase.
To qualify for BUD/S training, candidates must complete: A 1000-meter swim, with fins, in 22 minutes or less. At least 70 push-ups in two minutes.
Complete with squats, lunges, pull-ups, push-ups, sit-ups, and other abdominal exercises, I would PT at least 4-5 times a week. I focused on the upper body three days and the lower body twice weekly. You cannot go wrong with whatever you choose for your sport. Do a sport because you like the sport.
You only get three chances with most events. If you fail three of anything, you will be back in the fleet. Related Navy Special Operations articles: Navy SEAL Fitness Preparation.
BUD/S is a 6-month SEAL training course held at the Naval Special Warfare Training Center in Coronado, CA. You'll start with five weeks Indoctrination and Pre-Training as part of a Navy SEAL Class, then go through the Three Phases of BUD/S. First Phase is the toughest.
Although the Marines are highly respected and considered one of the most elite fighting forces, the Navy SEALs training is far more rigorous and demanding than that of the Marines.
According to the article, the SEALs are fearless because of the training they undergo. Their secret is what psychologist call habituation. This simply means the more you're exposed to something that you initially fear, they less it will fear you and eventually you become immune to it. You get used to it.
The SEAL teams have faced criticism for decades, both from outsiders and their own Navy leadership, that their selection course, known as Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL training or BUD/S, is too difficult, too brutal, and too often causes concussions, broken bones, dangerous infections and near-drownings.
First Phase (Basic Conditioning)
First Phase is nine weeks in length. Continued physical conditioning in the areas of running, swimming and calisthenics grow increasingly harder as the weeks progress.
Students get a taste of marksmanship, demolitions, patrolling, and small unit tactics, which they all have to put together during a final exercise. Graduating BUD/S doesn't make someone a SEAL, however. The follow-on SEAL Qualification Training (SQT) course still claims candidates.
If you are in another service branch, you have to join the Navy to go to BUD/S. There is no such thing as joining the Marine Corps, then going to the BUD/S program. You can join the Marines, but you have to get out of the Marines and join the Navy to go to BUD/S.
In this grueling five-and-a-half day stretch, each candidate sleeps only about four total hours but runs more than 200 miles and does physical training for more than 20 hours per day.
People well beyond their teens seek military service. There are age limits in the military for a reason, but even for the SEAL training program, the window to attend Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL training (BUD/S) is from 17-28 years.
' You get 4 hours of sleep. You're not allowed to have any caffeine. Throughout the entire week, you're hungry, you're cold, you're sandy, you're wet, just the lack of sleep. Constantly getting pushed harder and harder.”
BUD/S prep is a six- to eight-week course where you will be rebuilt to perform at the expected levels of BUD/S standards. You will take more PSTs, an advanced PST with a longer swim (800 and 1000 meters with fins), longer run (four miles timed), along with weightlifting, sprints and agility testing events.
Initial BUD/S recruits are required to build up to a 16-mile-per-week running regimen. This is a nine-week program that begins with running 2 miles a day at an 8:30 pace, for three days a week. This continues for the first two weeks, with a week of rest. Week four increases this amount to 3 miles a day.
Class 295 is now in BUD/S 2nd Phase. Here is a glimpse of what they are going through. For more training videos, photos and information, visit www.sealswcc.com.
Average: 55-74 push-ups. Good: 75-99 push-ups. Excellent: 100-110 push-ups. Extraordinary: 111 or more.
If you want to be a Navy SEAL, you have to be able to do this: 20 pullups, more than 100 pushups in two minutes and a 500-yard swim in under nine minutes. And that's all before Hell Week, the grueling Navy SEAL test that consists of 120 hours of virtually nonstop training on fewer than four hours of sleep.