Physical Training As A Prep

Physical training and being fit takes time and effort, no two ways about it.  How much time and how much effort? Is it worth the payback?  In this podcast, Salty and I talk it over.  We’re not physicians or physical trainers, so don’t take these as prescriptions, but we both have some relevant experience and I have a professional background in human function, in sickness and in health.

There are two main reasons why it might be worth a prepper’s time and effort to start training to get/stay fit. We talk about them in this accompanying podcast on physical training for preppers.

The best health prep is prepping not to need health care.

I can’t think of a single emergency situation of the type preppers prepare for where health care becomes easier to get.  Having your life depend on getting high quality care might well be a death sentence in fact.  Of the leading causes of death and disability in the U.S., exercise is strongly protective against so many that it has often been called  the most effective and least used prescription in America.  In fact, some physicians have actually started literally prescribing it — to the benefit of their patients (1,2)

Cardiovascular fitness and/or regular exercises strongly reduces risks of heart disease, hypertension, diabetes mellitus, depression, Alzheimer’s disease, stroke, etc.  All of these conditions require a lot of medical support and provoke a lot of disability.  Do you want them at all, much less under conditions when medical care might evaporate or your survival might depend on your physical capability?

How much do training you need, and what kind?

To reduce risk of all those nasty chronic diseases, cardiovascular fitness is the most important; anything (other than yelling at the tv) that raises your heart rate regularly.  (Regularly is kind of important here, folks.  Big snowstorms don’t cause a spike in heart attacks because shoveling snow is dangerous, but because shoveling a lot of snow occasionally is dangerous.  The usual sedentary habits lead the person to the edge of the heart disease cliff, then the sudden effort kicks them over the edge.)

How much training?  It’s an individual answer, but there are some guidelines:

1. Any is better than none.  Fifteen minutes a day shows better results than none, to be specific.  It doesn’t matter if it’s all done in one go either; three brisk ten minute walks a day (Hey Fido, Go For Walk??) do as much good as half an hour on the treadmill (yawn).
2. More is better, until it isn’t.  What’s too much?  Frankly, few people have this problem.  Overuse injuries or a constant, wrung-out washrag kind of tiredness are hints.
3. Intervals (go very hard for a short time, rest, repeat) are more effective than an equal time spent at a moderate pace (but if you hate intervals and won’t do them, the moderate pace is still really valuable).  People new to intervals often do 20 seconds on, 10 rest.

What kind of training?  The kind you’ll do, first and foremost.  Everyone benefits from cardiovascular exercise because it strengthens the heart, encourages you to build more red blood cells, and makes the blood vessels more pliable so you’re less likely to run high blood pressure.  It also makes you use sugars better, reducing the chance of diabetes.

Strength training (such as weight lifting) helps keep muscles and bones strong.  The bone thing is very important for women; we don’t tend to have as much bone mass as men (they cheat by having testosterone) and getting fragile bones late in life causes a lot of fractures and disability in older women.

The other main reason to be fit:  To be able to handle emergencies

Do your plans to Get Out of Dodge involve walking, perhaps with a pack (or a toddler?) . Do your plans for keeping warm or cooking involve cutting or carrying wood?  How about getting water after the in-house storage runs out?  Based on the popularity of web gear among some preppers, I assume they expect to be defending hearth and home by running around with their trusty weapons and full load-out of ammo, plus radio and med kit.  Do you see yourself doing that?

Scenario:  The Stuff has Hit the Fan, and you’re bugging out.  You’ve got your carefully considered, ultra-useful pack.  Your plan is to make fifteen miles a day.  You go to sling the pack over your shoulder… and put your back out.  How’s the rest of this story go?

Needs are not mechanisms.  Not ever.  The fact that your plan requires you to walk miles with a pack doesn’t mean you can do it.  Not even if other people can do it, and you could do it when you were younger, and you really Need to do it.  Injuries are way more common in the unfit than the fit when both have to get physical (and of course the fit have a lot more staying power).  Even if you make those first fifteen miles, how about the next day when every muscle screams as soon as you try to move, or your knees are tender and swollen from the unaccustomed use?

So this is Part II of the How Much? and What Kind? questions:  If your plans call for any physical effort, it’s your job as a prepper to make sure you’re physically capable of fulfiling the plan.  That may take some combination of changing you and changing the plan.  For example, if we can’t drive to The Place (our bug-out location if we can’t bug-in), Salty and I plan to ride our bikes (bicycles, not motorcycles) with panniers.  Walking would be a bad plan for us, as Salty’s repaired knees might not get that far; but we establish every summer that we can both bike that far.

If you’re not in shape to carry out your plan, the coolness of your web gear doesn’t matter.  It’s not a plan at that point, it’s a daydream.  We’re preppers; it’s on us to be ready for real.

Bonuses:

1. Getting fit is a completely stealthy prep.  People will totally believe you’re doing it because it will do you good right now, not in some zombie apocalypse.
2. They’re right, it Will do you good right now.  Although chronic diseases are more manageable with modern medical care, being healthy is much nicer.
3. It’s essentially free.  While gym memberships can make getting fit easier, there are plenty of methods that require little or no cash.  Brisk walking, with or without pack (I tell people I’m training for a hike with a friend to normalize it), walking or jogging stairs, body weight exercises, jumping rope, resistance bands and more all work.

1) Exercise is Still the Best Medicine. (2014) Harvard Heart Letter.  Harvard Health Publishing. https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/exercise-is-still-the-best-medicine

2) Jes Bak Sørensen, Thomas Skovgaard & Lis Puggaard (2009) Exercise on prescription in general practice: A systematic review, Scandinavian Journal of Primary Health Care, 24:2, 69-74, DOI: 10.1080/02813430600700027