For those of you who aren’t aware, there is an Airborne & Special Operations Museum located in Fayetteville, North Carolina. This gallery of photos was taken during a recent visit by the Soldier Systems Daily and Tactical Fanboy crews, and it gives you a taste of what the museum has to offer. We recommend that everyone visits if they have the chance.
WWII
Korean War
Vietnam War
Panama
Modern Era
Battle of Mogadishu Special Exhibit
During last week’s Warrior West we were introduced to Klim Tactical and their new Vigilant FR motorcyclist suit. In this short video, Peter Jensen offers a short introduction to the brand.
There was a lot of new kit at Warrior West but this is certainly something that stuck out.
Violent Little Machine Shop’s Toe Tag Luggage ID acts as the perfect luggage identification tag, with none of the unfortunate implications of a real toe tag, such as announcing one’s untimely demise. Made from American leather, the Toe Tag Luggage ID is double sided, with the opposite side featuring the VLMS logo. The tag is fully secured by steel cable and grommet.
www.violentlittle.com/collections/patches/products/toe-tag-luggage-id
Earlier this week Magpul announced their new M-LOK attachment system for mounting accessories to rails. The list of manufacturers adopting the system has really taken off, thanks in part to the ongoing NRA Annual Meeting in Indianapolis, Indiana. I’m happy to see several of my favorites on the list.
Recently I had a good friend go through a serious health crisis. This is a buddy that I’ve known since the 2nd grade and when I joined the Marine Corps, he became a firefighter. As I came up the ranks, he did also. Eventually he became a Battalion Chief in our city’s fire dept. Now my friend was an athlete in HS, but as he got older he rarely did any serious PT, nor did he watch his weight. He wasn’t a smoker, or seriously overweight, but one day not to long ago he went in for some minor chest pains and it was found that he had a seriously damaged heart value. In fact it was so serious, that he had to immediately have major open heart surgery and was medically retired from the fire dept. Within a few weeks, his career as a firefighter was over at age 54.
His family had no known history of this type of problem, but sadly his occupation does. When I was doing research for my book “Corps Strength”, I consulted many friends I had in Law Enforcement and Firefighters about their physical fitness needs, and I was surprised to find out that more firefighters died on duty from heart attacks than from any other reason. The life of a firefighter is hard, not just in the fact that they may be burned, suffocated or have a structure fall on them, but from the irregular work shift and sleep patterns, and the constant instant stress (alarm mentality) when responding to fire calls. If you combine that with being out of shape over many years, can cause serious physical issues, like my friend is dealing with now. I’m not a doctor, and I’m not trying to preach like one. However I do believe that a simple, consistent routine of balanced physical training, and a good diet of healthy foods goes a long way to preventing these problems. Exercise is a proven stress reliever and we know its positive effect on maintaining a healthy weight and heart.
My friend had successful surgery and is now slowly on the mend, however he could have easily become a statistic. His doctor told him that if he hadn’t come in for a checkup when he did, he would have probably been on a fire call and then without warning, suffered a massive heart attack and died on the spot. My friend and all other 1st Responders spend their lives helping others, but the bottom line is they also need to take some time taking care of themselves. After everything they do for us, they deserve it. Be safe always, good when you can.
Semper Fi
MGunz
Defoor Proformance climbing prep/ PRT prep pull up workout
This is a simple routine designed for use during the workweek with sat/sun off. I came up with this over the years to help guys pass certain PT tests and to prep for mountain excursions. If you perform this work out for a minimum of four weeks you’ll gain at least five reps on your max pull-ups. Once you are able to perform 15 dead hang pull-ups at any time start using the modification piece of the work out for Tuesdays and Thursdays. This will get you to the magical 20 rep place quicker. Once you can do 20 clean, dead hang, no kipping, palm away pull-ups you can go back to the normal Monday, Wednesday, Friday routine and you will maintain 20 pull-ups for as long as you want to.
First, it is extremely important to have the correct grip when you begin this routine. A lot of people have too wide grip when they do pull-ups. Look at any gymnast, professional climber, or anyone who does over 20 reps and they do not have an extreme wide grip. The ideal grip is just slightly wider than shoulder width and palms always facing away. This will also reduce any possibility of injuries due to over training or lack of proper rest.
Second, begin this routine with absolutely no kipping whatsoever. It has become commonplace lately in many exercise regimens to introduce kipping to the pull-up to make people feel better about the number of reps they can perform. All this does is give a false sense of one’s true strength.
Third, know your math when it comes to pull-up pyramids. For example; a pyramid of five is a total of 25 pull-ups, a pyramid of six is a total of 36 pull-ups. Simply multiply the top number by itself to find how many pull-ups are in that pyramid.
Fourth, the most ideal bar is between 2.5 and 2.75″ inches in diameter. Anything smaller is width causes too much hand and low forearm grip strength which can result in an overuse type injury or reduced total rep numbers. One of the best places to find a good bar is on any public or city playground, like Hannibal does.
Lastly, Monday’s workout was not invented by me but by United States Marine Corps Maj. Chuck Armstrong. Years ago I used his complete routine but I found it to be a little bit of overtraining with some individuals and myself. Also, I found the modifications that I made for Wednesday and Fridays workouts to work better for myself and others that I have been mostly around in the past 10 years. Major Armstrong’s complete pull up routine can be found here: http://www.ososb.com/documents/Armstrong_Pull-Up_workout_Program.pdf
The routine
Monday – from USMC Maj. Chuck Armstrong (if you don’t know you should) – 5 max sets of pull-ups with 90 seconds rest in between. My addition- Add up the total reps for the five sets you performed and find the closest pyramid to your total without going over and this will be the pyramid you will perform on Friday.
Wednesday – using 60% (round low for half numbers) of your max number of current pull-ups (set 1 from Mondays workout), do this number all day until you reach 100 total pull-ups.
Friday – pyramid of pull-ups with 10 seconds of rest between sets for each rep done in that set. start pyramid with your 60% number (ex.- if your 60% number is 10, you do a set of 10 first. This takes care of sets 1,2,3, and 4 of a traditional pyramid, your next set would be 5, then 6, 7, etc.
Modified workout additions (once you can do 15 pull-ups):
Tuesday – hang for 1 min, rest 1 min, repeat for 3 total hangs of 1 min
Thursday – using the number that is 75% of your max (set 1 from Monday) do that number of pull-ups 3-5 times throughout the day.
20 pull-ups is a great place to be.
V/R,
Kyle Defoor
“Trainer of Feeders”
Kyle Defoor is one of the world’s most committed and passionate shooting instructors. Literally growing up with a gun in hand he took his talents into the military where he was combat decorated as a SEAL assaulter and sniper. Kyle helped to create and define modern training while along the way personally teaching thousands of military personal and civilians from around the globe. His shooting prowess led to appearances on multiple TV shows including Shooting Gallery, Tactical Arms, and Tactical Impact, and guest appearances on History Channel. Kyle’s outdoor athletic lifestyle includes shooting, ultra running, stand-up paddle surfing and climbing. He now serves as the brand ambassador for Mission Ready Equipment and runs his own company which offers tactical training, wilderness navigation, TV and film consulting, and motivational speaking.
Gunfighter Moment is a weekly feature brought to you by Alias Training & Security Services. Each week Alias brings us a different Trainer and in turn they offer some words of wisdom.
The Oneiros Valley USMC Pack Modification Kit is designed as an upgrade or repair kit for the FILBE pack. The kit consists of two components: the Top Buckle Adapters and the Quick Release Adapters.
The Top Buckle Adapters replace the existing load lifter buckles on the Shoulder Harness Assembly.
The Quick Release Adapters replace non-NIR-compliant and improperly sized quick release straps. The snap fasteners feature a NIR-compliant polymer cap, providing superior wear resistance and infrared reflectance over the standard enamel coating.
The Kit is made from solution-dyed nylon webbing, ITW Nexus hardware, NIR-compliant snap fastener, and T-90 nlon thread. Components can be purchased individually or as a complete package.
Available in Coyote Brown. Berry Amendment compliant.
oneirosvalley.com/products/filbe-mods
(EO)2 or Easy On, Easy Off is an extremely rigid industrial fastener that allows for secure attachment of gear without the use of straps, cords, or U-bolts. (EO)2 consists of two mating rails that “snap” together. (EO)2 offers both individual “SnapTop” rails and bottom rails in various sizes to allow the end user to modify their own gear and/or vehicles with the attachment system.
Also available are SnapTopCarriers, crush resistant, water resistant hard cases pre-configured with the SnapTop rail, with or without foam or dividers.
(EO)2 offers a unique harness system that allows for individuals to carry either the SnapTopCarriers or their own modified gear on their person in a secure fashion.
There is even an (EO)2 system designed for securely attaching firearms with picatinny rails to walls or inside vehicles.
