Hi, I’m a 22 year old woman and I’m training to become a US Navy SEAL. How should a woman prepare for BUD/S (US Navy SEAL training)? Do you have any advice for preparation? What books or websites would you recommend? There’s never been a female SEAL.
SEAL candidates have to run 40-70 miles per week on sand, run 4 miles in 30 minutes weekly, swim 2 miles in 75 minutes in Scuba fins weekly, carry boats/logs, do rucking with heavy gear, complete an O-course weekly, etc.
According to what some BUD/S dropouts told me, one female SEAL candidate broke her legs in Basic Orientation (BO) which is the first two weeks of SEAL training, another female SEAL candidate broke her legs in BUD/S Prep (the school that prepares you for SEAL training) and a third female SEAL candidate got rolled back in BO for stress fractures. None of them made it.
According to the SEALSWCC Scout Team, most female SEAL candidates struggle with load bearing and just don’t have enough durability. Women have weaker bones and tendons than men, studies have shown that women develop stress fractures 3x more often than men. Do you have any advice for becoming more durable? zz0.k13efn392zazz
Hi there,
Sounds like a really impressive goal you’re working towards!
I don’t know that either of us can confidently recommend any particular websites or books on this, as neither of us have any experience with BUD/S or training Navy Seals for this directly.
Obviously it requires building an enormous base of physical capacity, which will require working up to large volumes of aerobic training across various modalities, but also requires a significant amount of strength development.
I don’t think that the fundamental principles for the strength component necessarily change from our usual recommendations just because someone is a woman, or is training for BUD/S, so the strength training component here is arguably the simpler part. We do have a multi-part article series on resistance training for endurance athletes in general, which may provide a decent start although it is probably not a perfect fit for the BUD/S context. The other content we have put out relating to strength training programming on the website/YouTube/podcast, and concepts around progressive loading, will all be important as well.
Regarding the stress fractures, injury risk, etc., – that is primarily a consideration of overall loading compared with the individual’s trained capacity, combined with nutrition status [and is discussed a bit here]. Learning about Relative Energy Deficiency in Sport (RED-S, formerly the “Female Athlete Triad”) will be relevant for your goals, and ensuring adequate nutrition along your training and BUD/S journey will be especially important.
Overall, the content we have available may help to provide a foundation of knowledge for your situation, however the specific applications for BUD/S will require someone with specific experience/expertise in that context. I suspect there are coaches out there who specialize in military/special forces-type training, which may be your best bet for individualized guidance.
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