COVID vs The Taliban: What do a “tour” in Afghanistan and a pandemic have in common?
It was early September 2008, 40 degrees in the shade, and “Sex on Fire” by Kings of Leon was ruling the airwaves. While the rest of the world carried on with their everyday lives, myself and 16 other Bootnecks (Marines) from Zulu company, 45 Commando, were deployed to a charming outpost called Patrol Base Tangiers in the heart of Sangin District Centre, Helmand, Afghanistan.
Being stuck at home during lockdown has made me reflect on my time in Afghanistan back in 2008/09. The two experiences share a striking amount in common.
Firstly, and most obviously, during my 7 months in Afghanistan access to a gym and training equipment was very limited. This meant maximising the use of my body weight and becoming very inventive with what we had around us. In a nutshell: learning how to become more resourceful rather than needing more resources (kit and equipment) was the order of the day.
The two scenarios also have a striking similarity in how they both carried an underlying fear created by an invisible enemy (virus or an insurgency force) which severely limited our ability to move around freely and of course stopped us being with friends and family during a period of high stress.
Where the two experiences differed was in the lack of support system and the daily competition (provided by being surrounded by mates) found in abundance in Afghanistan. During the pandemic, it has really hit home how not having my usual crew around me (who have my back) and the competitive environment this brings is so vital for me to thrive.
This current experience has shown me how important having these elements in my life is and, when this is removed, how much this affects my daily performance. In Afghan, it was literally life-saving, but in our usual day-to-day its value is often forgotten or overlooked and only noticed when it is no longer there.
Allow me to take you down a trip down memory lane and give you a glimpse into what life and training were like during a very interesting period of my life. Hopefully, it provides you with some useful perspective on our current situation and some insight into how you can make great strides forward, even in the most challenging of times.
Home Sweet Home
Patrol Base Tangiers was a large mud-built compound, surrounded by a large perimeter wall. There was a slight incline leading to the north of the compound which left you feeling more than a little vulnerable as the open ground occupied was more than a little exposed to the rooftops towards the South and East. 50 metres further South was the "Green Zone". A stretch of green arable land in the middle of the desert irrigated by the Helmand river that runs directly through it. This small strip of land was/is sacred territory to the Taliban as they used it to grow over 60% of the worlds opium/heroin production. Suffice to say they were not keen on us entering this area.
The main building consisted of a long corridor (50 m) with several small rooms either side. These rooms were all uniform in size and dimension and felt quite cell-like. The thickness of the mud walls and the very limited natural light kept us cool and away from the piercing desert heat. They were far from luxury and definitely fit for practice but i had real complaints and had undoubtedly slept in A lot worse. We also had two other small outbuildings that served as a store and the latrine during our stay.
Some Background
My troop was meant to be heading South down the Helmand River with the rest of our company but were re-tasked to go to Sangin, the Improvised Explosive Device (IED) capital of the world, two days after arriving in “theatre”. We ended staying for the entirety of our 7-month "holiday".
Sangin is a market town on the banks of the Helmand River with essential road links to the rest of the province, which gave it considerable tactical significance. It had been the scene of much tension and fighting ever since NATO (that's us) arrival in 2004. The tactical significance stretched both ways and the Taliban ("Terence") were sure to let us know exactly how much they valued this area many times throughout our deployment.
Our main task was to dominate the ground in the surrounding area and keep Pharmacy Road clear of IEDs. As a casualty extraction route, the road needed to remain usable at all times. Sadly, the necessity of this route was demonstrated too many times over the 7 months.
Pharmacy Road was a 1km road made from dust and gravel that stretched between our "holiday home" and another Patrol Base occupied by fellow Zulu warriors. This was the most IED'd street in Sangin (and the world) and keeping it clear meant patrolling the road daily, and often twice daily, by either or both Patrol Bases.
As you can imagine, this routine did not go unnoticed, and you don't need the brains of an Archbishop to work out what kind of delights the Taliban left for us on a daily basis.
The Routine
The routine was pretty savage! You could either look forward to 2x4-6 hour-long patrols in the blistering heat or freezing cold (the desert gets pretty damn cold in winter) on one day and the following you "manned the fort" - 9 men watching over five sentry points in a 24 hour period and any downtime was allocated to weapon cleaning, eating, filling sandbags, digging latrines and any other tasks on a long list required to run a base surrounded by a local population who really didn't care for you being there very much.
With such a routine, sleep was a bit of luxury, and we didn't get that much for the first couple of months. 3 hours a night was a boastful number in those early days. However, despite the challenging routine and the stressful environment, life actually felt not too bad once you got used to it. It is surprising how well you can adapt to a situation when you have no option, and others are dependent on you.
How I Coped
Undoubtedly one of my main coping mechanisms was training. Despite the fatigue, it became my mission to train every non-patrolling day. This was made considerably easier to maintain thanks to my new training partner Cai - a 100kg Welshman, with arms bigger than my legs, who loved nothing more than lifting very heavy things.
The most southern room in the building was designated as the gym. This was chosen due to three main factors:
It had a large metal pole sandwiched between the two walls at around 8 feet high which was perfect for pull-ups (it was likely originally put there for sinister reasons, I fear)
It had a hard, flat floor which is ideal for lifting weights
The ceiling was missing (previous mortar strike) so we could access the roof easily via a wooden ladder. This was important should anything untoward happen "mid sesh" and this proved very handy on a few occasions.
We managed to construct a makeshift dip station and bench press from some timber and sterling board left behind by previous occupants. We used ammo liners (filled with sand) for makeshift dumbbells and bound spare metal fence pickets in place of barbells. It wasn't exactly Equinox, but it covered most bases, and we were pretty happy with what we had.
Training
Training sessions were nearly always early in the morning. It was both cool enough to bear training and of course, the chance of "anything happening" at that time was far less. Terence certainly wasn't a lark.
It also ensured we got the hardest thing out the way early, and in that environment, this was even more key as it is back home. The days in camp were long and could be a bit monotonous.
The feeling of 'winning your morning' was even more important for daily morale. It made the thought of yet another ration pack breakfast, lunch and dinner that little bit more appealing.
We worked a basic chest and triceps, back and biceps and legs and shoulders split for the majority of the tour. The programme's upper body focus was due to the legs getting "beasted" from every 2nd day carrying 30-60kg for 4-8 hours while on patrol.
The sessions themselves would typically last around 60-75 mins. We would start with the heaviest compound movement, such as bench press, chin, dips or squats, to activate maximum mechanical tension for the muscle group we were working. We would do between 4-6 sets with the load and/or reps increasing each set and the final set to failure.
Next, we'd superset (2 exercises back to back with limited or no rest) a compound exercise with an isolation exercise. The compound exercise would be for a number of reps and the isolation exercise for time. We found this would help us keep focus in the heavier first exercise and then stopped us from rushing the reps in the isolation exercise—an easy thing to do when you have a rep total to hit, and you're hurting.
Following this, we would normally do a tri-set. This would be a mixture of body weight and isolation exercises. These would have little to no rest between them to make it as "spicy" (lots of lactic acid) as possible for maximum effect (metabolic stress).
We would almost always end on an arms finisher. Something like a set of heavy 21's using a picket for a barbell or a drop set using different ammo liners acting as dumbbells.
While I was already massively into training before the deployment, my focus had primarily been on cardiovascular fitness and muscular endurance. These are the two main fitness considerations required for being a Marine and also what I seemed to be more naturally suited too. So this deployment was really my first proper exposure to weight training and the possibilities that this brought with it.
A Typical Weekly Programme
Day 1 Chest and Triceps
A.4-6 x 6-15 Picket Bench press YGIG
B1. 4x 8-12 Ammo liner DB press
B2. 4x 8-12 Dips
C1. 2-3 x 6-15 Ammo liner flyes
C2. 2-3 x 12-20 Close grip press ups
C3. 2-3 x 6-12 picket skull crushers
D. 1x 21’s picket curls
Day 2 Back and Biceps
A.4-6 x 6-15 weighted chin ups YGIG
B1. 4x 8-12 Inverted row or TRX row
B2. 4x 8-12 picket barbell curls
C1. 2-3 x 6-15 Ammo liner reverse flyes
C2. 2-3 x 12-20 ammo liner hammer curls
C3. 2-3 x 6-12 picket Picket lying pull overs
D. 1x 21’s picket curls
Day 3 Legs and Shoulders
A.4-6 x 6-15 Picket Squats YGIG
B1. 4x 8-12 Dips
B2. 4x 8-12 Picket RDL’s
C1. 2-3 x 6-15 Ammo liner front raises
C2. 2-3 x 12-20 Rear lunges
C3. 2-3 x 6-12 Ammon liner lat raises
D. 1x 21’s picket curls
Food Glorious Food
The food situation when you are on operations varies hugely depending on where you find yourself. If you are based at one of the main staging camps (Camp Bastion) you can look forward to some very highly quality food and in plentiful supply.
The further forward to the frontline you travel, the more basic the offerings become. Forward Operating Bases (FOB's) have a team of chefs that work with limited fresh rations and cook mostly from longlife provisions for the men on the ground. We were in a Patrol Base* so it was 24 hour rations each day, barring the occasional trip to the FOB every couple of weeks.
For breakfast, I would eat a large bowl of oats combined with some dried apple, a protein ball and maybe some of the Yorkie bar found in the ration packs. This was most definitely the best meal of the day.
Lunch was always a boil in the bag meal with brown biscuits - cardboard tasting plain savoury biscuits that were so devoid of taste you had to add them to your boil in the bag to stomach them. You had a choice of 4 or 5 options which were mediocre in the taste department but beggars can’t be choosers in this situation.
The evening meal was the same as lunch, except it included a dessert. Up until this experience, I had never really bothered with the desserts in the ration packs. They were pretty lame taste-wise, and you had to boil them for a good 7 mins to make them edible. However, I grew accustomed to eating these most nights and, looking back, it was probably just my taste buds informing me that my body was in desperate need of the kcals. Have you ever noticed how much better food tastes, the more hungry you are?
You also had a selection of snacks and drinks to choose from: powdered tea (just what you want in the desert); energy drinks; and of course the 'pussers' Yorkie bar and fruit biscuits. The Yorkie bar was made with long-life milk, and by the time you opened it, it had melted and reformed at least 8 times. The fruit biscuits were the military's answer to garibaldi's and tasted a lot better than they looked!. This combo was half decent, and I often saved it to have with a very large cup of coffee whilst on long Sanger duty (guarding the camp) in the evening.
Sleep-Deprived and Not Enough Food = Muscle Gains?
You might think that this scenario is far from optimal for gaining strength and building muscle, and you would be right. A diet consisting nearly entirely of military rations, a very stressful environment, combined with a sleep routine that even a new parent would shriek at, is far from ideal for getting strong and jacked. However, when you mix the right blend of consistency/frequency/adherence into your training and eat enough protein and overall kcals, it is surprising what can be achieved.
On reflection, I was probably consuming somewhere in the region of 3000-4000 kcals per day (ration packs are loaded with kcals) with a macronutrient split of approximately 40% carbs, 30% fat and 30% from protein (meat paste, tinned tuna, meat in the boil in the bags and the occasional protein ball) - pretty much the perfect ratio for growth.
Results
Throughout the tour, I didn't really pay that much attention to any progress I was making in the gym. Training was my way of switching off and bringing some normality to my daily routine, I gave it my all every session, but I wasn't logging my reps and sets. This, combined with my general fatigue state, and the lack of previous benchmarks, made it hard to gauge if I was making any progress in strength or size. There was also a distinct lack of mirrors around, as you might imagine.
It wasn't until the following April when I was reunited with the rest of my company that I realised I had actually managed to put on some decent size. I stuck out like a sore thumb compared to the majority of the lads. Most had lost around a stone in weight, and I had managed to gain 4-5kg of good weight.
Significant weight loss is the common outcome for those serving on the front line on operational tours. A combination of searing heat, the dense patrolling schedule and access to a very limited menu lends itself to one primary result.
The fact that I had managed to gain this weight and strength (later confirmed) really opened my eyes to the possibilities that consistent strength training combined with an adequate dietary intake could bring. It illustrated how simple the process could actually be and my previous beliefs that I didn't have the frame and the genetics to build muscle were so wrong, it was laughable.
It was at this point that I knew that my passion for fitness and strength training had to be explored in much greater depths and was probably the first point I realised that a life in the fitness industry beckoned. My future was about to take a very different path.
Life Long Learning
This tour taught me many things that have gone on to shape who I am and how I have lived my life ever since. However, one of the overriding lessons I learned was the power of applying Consistency, Adherence and Frequency to your training.
Training (or doing anything challenging) in isolation is hard. We are pack animals and work best when we are in our tribe. When this tribe and the support it provides is taken away we lose certainty. This brings fear, despair and anxiety. These negative emotions can cripple us unless we set up the correct environment and habits that don’t permit this to happen.
This was my experience back in 2008/09. Fortunately, I was able to use training to provide a degree of certainty in daily life which allowed me not to be consumed by the fear and anxiety a situation like that could easily do. during the Covid pandemic I have been able to call on this “lifesaver” again to keep me focused, healthy and productive.
My time Helmand Province provided me with the bedrock of my strength training knowledge and helped conjure a passion that continues to grow. It also showed me that you do not need any fancy equipment to get strong and grow muscle. However, it mostly taught me how regular training/exercise provides us with so much more than the physical adaptations this brings us.
*Patrol bases are positioned a tactical bound in front of the FOB’s to help dominate the ground and restrict the enemies movement. They are considerably smaller and far less comfortable than their bigger brothers (FOB’s).