The Navy SEAL Physical Fitness Guide

While it doesn't serve as a traditional textbook with 500+ pages and an extensive bibliographic stew, it does have uniquely qualified and credentialed authors contributing key chapters throughout, making this a terrific reference guide and course builder for any new instructor or instructor looking for new direction.

I have two criticisms, minor and not enough to reduce the star ratings.

One, there should be at least two more pages of material in the estimation of VO2(max) for trainees. What is written can be figured out, but it can be re-written for clarity, and given two more pages, it can be broken down a little more to see the numbers transform.

Two, the typesetting is terrific for handouts, but the layout breaks across page boundaries in weird places. This is, after all, printed matter bound for publication and distribution to the public as a book. It should be laid out like a training manual with better formatting and page breaks, and given a keyword index at the back of the book.

In all, this is a very helpful guide for PE instructors of all kinds. While its basis is primarily for training SEAL teams, there is wide appeal to any athlete looking for a disciplined, scientific approach to realizing one's full potential.


Intro to exercise physiology + Customization tool   December 20, 2002
7 out of 8 found this review helpful

This book provides a practical, user-friendly introduction to exercise physiology. The author provides tables and formulas to help the reader calculate how much, how far, and how often to work out. Also included are basic exercise physiology principles to help readers understand the how and the why.

There's a lot of useful general information, though the book also contains specialized stuff not relevant to civilians (like training for extreme combat conditions, or how to customize training for different mission profiles.)

If this had been my first and only SEAL fitness book, I would've been disappointed and bored. But after watching SEAL fitness videos, reading the other books, and trying the PT exercises, merely doing was no longer enough and I wanted to understand more.

In particular, I wanted to go beyond the standard "beginning - intermediate - advanced" classifications. I wanted to find out how to really customize the exercise routines for my own needs. I also wanted to discover how to set personalized goals. Deuster's book provides the answers and the quantitative tools to boot. Combine this book with Deuster's other book on nutrution, and you have a complete customization tool.

My only gripe -- Deuster's suggested PT routines seem too tame. In the interest of preventing injuries, she builds in so much stretching that the exercise tempo gets slowed way down. Other than that, I found this a very useful book.


Great Workout!   February 11, 2005
Michael G. Forrest (Santa Clarita, CA)
3 out of 7 found this review helpful

I was stationed with Mark on the USS Duluth in 1994. I was part of a marine corps unit back then and worked out with him and a fellow shipmate. He got me in the best shape of my life during those 6 months out to sea. Thanks, Mark!


Standard, solid info for beginners   October 24, 2009
AmazingOne (Italy)
This is a guide for beginning in the world of athletics and fitness.
It's written in a very simple way, with large text and bold catch-phrases.
Nevertheless, it provides you all the info to become a great endurance and basic strength athlete.
There are new approaches to strength like 5x5, periodization and weightlifting, which this book lacks of.
Buy it if you want a good reference on the main topic, without much insights.


all one would want to know about navy seal conditioning   February 7, 2010
John D. Koehler
Excellent book. Very detailed outline of everything one would want to know about the conditioning of Navy SEALs. Very pleased with the book, and use it almost every day.