Question about enlisting at parris island

[Shaggy]

Exactly what are the physical demands in the first two weeks.

I have hear you run a 3 mile once a day. My other questions are...
- how many times a day do you do crunchs?
- when you do push ups...how many is typical?
- how many times a day do you do crunchs?

Is the rest just repetition of drills and obstacle course?

Its really hard to get a similar opinion but I figured if I can get this it will help in these last 21 days I have before I go.

Anyone know a site that adequately describes what you go through?

 

[BRM21o]

I'm a Hollywood Marine but I graduated on Dec. 12th so I can shed a little bit of light. We don't get the sand fleas but you don't get the hills. Enlisted don't run 3 miles a day. The first 2 weeks are mainly meant to break you down mentally. Your gonna be thinking "What the #@$)*% am I doing here". It's not hard physically. You PT every other day and do MCMAP during the days inbetween. The furthest we ever ran was the 3 miles for our PFT and then the 4+ mile moto-run at the end. If you can run 3 miles in under 28 minutes, do at least 3 pull-ups and I guess 50 crunches before you ship off then you won't have a hard time. There will be some people there that struggle at doing just the minimum. The PT at boot camp was easy. The hard part for me was the humps and even those weren't bad. My best advice would be to go on a short camping trip and load your pack full of gear and go up and down every hill until your legs give out. PT condition and Combat condition are two different things. We had guys that were ripped and very fast that fell out of humps. If you get in Combat Conditioin (doing everything with packs, boots, kevlar, flak jacket, rifle) then the PT is a joke. Work on push-ups (you'll do about 200 each PT session because of people screwing up during the warm-up), pull-ups, crunches, and go backpacking as much as you can. Enjoy your time here because you're about to go through some hell. It's fun hell though!

 

[Shaggy]

I really really hope your right. It's the physical part I'm scared. My arms are so GD long that 3 pull ups are a chore. I can run like the wind though. I kinda suck at crunches but can get through them. Push ups will be a chore but as long as they aren't 200 in a row ill be good. Do you know what kinda reps they are in? I went to some tough football camps and at the end of 5 days we all drove away on the bus giving the finger out the window. I heard boot was kinda like that only 13 friggen weeks long.

I'm really looking forward to a lot of it. I've had my ar15 and shot my whole life so I hope I can get expert on the range. But yeah, I've been in DE for like a year cuz of college and the fear has kinda drowned out. 3 weeks away and I don't feel a thing. Blah, im talking too much.

BTW...congrat on your graduation. I hear getting your EGA is the best thing in the world. Some describe it as better than marriage.

 

[BRM21o]

I can pretty much guarentee you are in better shape then I was when I left for boot. My preparation was going out drinking every night. When I left I could only do 4 pull ups, 42 crunches, and a 13:20 1 1/2 mile run. After boot camp I now do 11 pull ups, 110 crunches, and 21:30 3-mile run. Pull-ups are like running, you only get better at them by pounding them out. Push-ups are in counts of 4. You'll spend a lot of time "get on your feet right now...good, wanna move slow, get on your face right now, still wanna move slow? get on your feet right now" X 20. PT is what you make of it. Your gonna be so motivated after you get back from putting out after a good PT session. As far as the rifle qual, forget everything you ever learned about shooting a rifle. Go in there like you've never shot anything before. I had only shot a .22 a couple times before I shot the M-16 and I ended up shooting a 231. It's easy, all you have to do is listen. The only thing people struggled with was the pressure they put on themselves for qual day. One guy in my relay shot expert on pre-qual day then got all nervous during qual day and shot marksman. I didn't leave boot camp with my finger in the air. I wanted to get the hell out of there but it was overall a very positive experience. Getting the EGA is something you cannot describe. Seeing your family is kind of awkward at first, it seems like your in a dream. Also, on Thursday you'll think everybody's families are extremely nasty looking. I'm sure you have 1,000,000 more questions like i did...PM me anytime. Later

 

[Shaggy]

One more does come to mind. When doing pullups can you still do them with arms only bending 90 degrees and then pull back up for a full one or do you have to go fully extended? I can't do pull ups worth anything. I just barely squezzed of three doing 90 degrees. But im glad to hear people will be on the same boat as me. Ive played a lot of sports and am very familiar with "conditioning" so it's not like I don't know what the pain from working out is thank god. But I am scared to death of it

 

[TNWhiskey]

No you have to do dead hangs (pretty much a lockout at the bottom)for them to count on a PFT...Do them the right way now regardless of how many you can do. Start the Armstrong or Recon Ron pullup program even if you can't do many because it will give structure to your workouts.

Also, run 3 miles straight through now regardless of time...just make sure you can do close to the PFT min of 24:00 before you go and you'll be ok...regardless of what anyone tells you don't show up and think you'll just get into shape as you go. It will happen, but you'd much rather be able to cruise on days you feel like crap and still not be at the end of run. Remember you don't want to stand out in any way...slugs and slackers stand out and usually find themselves 'quarterdecked' or in 'the pit'. You'll get through, but it will become hell. OH and only 13 weeks??? Wish I could see your face about week 1.5.

You may want to read "Making the Corps" and "Into the Crucible" both are books about boot camp at PI.

Good luck and remember the more you sweat in training the less you bleed in battle.

 

[Shaggy]

Thanks for the input!

btw...I didn't mean "it's only 13 weeks long" in that way you took it if you read again . That's a long ass time and I know some friends who were in for only two weeks and I got some letters that made so sense whatsoever. I went to one graduation and they seemed confused. Can't wait

 

[Shaggy]

Did a 12:15 IST 1 1/2 mile run just now. Could probably do faster with the pressure and encouragement of boot camp. I still have 3 weeks to work on it. So a 24 minute three mile time is the average hump pace? I'll work towards that. I suck at pull ups but I figure if I try to do 1 or 2 or 3 every time I get see or think of the bar during the day I'll go good. Im doing 5 sets of push ups a night increaseing each set by 1 rep each night. As for cruches I am still not sure how to do them. I've done them one way at my recruiters for the monthly IST and they say your arms can leave your chest. Then I read in a training guide they gave me your arms can't leave your chest (but wouldn't that basically be a situp?). Hmm, I don't think I'm leaving anything out. Basically my excercises consist of just that...pull ups, push ups, crunches, running.

And thanks for the book recomandations. I got a 15 buck borders gift card for christmas, added 15 bucks off my debit card and ordered them both online. I just finished reading "Jarhead" which was incredible.

I'll just keep anything worth a damn posted here and if you decide to run across it and leave me any more feedback I'd really appreciate. Thanks so much for the posts so far full of good knownledge. I really do appreciate the time you took to post it