Transitioning to Functional Strength Workout

I am a 2LT in the U.S. Army doing recruiting for my ROTC unit until I leave for infantry school in June. I have been powerlifting off and on for the last 5 years, and for about the last 6 months I have been training fairly intensely for a bench meet in a couple of weeks, but recently one of the officers at the unit (who’s also infantry) introduced me to functional strength training (i.e. kettle bells, medicine ball full body lifts, etc.)

I’m really unfamiliar with this type of workout, but I like it and want to do it more often in my regular weekly workouts. My question is how do I integrate these types of exercises best with a regular weight training regiment? Thanks in advance for all the help

Just throw it in as conditioning work outs.

Or an events day at the end of the week.

You could take a break from the powerlifting and strictly do the stuff you’re talking about for 4-8 weeks and I bet all of your lifts will go up when you return to your powerlifting. Or you could throw this stuff in on your deload weeks. I think it’s a good idea to incorporate this stuff whatever route you decide to take. Give us an idea on what your plan is when you decide. Good Luck!

[quote]bigg mike wrote:
You could take a break from the powerlifting and strictly do the stuff you’re talking about for 4-8 weeks and I bet all of your lifts will go up when you return to your powerlifting. Or you could throw this stuff in on your deload weeks. I think it’s a good idea to incorporate this stuff whatever route you decide to take. Give us an idea on what your plan is when you decide. Good Luck![/quote]

If I were to focus strictly on functional exercises how many days a week would a like to train and what would be a good split, if any? Sorry to ask what is probably a really obvious question but like I said I’m really new to this

Check out DragonDoor.com for some ideas and google kettlebell and medicine ball workouts.

[quote]jw1322 wrote:
I am a 2LT in the U.S. Army doing recruiting for my ROTC unit until I leave for infantry school in June.

I have been powerlifting off and on for the last 5 years, and for about the last 6 months I have been training fairly intensely for a bench meet in a couple of weeks, but recently one of the officers at the unit (who’s also infantry) introduced me to functional strength training (i.e. kettle bells, medicine ball full body lifts, etc.)

I’m really unfamiliar with this type of workout, but I like it and want to do it more often in my regular weekly workouts. My question is how do I integrate these types of exercises best with a regular weight training regiment? Thanks in advance for all the help[/quote]

Know nothing of your stats (HT and WT), and your current overall fitness levels; so do not take anything I say as an insult to your level of preparedness or intelligence.

As you are an 11A about to begin the gauntlet of schools at Benning, (my 2 cents) you can go back to powerlifting once you get past the next +/- 12 months. BOLC II/IBOLC (BOLCIII), ABN, and RGR will take you away from the gym (more than you’d like) and have you pounding pavement either running or rucking with a healthy dose of combatives.

Unless you already have your shit, primary focus should be endurance, then strength and power.

Check out militaryathlete.com for some ideas.

Ill reiterate what you’ve heard before- don’t show up to your unit without your shit. Good luck!