The Definitive Spec Ops Resource
Continue to prep for the UBRR and get some leg work in with a trip to the gym today.
Training:
3 x Pullups 10 reps
3 x Front Squat 20-15-12 reps (lighter weight)
3 x Goblet Squats 20-15-12 reps (lighter dumbbell)
3 x 10 Leg Extensions
3 x 10 reps Standing Arnold Press
3 x 20 Push-ups
30 x “V” ups
2-mile run
Stretch well after completion
Thomas Rosehaley is a busy man these days. When he’s not flying across the globe working as a personal security professional, he’s back at home keeping on top of his medical training, which is his bailiwick. He had just arrived back in the states but was not getting much free time. “I’m diving tomorrow in Monterrey Bay and then have a Med class at Folsom Prison, I’ll call you on my way home from there,” he said.
In the first two parts of the interview, we talked about his background, growing up in LA and how he entered the Navy. Then we moved on to the beginning of his Navy training and on to Hell Week.
Once the candidates passed Pool Comp, they moved on to the LAR V rebreather, which is a different kind of diving altogether. “The amazing thing today is, how far technology has progressed when you can go to Long Beach today and buy a LAR V for about $8-10 grand,” Rosehaley said. Back then that was a classified piece of equipment.”
“Dive Phase was two months and is the bread and butter of the Naval Special Warfare guys,” he said. That is where they’re trained on dive searches, underwater recon, navigation, he recalled diving at Coronado and crossing over to 32nd St. and trying to identify ships and compartments from under the water. Planting fake explosives on drive shafts of ships. This training evolved from the first underwater demo teams from WWII.
After Dive Phase the candidates move to San Clemente Island where they’re trained on the finer aspects of demolitions. Shaped Charges, C-4, even the old haversack charges that the old frogmen used. They’re also trained on weapons, small unit tactics and patrolling.
His class 202, finished with 26 sailors some of whom were picked up from other classes due to a minor injury or issue. Most of those who failed did so because they couldn’t handle the mental aspect of the training.
“Look there’s no way you can adequately prepare yourself so that the course is a breeze, it is a total lifestyle change,” he said. Due to his Sea Cadet training with the briefest of glimpses on what he’d face in Coronado, he tried to prepare himself physically as best he could.
He ran the streets barefoot, trying to toughen his feet up. Rosehaley was an accomplished competitive swimmer and played the tough sport of Water Polo. “My water skills were definitely as good as I could be prepared for. I grew up surfing on the Los Angeles coast.”
Some candidates were just not comfortable in the water which for a sailor wanting to become a Navy SEAL is unconscionable. “The water is our bread and butter,” he said. “That is what we see as home. The water is our safe place and if you aren’t comfortable in the water, you need to try something else.”
Rosehaley said the guys who weren’t comfortable in the water before arriving didn’t last long. And told the story about “the Beehive” which reflects his point perfectly. At this point, there were still over 100 students in the course. Everyone is in the pool so it is crowded and ready to get more so.
“The instructors just start pushing everyone into the center of the pool,” he recalls. “Everyone is trying their best to stay calm but the students being pushed inward into ‘the Beehive’ begins to take its toll,” he said.
Students are shoulder to shoulder trying to stay afloat and it takes just one guy to panic and grab the guy next to him and try to use him for support and it sets off a chain reaction. In just a matter of seconds, it turns into what Rosehaley remembers as “a fight for your life.”
Rosehaley who was among the most comfortable in his class in the water remembers that the panic that ensued was contagious. Rosehaley just decided to hold his breath and stay calm. He recalls that he was being kicked in the face and being held down and as he says, “your body’s willingness to stay alive wins out.”
He remembered it akin to being trapped under moving ice, and it was a dog-eat-dog situation and the instructors kept at it until students began to quit. “Too many guys were in no way prepared for this and it is mostly mental.”
Rosehaley then surprising finished his Navy career abruptly in 1997 and moved on to further his medical career until the second Gulf war when he came back as a contractor working in Iraq. He had his share of hair-raising experiences there but none close to what he experienced in Haiti.
Sent in as security and medical support for a CBS film crew, aftershocks still racked the country. The guests at the hotel had to sleep on the pool patio because it wasn’t safe to remain inside. He and another medic began a triage, treating the numerous injured locals at the back of the hotel.
He’s still a security professional and has traveled the world with many high-profile clients. I used to chuckle when I’d see his picture of People, US etc, working with a certain female singer who has been plastered all over the magazines you find in the aisles of supermarkets and Wal-Mart.
We had the pleasure of working together for a security company Thomas Dale & Associates based out of Los Angeles, in the Middle East watching over a family of clients who traveled, frequently taking many of their friends. Later, we worked on a film crew down in Mexico, where there was never a dull moment. But that’s a story for another time.
He’s a devoted follower of the Gracie Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, (word to the wise, don’t wrestle with him) and after a recent trip to the Middle East, he had a stopover in Jerusalem, Israel. That night he found a gym and was wrestling Orthodox Jews that were half his age. “It was wild,” he said.
“Visually seeing the guys with their traditional long curls and dressed up in a gi was off the wall. I loved it,” he added. That fits him to a tee.
Continue to prep for the UBRR by taking a practice test but without the rope climb event as most will not have access to one.
Training:
Stretch well after completion
Grading scale:
Pushups +2 pts for each rep above minimum.
Situps +3 points for each rep above minimum.
Pullups +3 points for each rep above minimum.
Dips +2 points for each rep above minimum.
Bench Press +3 points for each rep above minimum.
Kip -ups +2 points for each rep above minimum.
Shuttle Run +2 points for every 1/10th of a second under minimum.
Run +2 points for every 15 seconds from 35-30 minutes.
You can check your score at the website here:
Thomas Rosehaley is a busy man these days. When he’s not flying across the globe working as a personal security professional, he’s back at home keeping on top of his medical training, which is his bailiwick. He had just arrived back in the states but was not getting much free time. “I’m diving tomorrow in Monterrey Bay and then have a Med class at Folsom Prison, I’ll call you on my way home from there,” he said.
In Part 1 of our interview, we spoke about how he ended up in BUDS right after high school, and the initial training he went thru right up until he made it to his training at Coronado. His initial class of about 160 was sliced down to 46 before the class even made it to Hell Well and was further reduced to 26 after that 5 ½ day experience.
But if you think that was the hardest part, think again, he said the next portion of the training, during the Dive Phase actually had some of the more difficult moments.
“The course is designed to demoralize you at first,” Rosehaley said. “Their thought process is we’re going to break you down, test your mettle and then…slowly build you back up.”
“You really have to suck it up, and the instructors are constantly in the background encouraging the guys to quit, looking for any weakness. At that point, you just narrow your focus,” he said. “There were times my only focus was to survive until dinner.”
We both laughed because everyone has been there at one point or another. Rosehaley added, “then at night, as you are hunched over your creamed corn, you find the resolved to go one more meal, one more day. It gets reduced to that at times.”
After Hell Week, he said the sailors got a week where there was a bit of recovery where the candidates got a chance to regain some strength and grow back the toenails that were lost during Hell Week.
But then it was right into the Second Phase, the Dive Phase. That consisted of one week with an introduction to SCUBA which many of the candidates had never dove before. And then they’d roll into LARV Rebreathers which Army SF guys will remember as the Draeger system.
“Pool Comp is to the second phase what Hell Week was to the first phase,” he remembers. “It is a brutal, and yes brutal assessment of your underwater, open circuit and SCUBA abilities, he said.
The candidates once again are beaten down by the instructors in very tough conditions. Rosehaley stated that most of the training is conducted in just 9-12 feet of freshwater in the CTT (Combat Training Tank). So what was the purpose of the beating underwater I asked? “Well, more than anything the instructors want to see that you won’t panic underwater when things go wrong and frequently can. And the beatings were equated to coming ashore in very rough surf.”
So what happens underwater during the toughest parts of this? “Well, your mask will be ripped off, you may get a shot to the face with your regulator in your mouth, you’ll lose one if not both of your fins and they may try to untie your weights, all fun stuff,” he said.
Rosehaley recalled one instructor stretching his dual line gas line and tying an overhand knot in it which effectively blocked his air supply. He said that candidates have to keep their wits about them, remove the tanks and restore the air supply while maintaining their depth. “Pool Comp is a tough challenge and many of the guys who made it thru Hell Week didn’t have what it took there,” he said. “It was a life-changing experience.”
In should be remembered from the first part of the interview that the training he was going thru, some of the toughest in the military or anyone’s military for that matter was done when he was just months removed from high school. It isn’t often that men pass that course after having a few years of military experience. To do it right out of high school is quite an accomplishment these days.
In our final segment of the interview, we’ll talk about finishing out BUDS training, one terrifying sequence that he remembers and what life has been like post-Navy for Rosehaley. Including working for some high-profile celebrity clients and working as a professional security detail for a Hollywood film in Mexico.
Today we’ll hit the legs hard again and then rest on Sunday. More reps on the legs today, as we’ll get ready for the Rifle PT squats, that everyone loves so well.
Training:
More Preparation for the UBRR:
First, head into the gym:
3 x Front Squat 20-15-12 reps (lighter weight, more reps)
3 x Goblet Squats 20-15-12 reps (lighter weight, more reps)
3 x Hungarian Lunges 20-15-12 reps light weight
3 x 10 Pull-ups
3 x 10 reps Standing Arnold Press
3 x 25 Push-ups
30 x “V” ups
6-mile rucksack march with 45-pound minimum
Stretch well after completion
Training:
Shoulders and Chest Day in the gym, all of this will help with the UBRR
Stretch well after completion
Thomas Rosehaley is a busy man these days. When he’s not flying across the globe working as a personal security professional, he’s back at home keeping on top of his medical training, which is his bailiwick. He had just arrived back in the states but was not getting much free time. “I’m diving tomorrow in Monterrey Bay and then have a Med class at Folsom Prison, I’ll call you on my way home from there,” he said.
I was trying to catch up with him to talk about his experience with the Navy’s Selection program, Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL (BUD/S) training which Rosehaley attended and passed just after high school at the age of 18. He was able to enlist for Naval Special Warfare right out of school as he’d been a member of the Sea Cadets in High School.
Rosehaley joined the Bryce Canyon Division of the Sea Cadet Corps based out of LA at the age of 14 where he learned basic seamanship, knots, flags, semaphore as well as basic firefighting. They had an adopted frigate, USS Wadsworth (FSG-9). During the summer months, the cadets got to go on float.
At the age of 15 he went on float to Hawaii, and Canada for a couple of weeks. “I got my Helmsman qualification before I got my drivers’ license,” he said. “Within the Sea Cadet Corps there was a mini-SEAL camp.” A series of tryouts ensued, which Rosehaley did three years in a row, he got to go to Coronado with 20 other Sea Cadets and got to experience a one-week BUD/S course to include a shortened (24-hr) version of Hell Week, not quite what he’d experience later but enough to open his eyes.
“By the time I joined the Navy, I had a good working knowledge of the Navy which was a good thing, as I was ahead of my peers a bit,” he said. And there was an ace in the hole.
“I had a really good mentor by the name of Gordon Meehan, who was an original UDT (Underwater Demolition Teams). He stood beside when I went to my recruiter,” Rosehaley said. “And he said, ‘so when he finishes boot camp, he’s going to his Corpsman A-school and during A-school, he’s going to get a chance to try out for BUD/S, and then he’s going straight into BUD/S Selection, right?’,” Rosehaley said with a laugh.
The tryout for BUD/S was administered by NSW2 sailors and consisted of a 500-meter swim, a mile and a half run, pull-ups, and two minutes of pushups and two minutes of situps. Passing that, got him into the pre-BUD/S pipeline.
Rosehaley wasn’t even the youngest sailor in his class, although just 18, another candidate was younger by just a few days but it was an eye-opening experience. Laughing now, Rosehaley says, “I had no clue what was going on then, and truth be told, I was too immature at 18-19 to get the whole picture.”
So, what was it like on Day 1? “You learn very quickly to ‘Embrace the Suck’ because the class was quickly whittled down. Very few people make it non-stop for the entire six months of BUD/S.”
The first phase of BUD/S he related was basically a hammer session as he called it. “That’s all it is, they’re not really working on teaching you anything yet other than learning to embrace the suck,” he said.
At the culmination of that first phase was Hell Week which is Week 4 for the candidates. That was pretty much a blur for him, where you are pushed to the maximum. This is where the rubber meets the road. Before the Navy invests a lot of time and training (and money), in a candidate, they have to know what he’s made of.
Hell Week consists of 5½ days of brutally intensive training where the candidates are cold, wet, and tired (they average less than four hours sleep). Here is where mental toughness and dedication take hold.
“We started Day 1, Week 1 with 160 students,” Rosehaley said. “We were already down to 46 at the start of Hell Week, and by the time we finished it were down to 26, the attrition rate is pretty significant.”
“And by this time, we weren’t taught anything that you couldn’t get from a P90X video,” he added. But the NSW instructors then knew they had 26 sailors that could handle the stress of being maxed out physically, under trying circumstances and still be able to think on their feet.
“I’m not trying to downplay what they do there, but it is what it is. It is a total fucking gut check. We’re going to break you down, and they see…by design how you respond to being broke down,” he said. How did you feel after Hell Week, I asked? “Shattered,” he said laughing.
In part 2 of our interview, we’ll get further along in the BUD/S program and Rosehaley will share some of his experiences post-Navy, including working as a contractor in Iraq, Haiti, going to Hollywood and keeping up with the young guys.
SOF Selection PT Preparation 3.23.2017
A heavy day of preparation with the pushups, sit-ups, and crunches. Plus, the longer ruck march to get you ready for a tough day ahead.
Training:
More Preparation for the UBRR:
100 x pushups (no time limit)
100 x sit ups (no time limit)
100 x crunches
3 x 20 dips or until muscle failure
25 x V-ups
6-mile rucksack march (45 lb minimum) over varied terrain, note your time
Stretch well after completion
While preparing to go to Selection, there is a lot of individual work that must be put in. Finding and breaking in the best boots for your feet and prepping your feet for the long road ahead. Then there is the Land Navigation training and map reading which, if you aren’t ready for can be daunting. Then, of course, is the physical training, and finally, the rucking that goes in to prepare. No one says you can’t have a little fun while rucking and preparing for Selection which leads us the GORUCK Challenge.
What is GORUCK? GORUCK is a company that was started by Jason McCarthy after his Special Forces service with the 10th SFG(A). He originally was trying to just sell his gear that he was manufacturing. But then he got an idea to promote the gear and let people, many of whom had never rucked or experienced anything close to being in the military a little taste of what Selection is like.
But this event is built on having fun, sweating up a storm, working within a team and accomplishing a goal under the watchful gaze of a Special Operations cadre member. It is built around events that you’ll encounter in Selection, doing PT in the sand, or in some cases the water, carrying heavy objects as a team, (logs, telephone pole sections) and then building an apparatus that has to carry about 500 pounds and then moving it around a city in the US. Sounds strangely familiar?
The different GORUCK events last anywhere from:
The Light – 4-5 hours, 7-10 mile distance
The Tough – 10-12 hours, 15-20 mile distance
The Heavy – 24+ hours, 40+ miles distance
Selection – 48+ hours, 80+ miles distance (has a less than 5 percent finish rate)
They also have an Orienteering course, a Scavenger Hunt, as well as others.
So, while you’re having fun, you are also getting some difficult and useful training in. Preparing for Selection is a lot of work. It is demanding, tough and generally a lonely process, as the onus is on yourself to get ready for the challenge ahead.
This is a chance to put together a like-minded group of individuals to enjoy the camaraderie of the course, getting some challenging training in, all while in a much more light-hearted atmosphere than the Selection courses.
If you want to give your friends a taste of wait awaits you or just want to get training partners involved in a break from the monotony of singular training than the GORUCK challenge would be a fun way to do just that. And if your Land Navigation is a particularly weak area, the 36-hour Navigator course, taught by Special Forces cadre members will be a good, learning tool while also being taught some survival skills.
Now don’t think that this is a harbinger of things to come at Selection. There is no way, I’d ever try to sell you that and the GORUCK people wouldn’t either. Their course is based on having fun while you’re working your tail off.
I’m in the midst now of trying to convince some friends and family members to put together a team and attempt one of the challenges that are upcoming in the next few months. My wife thinks I’m insane to want to do this, “After all this time, you want to go back to being in selection?” Perhaps she has a point.
But being a Special Forces guy means always being up to the challenge, right? That’s what it is all about. That and doing what we love and most importantly doing it with the ones we love. That being said, I doubt I’ll have any luck convincing anyone to do the Selection challenge, but hey, it is time to throw the ruck on and get outside and work out the kinks this morning. Let’s go rucking.
Photo courtesy of GORUCK
Back to the gym today. Unlike last week where we went heavier weight with less reps, we’re going the opposite this time, building up the endurance.
Training:
More Preparation for the UBRR:
Run 3 miles and record your time
Then, head into the gym:
3 x Front Squat 20-15-12 reps (lighter weight)
3 x Goblet Squats 20-15-12 reps (lighter dumbbell)
3 x 10 Pull-ups
3 x 10 reps Standing Arnold Press
3 x 20 Push ups
30 x “V”ups
Stretch well after completion