A few weeks ago Date Tate, owner of Elite Fitness Systems had a post requesting videos for cases of the Prowler Flu. In case you’re not familiar with the Prowler, it’s regarded by many as the hardest conditioning tool there is.
Here’s some of the symptoms of this torture device: fever, aches, chills, tiredness, disassociation, slurred speech, cramping, seeing stars, muscle aches,dry coughs,vomiting, incontinence, double vision,swamp ass, decreased body fat, reinforcement of bulimic habits and being in the best shape of your life.
There was a contest for whoever sent in the most Prowler Flu incidents would be able to attend the next UGSS seminar at the brand new Elite Training Facility. 
We won and I’m pumped to be able to go train and learn from some of the best.
I’d like to thank everyone for participating in our Strength-Bloc training sessions and personally thank Idriz for all your hard work puking all over the field. If you haven’t had the pleasure of seeing his dedication in action, click on the “NEWS FLASH” picture below or CLICK HERE.
Since posting these videos to my Youtube and Facebook account, I’ve been getting a lot of questions about how to implement the prowler and other less conventional training tools (farmers walk, tire flips, sled drags, etc.) into training. I can only tell you how I’ve utilized this equipment and what has worked for me and my athletes. Other strength coaches might have completely different opinions and variations than mine.
Prowler: I currently don’t have a facility where I can use this indoors. I take it along with other pieces of equipment to a soccer field with a mondo track that’s about 3 blocks behind the Gracie Barra Jiu Jitsu Academy where I train. If you load the prowler up with to much weight here you can’t get any traction because your feet slide. Because of this, I’m currently only using it as a conditioning finisher. Here’s two drills we’ve been doing:
- One person pushes the Prowler on the high handles for around 40 yards. Another person pushes it back from the low handles. This way one set is pushed on each side (high and low). We perform 4 to 6 sets total (there and back is one set). We’re usually in groups from around 7 to 10. This puts five people on each side. The rest interval is probably around 90 seconds to 2 minutes or so. If you plan on doing this and have less people than six, you might want to actually use a stop watch to measure rest intervals. It’s all about progression, and without knowing roughly where you’re starting from makes it pretty difficult for there to be a progression.
- 120 yard straight push with the high handles with a 45 pound plate on each side, aka “The Terminator”. This is done as fast as possible. You build up a lot of waste by-products in your legs on this one. It’s brutal hence the nick name. Many have puked from it. I’ve found that after two different training sessions doing this most people that puked from it the first two times won’t by the third. Like any other type of training, your body will adapt. I’ve found that most anaerobic lactic conditioning programs your body adapts after the second workout, so now the program (at least the rest intervals) must be changed. Shaving 15 seconds off the rest works great. Shave to much and it takes to long for the adaptation to take place.
Back when I was in Michigan, I had astro turf indoors and your feet didn’t slide with heavy weight. Because of this, I also occasionally used the Prowler as a max effort lift. Especially with young athletes that weren’t ready to squat.
Here’s a quick video of a heavy prowler push that could be used as a max effort lift performed by a friend and past client illustrating what I mean.
What I looked for was good mechanics (no shoddy form just for the sake of heavy weight) and a time frame for my athletes to get from one side of the astro turf to the other, which was around 30 -35 yards. The time I used was 10-12 seconds. If it took longer than that I’d lower the weight.
Farmers Walk: The two main variations I use with this are:
- In and out of cones
- Straight away for distance
The former works your core, hips, and ankles a lot more than the later. This is because the farmers walk implement wants to keep moving in the same direction you were originally going once you’ve changed your direction. Your body has to attempt to prevent the rotation. This is considerably harder than just going in a straight path, thus you’ll have to use less weight. I’ve had athletes that could carry 200 pounds for 100 yards barely able to make 50 yards with the cone drill.
Tire Flips: I currently have no tire at the moment. We left it on the side of our building in the alley and someone stole it. Back when I was in Michigan we had three tires. A 450, 600, and 700 pounder. Which one you flipped obviously depended on your strength but also on the strength quality being trained. If an athlete was training for strength endurance and could only flip the 600 pounder three times, then they’d be using the 450 pounder and flipping it for a designated time or designated reps. Also, what they’re flipping it for would determine where it would fall within their program. You wouldn’t train to improve power under fatigue. Just like any other training program, it should be written with the exercises requiring the most coordination, speed, power, and CNS stimulation in the beginning of the training session.
Sled drags: Lately I’ve been using forward and backward sled drags as a warm up for the vastus medialis, glute max, and hamstrings. We’ll pull backwards for 40 yards and then forwards for 40 yards, adding weight on each set for four warm up sets. In the past I also used these exercises within conditioning circuits and as finishers. When used for warm ups I never use really heavy weight. I don’t want any fatigue before training a big lift.
Rope Pulls: We’ve been attaching a 50 foot one and one half inch nylon rope to the sled and pulling. We’ve been doing four to six sets and adding weight on each set. We either do straight sets with this or super set it with the farmers walk. It all depends on how many people are training so the rest intervals aren’t to long.
Currently that’s all the equipment I’ve been using for our outdoor strongman training sessions. This coming week I will be adding two more pieces of equipment to the mix. Since I don’t have the option of using this equipment inside, it has to get it’s own training day. When I did have that option, I would use an unconventional exercise in replace of a more conventional one when I desired.
For instance, here’s some replacements:
Tire Flip in place of Squats or Dead Lifts
Rope Pull Instead of an elbow flexor or ab exercise
Sled Drag instead of a unilateral leg exercise used for hypertrophy
Farmers Walk instead of a more traditional core exercise or used as a grip exercise
There are many options. Again, the most important thing is knowing what to do and when to do it, which is relevant to the strength qualities you need to bring up. There are entire books written just on loading parameters.
For some real world application, here’s a current workout we just did:
Warm up: Dynamic Mobility Drills and Backwards/Forwards Sled Drags: 4 sets at 40 yards Rest: 2 minutes
1A. Rope Sled Pulls: 4 Sets at 50 yards Rest: 120 seconds
1B. Farmers Walk Around Cones: 4 Sets at 50 yards Rest: 120 seconds
2. Prowler Push Low Handles/High Handles: 4 Sets at 40 yards (there and back is one set)
3. Prowler Push High Handles: 1 Set at 100-120 yards (this must be done as fast as possible) Your goal is to have the fastest time of the group.
Hope this helps and has given you some ideas. A good book that I recommend picking up is Applied Strongman Training For Sport.