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Posted: 4/18/2017 9:26:33 PM EDT
I was doing some reading on Roman warriors and it went into their physical.conditining. They routinely had to march 19 miles in 5 hours or less with about 100 lbs or so of kit on their back.
Is this an extreme feat or is it doable by today's .mil training for combat arms guys? |
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That's about the standard today, with many high speed types surpassing that.
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Yeah that's doable. EIB road march is 12 miles in 3 hours with about 60 pounds of gear. I know a couple people who did it in 2 1/4 hours. We did a 25 mile in about 7.5 hours once which sucked ass but with enough training it's not too hard.
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It wouldnt be easy for the vast majority of combat arms.
And fighting when the march ended would be damn near impossible without some rest. |
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I'm not a soldier but dad was (Not Roman!!! ) He always asked, when questions like this came up from .civ people, "how much did you guys carry? how far? how fast? etc. "
Dad "road march or over uneven terrain? Weather? How much water do I have" All the details mattered to him. |
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100 lbs with rough terrain would suck bad at 15 min per mile. Rucking along a road makes it quite a bit easier.
It's possible for those in shape, but it's not fun at all. I would say the majority of combat arms wouldn't be able to do it assuming it was off-road. |
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12 miles in 3 hrs is the standard. That's "walking".....not your normal walk, more like a "mall walker"
We used to do it in just a little over 2 hrs. We'd run then walk the run then walk, etc. Airborne shuffle pace most of the way. 19 miles in 5 hrs is absolutely do-able. |
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I'm not a soldier but dad was (Not Roman!!! ) He always asked, when questions like this came up from .civ people, "how much did you guys carry? how far? how fast? etc. " Dad "road march or over uneven terrain? Weather? How much water do I have" All the details mattered to him. View Quote The weight is pretty high especially considering the average Roman soldier wasn't that big of a guy. I think the weight may be a sort of "max" and not their typical load. |
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View Quote Made me a firm believer in the "pack light, freeze at night" mantra. pack water and bullets....it's all you need. |
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Not sure now, long time ago. All Marine combat arms units had to do at least couple times a year a march 25 miles within 8 hours with weapon and full gear. We usually did 27-28 miles in 7 hours.
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Off/sorta on topic... I went through infantry reclass and the ruck 12mi in 3 hours was a go/no-go event on day 2. If you didn't make it you retested on day 6.
I did NO training to prepare for this and used my admin boots on top of it. I started getting hot spots about mile 2, and by the end I had blisters on both heels half and again bigger than half dollars, both big toes, and both little toes.. I made with about 15-20 mins to spare. I made it but the rest of the course SUCKED! We had to do another 6 mile movement with about 85 -95 lbs of gear to our AA at the end of week 2. Just because you can do it doesn't mean you should. |
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Not sure now, long time ago. All Marine combat arms units had to do at least couple times a year a march 25 miles within 8 hours with weapon and full gear. We usually did 27-28 miles in 7 hours. View Quote |
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They would also train with swords and shields that were 3x heavier than the real ones. This way they would be faster when using them and not tire as easily
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Another big difference is that I'm pretty sure romans didn't have the hig speed rucks that we had. Waste belts really help distribute weight. 100 lbs in a 2000 year old design backpack would suck.
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Another big difference is that I'm pretty sure romans didn't have the hig speed rucks that we had. Waste belts really help distribute weight. 100 lbs in a 2000 year old design backpack would suck. View Quote |
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For training, yes, you could do that.
Thats a little fast for pratical work, as you wanted to be in shape to fight if you got ambushed, and at the end of the day you may need to dig in, build fortifications, etc. So PT is one thing; on campaign, 20 miles or so in 10 hours, plus fortifying, every day. Over and over again. Here is a good source: As the Roman Legionnaires could be expected to march up to 32 kilometres per day and then fortify their night camp, they needed to be physically conditioned for such a task.33 To prepare the Roman soldier to carry such loads and march long distances, Flavius Vegetius, in his work Epitoma rei militaris (Epitome of Military Science), recommended that recruits carry a load of up to 60 Roman pounds (19.6 kilograms), route marching at the ‘military step’ of 32 kilometres for five hours (a pace of 6.4 kilometres per hour) or at the ‘full step’ of 39 kilometres in the same time (a pace of 7.7 kilometres per hour).34 This load did not include the soldier’s clothing and weapons, and was designed to condition the soldier to carry rations as well as arms during campaigns.35 http://103.11.78.168/~/media/Files/Our%20future/LWSC%20Publications/AAJ/2010Winter/07-TheHistoryOfTheSoldiers.pdf |
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Those long ass marches are dumb, at the end of it, no unit could possibly be combat effective.
It does not improve your health and fitness, in any way. It does more harm than good. When you have Infantry and SF guys with backs and knees of a 60 or 70 year old man, when they're only 40 years old. |
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The firka wasn't a backpack, it was a pole with a bunch of their equipment packed on the end. Not too dissimilar from the bindle popular with hobos in the early 1900's. View Quote |
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Just googled that. That's 10 times worse than a 2000 year old backpack design. That would REALLY suck. You sure it was 100 lbs? View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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The firka wasn't a backpack, it was a pole with a bunch of their equipment packed on the end. Not too dissimilar from the bindle popular with hobos in the early 1900's. |
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MCCRES was ~26 miles and I don't remember how long it took. We left at night and got back to main side at sunrise.
Those sucked but the pace was manageable. The workups for MCMWTC sucked much ass. Those were some of the hardest foot movements I have ever done. |
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A roman mile was a thousand steps. That's where we got the word 'mile' from. I would want to double check the writers sources about how they did translations and conversions.
The one section comes to 20 U.S. miles per day with 43 pounds of gear plus armor and weapons. That's doable day after day. |
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Totally doable by modern infantry. I've done 12 miles in under 3 hours many times when I was in.
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It's doable, but it's a different type of fitness. I knew PT studs who would smoke me constantly on 2-5 mile runs but always fell behind on the longer ruck marches. My best 2 mile time was a 13:10, but I could really "embrace the suck" when the shitty physical stuff came around. Probably why my back mirrors that of a ww2 veteran .
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It's doable, but it's a different type of fitness. I knew PT studs who would smoke me constantly on 2-5 mile runs but always fell behind on the longer ruck marches. My best 2 mile time was a 13:10, but I could really "embrace the suck" when the shitty physical stuff came around. Probably why my back mirrors that of a ww2 veteran . View Quote |
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http://i.imgur.com/RNWPpTo.jpghttp://i.imgur.com/XkdFxGx.jpg https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/7a/c8/f7/7ac8f71e54f89c3d1584936448dd80eb.jpg View Quote The soldier's load in WWII was a lot closer to the Roman load than the shit we pile on infantry today. The WWII Soldier's Load |
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A roman mile was a thousand steps. That's where we got the word 'mile' from. I would want to double check the writers sources about how they did translations and conversions. The one section comes to 20 U.S. miles per day with 43 pounds of gear plus armor and weapons. That's doable day after day. View Quote Also, I think today's foot soldiers are bigger, better and faster then they have EVER been. We have so much better understanding of exercise, food and fighting disease. Not to mention, those crazy fuckers ATE lead, it was a popular "spice" in Roman culture. |
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Its doable for sure. Not fun, but achievable.
Would straight suck cock carrying a pole though. |
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I was doing some reading on Roman warriors and it went into their physical.conditining. They routinely had to march 19 miles in 5 hours or less with about 100 lbs or so of kit on their back. Is this an extreme feat or is it doable by today's .mil training for combat arms guys? View Quote What were you reading that claimed 100lbs? 20 miles per Day with ~70lbs has been a standard since Roman times. Which is hardcore enough. No need to exaggerate anything. |
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You got to think about the times also. They walked everywhere. My father walked 6 miles to school school and 6 miles back. Not flat land but over a mountain as it was closer then around. It was normal for him. My 5 year old can't walk around the mall without complaining.
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A marching pole? Damn. View Quote |
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The must have been itching to chuck those pilums at the enemy after carrying them for weeks on march.
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I wonder if that's as uncomfortable as it sounds? We're talking about an era where every leather or textile craftsman would be considered an artist by our standards. They had satchels and the like. There must've been some reason for them to choose the pole over a pack. The Romans prized efficiency, maybe there was something to there method that we dismiss so easily. Then again, it could be like native Americans never discovering a practical use for the wheel... View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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A marching pole? Damn. |
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You got to think about the times also. They walked everywhere. My father walked 6 miles to school school and 6 miles back. Not flat land but over a mountain as it was closer then around. It was normal for him. My 5 year old can't walk around the mall without complaining. View Quote |
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Minimum height for Legionaries was 5'5" so they weren't tiny. (Minimum in US military for males is 5 foot.) View Quote |
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4mph with 100 pounds of gear, crappy load bearing equipment, and in sandals doesn't sound like it was a regular standard/realistic. Roman soldiers weren't as big as your average American soldier either nor did they have as healthy a diet. 100 pounds in gear would have been a very big deal.
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Driving past a column of marching soldiers today I would swear they had a 10y/o girl in the formation. Her head didn't reach the shoulder of the soldier next to her. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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Minimum height for Legionaries was 5'5" so they weren't tiny. (Minimum in US military for males is 5 foot.) So I guess he was a giant dwarf. |
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Driving past a column of marching soldiers today I would swear they had a 10y/o girl in the formation. Her head didn't reach the shoulder of the soldier next to her. View Quote Yeah, you're still a prick......and I hate you. But you have me respect, sir. |
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