conditioning
Navy Seals
Works in
home, gym, calisthenics
Equipment
none
Primary muscles
full body, core, cardio
Why do it
One Navy Seal is roughly three burpees' worth of work, so treat ten of these like thirty burpees. The knee-to-elbow push-ups hammer the obliques and deep core while the chest and shoulders are already burning, and the jump keeps the heart rate pinned. Program them anywhere you would program burpees, just cut the reps to about a third.
How to do it
A burpee with three push-ups built in. Drop from standing into a squat, kick the feet back to a plank, then do three push-ups: the first one strict, the second driving the right knee to the right elbow at the top, the third driving the left knee to the left elbow. Jump the feet back in and explode straight up into a jump. That full sequence is one rep.
What the science says
Burpee-style whole-body intervals are proven engine builders: sprint interval training lifts VO2 max, a core marker of fitness, by around 8 percent (Gist et al., 2014, Sports Medicine). The knee drives layer core-stability work on top of that engine stimulus.
Fun fact
Bodyweight complexes like this one are often named after military units because armed forces PT culture loves brutal, memorable named drills, this is a folk name earned in gyms and boot camps, not a movement pulled from an official Navy SEAL training manual.