Major Donny Bigham (Retired) | Military Performance Specialist, Coach, & Power Lifter: LEAN FORWARD IN THE FOXHOLE, TACTICAL TRAINING, PURSUE YOUR POTENTIAL, HEAT & COLD RECOVERY TACTICS, FAITH, & ASSESSMENT STRATEGIES

Retired Major Donny Bigham served 27 years of service to our Nation in the Marine Corps and the US Army with deployments to Bosnia, Afghanistan, Kuwait, and Yemen. He was the First ever Strength and Conditioning Coach for the US Army (Conventional Forces) for the past six years while in uniform. Instrumental in being part of the team that changed the US Army Physical Fitness test after almost 40 years and co-authoring the Occupational Performance Assessment Test for initial screening of future Soldiers. Donny designed the Tactical Athlete Performance Center (TAP-C) at Fort Jackson and Fort Benning, emphasizing true strength, mobility, and speed to increase lethality and survivability across six pillars for the Warrior! Lastly, the TAP-C is the first-ever center that trains over 600 Soldiers daily within a Combat Battalion designed under his tenure. Donny was recognized as the 2017 TSAC-Facilitator of the Year (Strength Coach) and also awarded the 2016 Army Male Athlete of the Year. He is a 2x IPF World Champion in Raw Powerlifting and the current drug tested IPF World Record Holder in the Squat. He is currently a Ph.D. student at Rocky Mountain University pursuing a terminal degree in Human Sport and Performance.

IG: @onetimepowerlifting

Military Awards and Schools: Bronze Star, Meritorious Service Medal, Ranger, Airborne, Air Assault, Combat Infantry Badge, and Expert infantryman Badge.

Strength Coaching Credentials: NSCA RSCC, CSCS, *D, TSAC-F, *D, RPR, USAW 1, FMS 1 & 2, TRX 1 & 2, Kfit 1 & 2

He is also the Owner of OneTimePowerlifting L.L.C. and programs alongside Sorinex on the TrainHeroic Platform, and Educates in partnership with Kabuki Strength.

Mentions on Podcast
Breath Belt: Code: EDGES20
thebreathbelt.com

Sorinex Tactical App: STATP 
https://www.sorinex.com/pages/statp

MTN TOUGH + APP
https://mtntough.com

Kabuki Strength Education
https://www.kabukieducation.com

(Time stamps + 1:45)

1:34 Lean forward in the foxhole

3:10 If you don’t understand the brain, you’ll miss the mark

8:00 Effecting Human Performance in the Army, Changing Army PT test

9:00 Energy Systems for Military, Barriers to Implement Systems

17:40 Military Opportunities in Military

22:30 Military Guys Different, Athletes Given too much potential, Having guys that are coachable

25:55 Powerlifting, 2x World Champion & World Record

27:30 Donny’s Philosophy. Faith, Use what you have, because God will take them away

29:20 Pursue God, Bible lesson, Following the Cloud, Pushing us towards the promiseland

31:30 God and Proximity (33:18)

33:30 Helping or hurting, gifts, your responsibility to pursue

36:30 Why listen to God? What was your purpose to be deployed

40:10 Sorinex Tactical app, Go Wheel & Mountain Tough

41:20 What seperates the app from others?

41:40 Assessment built in, specificity, demo

42:00 Rower 2k in 8 min, elite VO2 630

43:12 The importance of getting assessed before the program

44:30 Learned by working with thousands, need to be efficient

45:50 Baseline Strength

47:30 Best advice to recovery and train optimally, programmed recovery and specificity

48:15 Hot and Cold therapy

50:00 Doesn’t set anything before 9am, 10 hours of sleep non-negotiable

50:30 Massage therapist, yoga

51:20 Breath Belt

56:57 Cold arm exposure experiment on soldiers