u/HansWorst7

Intro

Having run a ton of programs by now - including all-time classics like 5/3/1 BBB+BtM, Jonnie Canditos 6 Week Strength Program, Super Squats, as well as Mass Template and recently Dan Johns Armor Building Formula, the release of TB3 marked a great timing for me to fully immerse myself in the Tactical Barbell philosophy by running Activation. As first part of it, we have Base, which is basically a cut down Base Building phase we know off TB2: Conditioning. The original BB was quite hard, especially for people who were completely new to running and SE training. I ran the old BB once with the strength first variation but I had to lay it off after week 4 because I got sick. Somehow, I lost myself in other programs after that. The new Base of TB3 is way more in line with people who did lift in their history but have little experience with SE training.

Stats

I didn't test any maxes before (in fact, last time I did was about a year back) but I did track my weight. I started on July 21st 2026 and ended my last run today on August 17th.

I am almost certain I was eating more than before I started the program as I came back from a cut but somehow managed to go from 72.4kg to 71.8kg.

Training

I went for the default cluster of Push Ups, Squats, Inverted Rows and Ab Triad as a finisher. To be more specific:

• I used push up grips
• I used a 16kg Kettlebell for squats
• I used TRX bands for inverted rows
• I adjusted ab triad to 5x leg raise, 5x knee raise, 5x leg raise

The reason I changed the ab triad was mainly because my pull up bar is right at the wall and once I start having to use momentum, my head would bang against the wall (which happened to me the first SE session - ouch).

Also, notice that I never did the full ROM for the cluster exercises. I tried to stay in line of the ab triad thinking - keep slight tension across the full rep range. In hindsight, this might have done things easier.

Nutrition

Honestly, I ate and when I got bored, I ate again. I did not comply to KB's nutrition guidelines though. I just ate as many proteins as possible and other than that, both my wife and I like cooking. So we mostly ate fresh food with whole ingredients. That is to say, I also ate a Pizza here or a Kebab there, so it's not like I had perfect nutrition. I just don't eat it too often. I also did add a protein shake every now and then.

Results

I am quite the beginner runner so bare with me here.

My first run on July 22nd I ran 30 minutes at an average pace of 7'25"/km and an average HR of 130 bpm.
On my last run on August 17th, I ran for 60 minutes at the same pace but my average HR was at 124 bpm for the whole hour. I count this as a win.

The SE sessions felt relatively easy overall. The toughest and last workout got my heart rate up quite a bit but at no point did I feel like I couldn't go on. I took the liberty to record the session.

I also took a picture before and after of my upper body. I feel like I shed off a bit of fat without actually trying. My guess is the caloric demand just shot up because I suddenly did 100k steps per week instead of half of that.

Going on

I'll test my 1RM (2-3RM) in the coming days and see that I continue with Armour. For me, this was definitely a very nice change of pace and I had a lot of fun!

If I forgot to mention anything, feel free to ask!

Also, big shoutout to the small community on Discord running Activation. It's nice to have other people to talk with, ask questions and see how everyone is doing.