As a five-time Fittest Man on Earth, Mat Fraser is no stranger to a gruelling workout. And having recently announced plans to compete again in 2027 – although exactly what he’ll be competing in remains under wraps – it appears Fraser is already ratcheting up his training.

This 300-rep workout (and then some, but we’ll get to that) is the brainchild of US Army soldier and hybrid coach David Winne. Dubbed the ‘301’ test, it’s a brutal full-body challenge of strength, engine and stamina that, if loaded correctly, can also help build your chest, legs, back and pretty much everything in between.

The premise is simple: 100 back squats, 100 bench presses and 100 deadlifts, all with your bodyweight on the bar, followed by a one-mile run. The execution? Well, it might be simple, but it certainly ain’t easy.

Here’s how to tackle it, including our recommendations for scaling the weights and getting through those 300 reps without coming completely unstuck before you’ve even laced up your running shoes.

After a thorough warm-up, start a running clock and complete the following in order, as quickly as possible with good form:

The original challenge uses a barbell loaded to your bodyweight for all three lifts. If you weigh 80kg, you’re squatting 80kg.

Complete all 100 reps of each movement before moving on to the next. Break those reps into as many sets as necessary, but keep the clock running throughout, including your rests and transitions. Your finishing time is recorded when you complete the mile.

Use rack safeties for the squats and bench presses, or have a reliable spotter on hand. Seriously.

There are a couple of ways to approach this workout if bodyweight on the bar isn’t going to happen.

You could pick a single load for all three lifts, based on your strength in the hardest lift of the three – most likely the bench press – and then try to get through every rep as quickly as possible while keeping your form in check.

The other option is to use a different weight for each lift, capitalising on your strengths so that each movement presents a similar challenge. This is our recommendation if you want to get more out of the muscle-building side of the workout, rather than finding yourself grinding through the bench presses before breezing through comparatively light deadlifts.

For each movement, pick a weight you know you can hit for around 20 clean reps when fresh. That gives you the option of getting through a significant chunk of the work straight off the bat: 20% of your total reps for that movement.

There’s no need to force all 20 if the final few would become a fight, though. Leave a rep or two in the tank, then rest as necessary to keep hitting reasonably high-rep sets as you work towards that 100 mark.

You don’t want to be resting two to three minutes between every set. The idea is still to get through this quickly, giving yourself a bit of metabolic spice while making the muscles work hard. Get close to failure, but stop before your technique starts to unravel.

Naturally, each mini-set is going to drop off. Your first might be 20 reps, followed by 18, then 15, and you might only be repping out sets of five towards the end. That’s fine. Whatever keeps your form in check and stops you getting decapitated by the bar.

As soon as you rack the bar or put it down between sets, your focus should be on recovery. A rule of thumb I like to follow is to take as many controlled breaths as the number of reps you’ve just completed before getting back under the bar. Twenty reps, 20 breaths. Five reps, five breaths.

It’s a simple way to give your rests some structure, with shorter sets followed by shorter breaks. Treat it as a guide, though: if you’re still too breathless to brace properly, take longer. Don’t let the clock dictate your technique.

Whichever approach you choose, record your finishing time and the weights you used for all three movements. Once you can complete a movement in five sets of 20 or fewer sets, with good form throughout, you know it’s time to nudge the weight up on your next outing.

Chances are, by the time you’ve put the bar down for the final time, you’re going to be completely smoked. This is compromised running: heading out with fatigue already firmly lodged in your legs. It makes this a useful challenge for experienced trainees preparing for Hyrox, or anyone who wants to discover what it feels like to run through treacle.

A mile isn’t a horrendously long distance, but after 300 reps it’s going to feel considerably longer. Give yourself a moment to find your stride, then open the taps and aim to finish as fast as you can sustain.

If you know your usual one-mile pace, see how close you can get. With that much work in your legs, something closer to your 5K pace might be a more realistic starting point. Adjust to how you’re moving, and if you’ve got anything left in the final stretch, now’s the time to really leave it all out there.

However you decide to tackle this one, Godspeed. It ain’t easy. But as the big man himself says, ‘hard work pays off’.

With almost 18 years in the health and fitness space as a personal trainer, nutritionist, breath coach and writer, Andrew has spent nearly half of his life exploring how to help people improve their bodies and minds.    

As our fitness editor he prides himself on keeping Men’s Health at the forefront of reliable, relatable and credible fitness information, whether that’s through writing and testing thousands of workouts each year, taking deep dives into the science behind muscle building and fat loss or exploring the psychology of performance and recovery.   

Whilst constantly updating his knowledge base with seminars and courses, Andrew is a lover of the practical as much as the theory and regularly puts his training to the test tackling everything from Crossfit and strongman competitions, to ultra marathons, to multiple 24 hour workout stints and (extremely unofficial) world record attempts.   

 You can find Andrew on Instagram at @theandrew.tracey, or simply hold up a sign for ‘free pizza’ and wait for him to appear.