Training and preparing for Delta Force Selection and Assessment

I was a Green Beret stationed in Key West, Florida when I made up my turbulent mind to train up and try out for an assignment with the 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment Delta (1st SFOD-D).

Several men from my Key West assignment had already tried out before me. And it was a crap shoot among the men who would make it through Selection and who would fail.

The immediate problem I identified in my training was that Key West was only ever just a couple of feet above sea level. However, the testing ground for Delta’s Selection and Assessment (S&A) was West (by God) Virginia, arguably one of the most mountainous regions in the CONUS United States.

To account for the missing feet in elevation, I took to climbing the stairs on the tallest buildings I could get access to. One of them, the Bachelor’s Officer’s Quarter (BEQ) building, was just next door to my unit assignment compound on the Naval installation where I was stationed.

It was some 12 stories high, and I took to climbing it at least 10 times per day, and sometimes I went there twice per day.

Included in Delta’s published recommended training curriculum for S&A, were long marches a couple of times per week. Since Key West rested on the U.S. Interstate on mile marker zero, I took to making my long marches in accordance with the mile markers headed north toward Miami. For example, if the march was to be 20 miles in length, I would simple start in Key West, march to mile marker ten, and then return.

To give myself a little new scenery on the last of the scheduled 20-mile marches, I had my then wife, Myra, pick me up at the 20-miles marker at a specified time. That gave me 10 miles of new boring scenery to look at while I endured my march.

A candidate assigned to the U.S. Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School takes part in a an early morning ruck march as part of Special Forces Assessment and Selection (SFAS) at Camp Mackall, North Carolina January 13, 2026. (U.S. Army photo by K. Kassens)

My march speeds were so accurate that I was able to calculate a pick-up time that only had me waiting for my ride for some seven minutes, a period I spent laying down and drinking the remainder of my water!

By the time I had finished my training for Selection, and was loading my suitcase in my car to depart for the airport, I paused and took notice of one very important fact: just before been limping on my short walk to my car.

I was sore and sporting some minor injuries to my feet and legs, essentially from over-training. I leveled with myself: “Limping to S&A is no way to proceed; I’m setting myself up for failure to be sure!”

With that, I re-entered my house and unpacked my suitcase. I spent that evening with Jesus querying whether this endeavor was for me or not.

By the next morning, I was resolute to start over with a new training regimen that I would begin after two weeks of rest and recovery.

I again followed the recommendations in the Delta training guide, and if I were not able to meet any of the distances or speeds by the date it directed… I did not sweat it – I just did the best I could and drove on at all cost.

In the end, it was to be just as it was explained to me by a Delta soldier who went on before me: “It is an out-of-body experience, demanding the very best you could offer.”

Related: Lock-picking 101 with the Delta Force

(Cartoon courtesy of author)

During my training for Delta Force I drew the above cartoon and posted it in my Green Beret unit’s quarters in Key West to impart some sense of humor to the rest of the guys, to whom it was just as much a mystery as to me whether I would make it a through the first phase of the Unit’s selection. I named the cartoon “Delta Selection.”

I knew no better than anyone else if I would pass or fail, and I never knew who won my old wall locker – ah, ha!

And yet it happened!

By Almighty God and with Honor,
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