Carl-Gustaf Klerck graduated from school in Lund in 1907. He completed his military service as second lieutenant of the Jönköpings Regiment in 1909. In 1915, he was promoted to lieutenant of the reserve of his regiment. Klerck studied at the Central Gymnastics Institute starting in 1910 and became gymnastics director in 1913. He ran his own institute for health and physical education in Berlin in 1913/14 before he re-entered the military service during World War I as regimental adjutant. After the end of the war, he worked as a high school teacher in physical education in several Swedish cities.