Navy following the Army's lead...

Army basic, in the late 80’s, was hard but not too bad for people of even average fitness levels. Those that played HS football or ran cross country did the best on runs or PT, the PT standards were passable for most of my platoon. Even then, there was a “Fat Camp” for recruits that showed up as fat bodies.

I wasn’t a fat body but even I lost 20 pounds. I’m not sure what the average was for weight loss but I think most everyone lost a good amount. Based on what I see in my day to day life, I’m not surprised that these young people would struggle to get through basic. I see so many more fat teenagers now than I ever remember in my youth. They also live a softer life and suffer less stress then previous generations . I’m sure the physiological aspect of Basic is even worse on them than the physical parts. No cellphone or XBox, no Mommy doing their laundry or making them chicken nuggets.

I’d love to see some of these green and pink haired kids at Ft Bragg in the 80’s, doing PT 5 days a week and being treated like cattle. I would think the line for Sick Call would circle the building, full of malingerers and malcontents trying to get out of PT and other daily duties.
 
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@Car0linab0y

According to my brother who made a career out of the Air Force (he's 13 years older, for perspective), the Navy's PRT is a failed Air Force program.

Doesn't surprise me.

The best way to get and stay, fit is for exercise to be an actual part of your military job. Not just something you do as an exercise requirement, but as legitimate part of your job.

Some rates (MOS, whatever) are more difficult than others to do this, but that doesn't change this.
 
The USAF position was that fitness is an individual responsibility and you were expected to take care of being fit on your own time. The annual fitness test was just an evaluation to ensure you were doing it.

Horse crap imo; I always said we should have some sort of unit fitness. Would have built unit cohesion and helped remind the little darlings that we were a branch of the military and not a corporation who wore the same funny clothes.

To be fair, the units that were directly combat related were better about it. I understand that 20 years of GWOT helped instill a bit more warrior mindset, but only some.
 
Chdamn said:
I was made to do push-ups in boot camp until I volunteered to be a linguist.

Once that paper was signed I wasn’t allowed to change my MOS unless I re-enlisted. Nobody told me that until I graduated.

Hell I was even turned down to try out for the Marine Corps boxing team and I had been boxing since I was 10 and won golden gloves in my bracket.

Apparently boxing team is an MOS. Who knew?

Apparently linguist is the second most expensive primary MOS. LOL.
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The Marines (I think all the branches, but I can't swear to it) have members whose only job is semi-pro/Olympic sports: boxing, wrestling, judo, shooting, etc. A good job, if you can get it.

There was a guy in my company at Navy boot, one parent was from the Middle East, the other from somewhere in northern Africa. He spoke four or five languages. His NEC (navyspeak for MOS) was something like boiler technician, I don't remember. But something mechanical. They kept trying to get him to switch to linguist, dangles a crap-ton of dough, all sorts of incentives. I do not know if he did it or not.
 
RetiredUSNChief said:
@Car0linab0y

According to my brother who made a career out of the Air Force (he's 13 years older, for perspective), the Navy's PRT is a failed Air Force program.

Doesn't surprise me.

The best way to get and stay, fit is for exercise to be an actual part of your military job. Not just something you do as an exercise requirement, but as legitimate part of your job.

Some rates (MOS, whatever) are more difficult than others to do this, but that doesn't change this.
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A physically-intensive MOS/NEC is definitely the best way to stay in shape. I mean, I know the services need admin/finance/IT/computer, etc., and I am not knocking them. At all. It must be challenging to be in what is essentially a 8-4 office job and have to do 'extra' PT on the side.

You wanna know what the AF is doing for their AFSOF/specwar recruits? It's pretty awesome. Once they sign their contract, they are assigned a mentor who has a pool of like recruits, and the get ready for AF basic. By this time these guys are physical beasts since they are going into special operations. Then in basic, they are in a flight (i.e., 'company', platoon, etc.) with other like recruits, where they are fed differently, have nutritionists, physical therapy, trainers, access to latest high-tech training and gyms.

The AF recognized that if they wanted the best physically qualified candidate, they needed to do something different. The Navy did something similar but not nearly as involved, but I understand they don't do it anymore.
 
Being a submariner isn't a physically demanding job, as I'm sure nobody here would argue. At least, in comparison to many other military occupations. However, fitness is still required, if only because it's part of being in the military.

Yeah, there are some physically demanding jobs aboard submarines. At 69" tall and 140-150 pounds, I'd take on pretty much anybody when it comes to opening Main Steam 1 or 2 aboard an S5W submarine. And I could get a 90 pound submersible pump from one end of the boat to the other, through all the compartment hatches, and then lower it from upper level down to the bilge (and later back up) by myself during flooding drills. (It's actually a two man operation to tote the pump with its accompanying cable, rope, and control box, with the pump itself weighing 90 pounds. The guy carrying the pump is by far carrying most of the weight.)

You've got to be able to do your job, which is more than just Yeoman, Supply Clerk, Helmsman/Planesman, Reactor Operator, etc. If you can't don a full FFE and enter a burning compartment to combat a raging fire aboard your own ship, who else will? If you can't get the tools to the scene and employ them to combat a flooding casualty, who will? Anybody who thinks you don't have to be physically fit to do these things very likely has never had the opportunity to train in facilities designed to actually put you in burning compartments to combat fires...fires that won't go out unless you apply the proper firefighting techniques.

My opinion is that if you're in the military, you need to be prepared to actually meet physical challenges as if your life, the life of your shipmates, the lives of your unit, etc. depend on it. Because in the military THEY ACTUALLY DO DEPEND ON IT.

Not everybldy has to be SEAL/Ranger fit...but you DO have to be "fit".
 
RetiredUSNChief said:
Being a submariner isn't a physically demanding job, as I'm sure nobody here would argue. At least, in comparison to many other military occupations. However, fitness is still required, if only because it's part of being in the military.

Yeah, there are some physically demanding jobs aboard submarines. At 69" tall and 140-150 pounds, I'd take on pretty much anybody when it comes to opening Main Steam 1 or 2 aboard an S5W submarine. And I could get a 90 pound submersible pump from one end of the boat to the other, through all the compartment hatches, and then lower it from upper level down to the bilge (and later back up) by myself during flooding drills. (It's actually a two man operation to tote the pump with its accompanying cable, rope, and control box, with the pump itself weighing 90 pounds. The guy carrying the pump is by far carrying most of the weight.)

You've got to be able to do your job, which is more than just Yeoman, Supply Clerk, Helmsman/Planesman, Reactor Operator, etc. If you can't don a full FFE and enter a burning compartment to combat a raging fire aboard your own ship, who else will? If you can't get the tools to the scene and employ them to combat a flooding casualty, who will? Anybody who thinks you don't have to be physically fit to do these things very likely has never had the opportunity to train in facilities designed to actually put you in burning compartments to combat fires...fires that won't go out unless you apply the proper firefighting techniques.

My opinion is that if you're in the military, you need to be prepared to actually meet physical challenges as if your life, the life of your shipmates, the lives of your unit, etc. depend on it. Because in the military THEY ACTUALLY DO DEPEND ON IT.

Not everybldy has to be SEAL/Ranger fit...but you DO have to be "fit".
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Absolutely agree.

I know the army had played around with MOS-specific physical fitness tests. I think that idea has merit. No, no everyone has to be "recon ranger SEAL beret" fit. But yes, fit.
 
As a 6 ft 185 lb air force computer guy, I wound up with a lot of the physically demanding tasks.

150 pound power supplies inside a disk unit you could barely get your hands in; 120 pound power supply rack-mounted 6 feet off the floor that had 12 spade lugs on the back to take off while someone held it in front of the rack.... (did I mention I despise engineers?)

Could account for the bad back lol... but back then I was fit.
 
Car0linab0y said:
As a 6 ft 185 lb air force computer guy, I wound up with a lot of the physically demanding tasks.

150 pound power supplies inside a disk unit you could barely get your hands in; 120 pound power supply rack-mounted 6 feet off the floor that had 12 spade lugs on the back to take off while someone held it in front of the rack.... (did I mention I despise engineers?)

Could account for the bad back lol... but back then I was fit.
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Rack mounted UPS ain't light, either.

Heck, a case of paper weighs about 50 pounds, and there are people out there who have problems with that...including all those "office people" who think they have no need to PT.
 
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