The Army Fitness Test
Regardless of your age, all soldiers in the Active Army, Army Reserve, and the Army National Guard have to take the Army Physical Fitness Test, also known as the "APFT." The Army Physical Fitness Test is a three-part event that will access your physical ability and test your endurance and cardio fitness. The APFT will put your major muscle groups and respiratory system through the ringer to see how you effectively move and maneuver. How you perform in the testing is linked to a soldier's ability to perform tasks that have some fitness element to them. There are alternate APFT events for soldiers who have permanent profiles or for soldiers who have temporary profiles equaling greater than three-month duration.
Here are the three events that you will perform in the Army Physical Fitness Test. The events are listed in the required order.
-Push-ups
-Sit-ups
-2-mile run
You perform the events in the order listed above, and you will have to take at least 10 minutes to recover and no more than 20 minutes to recover before moving on to the next event.
Push-up event (2 minutes) - This event will test the endurance of your chest, shoulder, and triceps muscles. Depending on your age, there is a specific standard of push-ups you will need to perform in two minutes.
Sit-up event (2 minutes) - Sit-ups will test the endurance of your hip-flexors and abdominal muscles. Again, depending on your age, there is a standard amount of sit-ups you will need to do in that two-minute time frame.
2-mile event - This cardio event will challenge the endurance of your respiratory system and legs, and of course there is a time limit depending on your age.
There are many different exercises you can do to get yourself ready for these fitness tests. Make sure that you continue to do push-ups and sit-ups a few times a week, and always push yourself to the limit when do these workouts. Another great workout to do to get your upper body ready for the push-up test is chin-ups. Begin to do chin-ups and pull-ups, which will build your biceps and back. You can also do some free weight lifting to get your upper body ready for that push-up test.
To train for your sit-ups, you will definitely want to do as many sit-ups as possible, get used to the motion. Start involving extra weight when doing your sit-ups, and make sure that you are timing yourself too. Do not take this event lightly, because you might find it extremely difficult to reach your required amount if you do not prepare.
When preparing for your 2 mile run, make sure you time yourself so you know what pace you will need to run at during the actually testing. Besides running, you can also do interval training and stairs to get your lungs nice and strong. Swimming is another great way to build strength for your lungs, but make sure you get out and run as much as possible.
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Article Source: ArticlesBase.com
