[Buhoutsoupfap]

Today's AFT posted an article about Airmen taking extreme measures to lose inches around thier waist because of this new test. WHAT? What have they been doing over the past 5 years? What changed in the last few months that makes people to have to suddenly lose weight?

According to the new charts, females actually can have a bigger waist under the new standards from 35" to 35.5"...males, we lost an inch...down to 39" from 40". Still, one inch creates a ton of rapid weight loss schemes? Starvation, Liposuction, Prep H treatments with wraps? Why now?

The article makes you think this program just started last month, but this test has been around for 5 years!

Here are some things I noted from the article:

Football players who are fit, but wouldn't score perfect on the test: Okay, most Airmen who are big, aren't football players, they are fat.

Height to waist ratios: Sounds good for the tall guy, but that short guy ain't buying it!

Airmen testing Airmen: I doubt that will ever come back now.

Civilian testers: I see them at WAPS time too.

All this rapid weight loss talk is making me realize that there must have been more cheating going on than I ever realized...this AFT article just confirmed it.

[Nurse_sero]

Today's AFT posted an article about Airmen taking extreme measures to lose inches around thier waist because of this new test. WHAT? What have they been doing over the past 5 years? What changed in the last few months that makes people to have to suddenly lose weight?

According to the new charts, females actually can have a bigger waist under the new standards from 35" to 35.5"...males, we lost an inch...down to 39" from 40". Still, one inch creates a ton of rapid weight loss schemes? Starvation, Liposuction, Prep H treatments with wraps? Why now?

The article makes you think this program just started last month, but this test has been around for 5 years!

The difference is that there are stringent minimums in the test now. Before you could have a larger waist, still run a 13.5 and do as many push ups and sit ups as needed to pass. Now, you can do excellent on three events and fail due to less than 1/2 an inch on your waist.
Here are some things I noted from the article:

Football players who are fit, but wouldn't score perfect on the test: Okay, most Airmen who are big, aren't football players, they are fat. The article isn't about the fatbodies, it's about the people who are 1 or 2 inches over the maximum measurment. While most of the Airforce isn't built like a professional football star, there are a number of amateur or college football players, weight lifters, and body builders in the airforce that are just as likely to fail based on waist as the fatbodies are. Which is why the test is unfair. If even one fit person fails, then it isn't a sufficient or accurate standard for fitness.

Height to waist ratios: Sounds good for the tall guy, but that short guy ain't buying it! Why? Because a 5"1' guy with a beer belly is still skinnier around the waist than the 6"1' guy with less body fat?
Height to Weight ratios are a nationally recognized standard, and they're what everyone is referring to when they talk about obesity in america.
Airmen testing Airmen: I doubt that will ever come back now.

Civilian testers: I see them at WAPS time too. There have been issues with the testers using their own interpretations of certain events. I know for one, as someone who actually has to look at right angles all the time, that hands shoulder width apart elbows at a 90 degree angle should never end with my nose in the dirt (That's actually a 45 degree angle).


In the end, the new test has "jumped the shark" in several areas. First of all, the physical fitness test is not a job performance test, and never should be. If it was I'd be complaining about a different job performance requirement for males and females. Creating minimums and tying the test to performance reviews makes it a job performance test, and it still doesn't say that the person who passes is good at their job.
Secondly, they released a test that they knew, before even releasing it, that 1/4 of the Air Force was going to fail, and tied that new test to performance reviews and ability to re-enlist. In an airforce that is constantly undermanned in maintenance fields they release a test that stops people from being able to re-enlist, get promoted, and move bases or career fields.
I know the line we're given, "We want to make the Airforce as ready to fight as the Army or Marines". But we don't do any of the things those other forces do, we don't do squadron PT across the force, we don't do combat drills. The closest I got to hand-to-hand fighting classes from the Airforce was a Tech in BMT telling us the scream at an attacker, kick them in the groin and run away!

Our mission is to "Fly, Fight, and Win", not conduct ground war operations (Those supporting ground war operations and Security Forces excluded). To do that we need maintainers. Maintenance doesn't happen in a deployed location, it happens back at home, or, at furthest, in some nice base several countries away from the fighting. We're losing maintainers constantly because we have to work long hours, get very little respect, and still have to find time to pt after 10+ hours at a physically demanding job. Ready for the front lines or not, if the person can do the job, we need to let them do it. Not kick them out and put civilians (most of which have left the airforce or been kicked out and strictly cannot be put in the front lines) in the same job.

The idea of the "dumb jock" is false. However, you don't get 90+ on a PT test without thinking of yourself first when the mission threatens your ability to pass a PT test or even attend to your physical fitness. When the option is losing two hours of work to clean up, lunch, and set up, that guy isn't going to care about the mission over proper nutrition and health.
You work an 11 hour shift with no lunch pretty normally in a high-ops-tempo base and job. That kills your metabolism. You don't have the energy anymore to keep that up along with a rigorous PT program. You lose your ability to efficiently metabolize and digest food, leading to more fat.
You burn out quickly. Mentally and physically.

The PT test shouldn't be tied in with performance, it should be one thing, a test of your physical fitness. Turning it into an infantry training program, or skill assessment test is going beyond what it's intended to be. It's "jumping the shark".

[zuhraliyana]

Wow...that's a good summary. You brought up some good points....

[casinobonbone]

Today's AFT posted an article about Airmen taking extreme measures to lose inches around thier waist because of this new test. WHAT? What have they been doing over the past 5 years? What changed in the last few months that makes people to have to suddenly lose weight?

According to the new charts, females actually can have a bigger waist under the new standards from 35" to 35.5"...males, we lost an inch...down to 39" from 40". Still, one inch creates a ton of rapid weight loss schemes? Starvation, Liposuction, Prep H treatments with wraps? Why now?

The article makes you think this program just started last month, but this test has been around for 5 years!

Here are some things I noted from the article:

Football players who are fit, but wouldn't score perfect on the test: Okay, most Airmen who are big, aren't football players, they are fat.

Height to waist ratios: Sounds good for the tall guy, but that short guy ain't buying it!

Airmen testing Airmen: I doubt that will ever come back now.

Civilian testers: I see them at WAPS time too.

All this rapid weight loss talk is making me realize that there must have been more cheating going on than I ever realized...this AFT article just confirmed it.

As previously mentioned...the minimum standards in each category also changed. But, here's another reason people are resorting to DRASTIC measures. The goofy Air Force is making people test WAIST ONLY even if they are unable to do any other Physical Fitness activity to burn calories as a result of an injury. That's BS. So, as a result, people have to do what they have to do to pass. (hence: "DRASTIC MEASURES")