Fitness testing at police academies: Optimal fitness for duty

Abstract

Fitter police recruits are more likely to graduate, are less injury-prone, and fatigue less rapidly. Although most police academies implement fitness testing to ensure a minimum standard of job-specific fitness, academies may benefit from utilizing fitness tests that challenge recruits beyond the minimum fitness demand. The current study evaluated whether a fitness test called Professional Fit (ProfFit) of a police academy aligned with the academy’s purpose to challenge their recruits to become optimally fit. We evaluated whether the ProfFit measures an all-round range of fitness characteristics. Moreover, we evaluated whether the ProfFit measures higher fitness levels than the minimum fitness demand for duty. Police recruits (N = 103) were tested on the ProfFit, six extra fitness tests known to measure one (isolated) aspect of fitness, and a standard practice job-specific fitness test. Results showed that the ProfFit measures an all-round range of fitness characteristics: anaerobic power, strength lower extremities, strength upper extremities, isometric strength, and muscular endurance of the trunk muscles. The results also showed that recruits indicated a higher rating of perceived exertion during the ProfFit than during the job-specific fitness test, indicating that they experienced the ProfFit as more demanding than the minimum fitness demand for duty. It was concluded that the ProfFit facilitates to challenge police recruits physically, as was the aim of the police academy. These findings provide empirical support for fitness tests that aim to improve police recruits’ fitness levels to be not just fit for duty, but rather optimally fit for duty.