Adult Physical Fitness Test
Remember the Physical fitness test we took in gym class in elementary & middle school? It’s BA-ACK! Now, it’s for adults too. Sign up to go for the gold: http://www.presidentschallenge.org/home_adults.aspx
Government to Unveil Fitness Test for Adults
WASHINGTON - If you didn’t get a Presidential Physical Fitness Award in school, the government is giving you another chance to prove you’re in shape.
An adult fitness test is being introduced Wednesday by the President’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sports. It will incorporate several of the exercises that millions of students undertake each year as they aim for a certificate signed by the president.
“What were trying to do is inspire and motivate Americans to move their bodies more,” said Melissa Johnson, executive director of the council.
The test involves three basic components: aerobic fitness, muscular strength and flexibility. The test is for people 18 and older who are in good health. It was inspired by scores of baby boomers who kept asking council members whether there was a fitness test available today that was similar to the ones they took as students, Johnson said.
The aerobic component of the tests consists of a one-mile walk or 1.5-mile run. The run is not recommended for those who don’t run for at least 20 minutes, three times a week.
Push-ups and half sit-ups make up the strength test. The push-ups are done until failure. The sit-ups are done for one minute.
A stretching exercise called the “sit-and-reach” is used to measure flexibility.
The scores from all four of the fitness tests can be entered online. Other information, such as age, gender, height and weight are also part of the equation.
You won’t get a presidential certificate, but the results will then show where you rank among people of the same age. For example, if someone scores in the 75th percentile for push-ups, that means 75 percent of the scores fall below your score.
The fitness test incorporates height and weight to give participants their body mass index. Generally, a BMI score above 25 equates to being overweight. However, for people who do exercise a lot, the BMI score can be high because of their extra muscle mass, not because they have too much fat.
The test will allow people to easily record a baseline that they can work from through their exercise routine.
“The point is to do consistent, regular physical activity and these are good check-in points to see how fit people are,” Johnson said.
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I signed up for this through work a few months ago, and I find it a little confusing. You really have to discipline yourself to find time to go to the website and record everything ecery day, and it goes by the honor system a lot…I really want to try it, but the whole recording system confuses me….just like any part of a government system, it’s not user friendly!
Agreed…I signed up for it too, recorded what I did one time, and then stopped using it. It’s not that fun. It was a lot easier when you just took the physical fitness test in school. I want to take one test and then get a medal if I did well.