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No fatties allowed...how does the Navy reduce the displacement tonnage of its sailors?

Spekkio

Spekkio

He bowls overhand.
Flash said:
Okay, I get that we have a new emphasis on fitness which isn't in itself a bad thing but when you have folks away from their regular work now for up to 4-6 hours every week now it is getting a bit much. And yes, the USAF is still doing ultimate frisbee along with field trips and 'squadron days' what seems like every other Friday now. What is it, the military or elementary school? /rantoff
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On the one hand, if the military is going to require a mandatory periodic physical fitness assessment, then that needs to be part of the work routine.

On the other hand, the standards for male / female (outside of Special Warfare / Expeditionary) are:
-Have less than a 46" / 49" waist
-Be able to do 37 / 16 "push-ups"
-Do a 1:10 / 1:00 "plank"
-jog 1.5 miles in 13:30 / 15:30. Or just huff on a bike for 12 minutes with > 85 RPM.

Doing a 10 minute calisthenic session on the pier followed by a 20 minute jog 3x a week while chowing down on some Dunkin Donuts and a box o joe will get you well above standards. Unfortunately, the Navy PFA instruction discourages this kind of command PT.

I find it funny that SECDEF ordered a reversion of standards to 1990 or some shit and we lowered our existing fitness standards by a large margin. Well played ADM Caudyl. Well played.
 
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WhiskeySierra6 said:
Can you expand on this because I'm not seeing the same thing? What am I missing here?
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Well, prior to 2016, you had to be within height / weight standards or pass a rope and choke with 22% / 30% bodyfat for men / women. So reasonably, you're pushing it if you have about a 36-38" / 32-34" waist... provided the test was administered properly.

Then we said screw that noise, we'll go to a flat 39" / 35.5" waist.

Then SECDEF said that the Navy is too fat and we need to fix ourselves by going back to the standards of 1992.

So we came up with an over complicated system that allows you to have a waist well in excess of 40" and pass, albeit you will be on mandatory FEP, because the cut line is now 26% bodyfat for men and 36% bodyfat for women.
 
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Spekkio said:
Well, prior to 2016, you had to be within height / weight standards or pass a rope and choke with 22% / 30% bodyfat for men / women. So reasonably, you're pushing it if you have about a 36-38" / 32-34" waist... provided the test was administered properly.

Then we said screw that noise, we'll go to a flat 39" / 35.5" waist.

Then SECDEF said that the Navy is too fat and we need to fix ourselves by going back to the standards of 1992.

So we came up with an over complicated system that allows you to have a waist well in excess of 40" and pass, albeit you will be on mandatory FEP, because the cut line is now 26% bodyfat for men and 36% bodyfat for women.
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Why wouldn't you compare the fitness standards now to what they were immediately before they were changed (1 PFA/year and 39/35.5" waist)?
 
Spekkio said:
I'm not understanding what part of my post was confusing to you.
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The part I quoted about lowering fitness standards by a large margin. We increased the number of times per year we take the PRT, the BCA is a push, you can now be separated again for PFA failures whereas before you would only not advance.
 
WhiskeySierra6 said:
The part I quoted about lowering fitness standards by a large margin. We increased the number of times per year we take the PRT, the BCA is a push, you can now be separated again for PFA failures whereas before you would only not advance.
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The BCA is not a push. The max waist size was raised from 39 / 35.5" to 44-46", because the max bodyfat allowed was raised from 24 / 32% to 26 / 36%.

My point of referencing the pre-2016 standards is that the new BCA is even farther from that, contrary to the direction given by SECDEF.

Doing the PRT more frequently isn't an increase in standards. The scores to pass remain the same.
 
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Spekkio said:
The BCA is not a push. The max waist size was raised from 39 / 35.5" to 44-46", because the max bodyfat allowed was raised from 24 / 32% to 26 / 36%.

My point of referencing the pre-2016 standards is that the new BCA is even farther from that, contrary to the direction given by SECDEF.

Doing the PRT more frequently isn't an increase in standards. The scores to pass remain the same.
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To pass the BCA with a 44" waist, you'd have to be 6'9". The chart ends at 45.5" so I guess if you were 7'+ you could get a waiver or something. All this to say, youre correct in that 17-39 year olds can now get away with 2-4% more body fat. I think we just disagree on the definition of "large margin".

The PRT standard has literally increased from pass it once a year to pass it twice a year. That's just objectively true.

Anyway...
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WhiskeySierra6 said:
To pass the BCA with a 44" waist, you'd have to be 6'9". The chart ends at 45.5" so I guess if you were 7'+ you could get a waiver or something. All this to say, youre correct in that 17-39 year olds can now get away with 2-4% more body fat. I think we just disagree on the definition of "large margin".

The PRT standard has literally increased from pass it once a year to pass it twice a year. That's just objectively true.

Anyway...
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You're misreading the chart for the body fat test (step 2 in guide 4).

The 0.55 waist to height ratio test is superfluous in terms of passing because the next step just throws that away and uses your height, waist, and weight to estimate bodyfat percentage, with an allowance of 26% for men and 36% for women.

Although you trigger mandatory FEP by going to step 2, you can easily pass with a 44" waist as short as 5'8" for a man and 5'1" for a woman.
 
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Spekkio said:
You're misreading the chart for the body fat test (step 2 in guide 4).

The 0.55 waist to height ratio test is superfluous in terms of passing because the next step just throws that away and uses your height, waist, and weight to estimate bodyfat percentage, with an allowance of 26% for men and 36% for women.

Although you trigger mandatory FEP by going to step 2, you can easily pass with a 44" waist as short as 5'8" for a man and 5'1" for a woman.
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OK I'll bite. Check my math. A person who is 5'8" (68") can have a maximum waist of 37" per Table-1. With a 44" waist we get a 24 (68-44) for the height - waist metric to use in Table 2. To pass with 26% body fat they'd have to be 149 lbs (page 13). That sound right to you/did I miscalculate anything?
 
Spekkio said:
Although you trigger mandatory FEP by going to step 2, you can easily pass with a 44" waist as short as 5'8" for a man and 5'1" for a woman.
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Probably supports your point that the new test is pretty lenient…. But I think you’re mistaken on this point. Going to step 2 doesn’t trigger FEP.
 
WhiskeySierra6 said:
OK I'll bite. Check my math. A person who is 5'8" (68") can have a maximum waist of 37" per Table-1. With a 44" waist we get a 24 (68-44) for the height - waist metric to use in Table 2. To pass with 26% body fat they'd have to be 149 lbs (page 13). That sound right to you/did I miscalculate anything?
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That does sound right. And I was using broad estimates. If we go down to 42" (which is still more than 39"), you now have a max allowable weight of 190 lbs. And if you go to 40", the max allowable weight is 230 lbs.

So you got me on the minutiae, but not my overall point... the standards are lower.

The research that determined WtH ratio was a better predictor of health complications than BMI saw a rapid increase at 0.51 and higher. This person should have a 35" waist or less. This would have been in-line with the previous rope-and-choke, but merely removing the neck (and hip) measurement, because it turns out they just add statistical noise. Also, that research didn't allow the bulk of your hair to count toward the test subjects' height.

And the best results were obtained when using it in conjunction with BMI. In other words, to catch the < 10% of the population who exceed 25.0 BMI but are actually fit.

Allowing a waist size > 40" is just throwing away the science (and previous standards). If we wanted to do it right, there'd be a height / weight table with weights corresponding to a BMI of 26 (allows for some measurement fluff) and if you failed that then a rope-and-choke with a WtH ratio of < 0.51, always rounded up to the nearest 0.5".
 
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Spekkio said:
So you got me on the minutiae
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I'm not trying to get you and I'm just responding to the scenario you proposed.

Spekkio said:
the standards are lower.
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On this we agree WRT the BCA. I think we disagree on the "large margin" part particularly when compared to the standard that immediately preceded it which I think is the only fair way to do it. All to say, I'm personally OK with trading a little BCA leniency with going back to 2 PFAs a year. I'm also fully aware it's not an either/or proposition and we could do both.
 
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