Physical Fitness of reserves

[Northern Touch]

Okay - I'm back from my rucksack march - a cool, sunny day - the autumn leaves are beautiful
(yes - I know it's Sunday, I won't get paid for it, but the BFT doesn't have a "only class 'A' " standard ...)

So, I'm doing my BFT trg on my own personal (unpaid) time, wearing civvies just so some DJA doesn't haemorrage brown at the horrible thought that I might actually be doing military-related physical fitness training on my own time and at my own expense (egads - I hope that's not a service offence ...).

Yup - there's no bargain like it.

Ha, well it looks like you've pretty much described what I do, the thing is, I don't mind it at all.  Physical fitness is almost a way to tell apart those who want to be soldiers in the reserves and those who just want the LCF.

Unforunitly, there isn't enough training time in the reserves to focus on phsyical fitness but it has always been stressed to me that a soldier has to be fit in order to perform his job.  The way I see it, a reservist, although forced to work out on their own time, cannot use that as an excuse to be unfit.  All it requires is a little bit extra effort and a half an hour here or there.  I as a university student parade and go to my weekend ex's as well as work another job 3 shifts a week and I can still find time to go for runs, or yes, even a ruck march on an early satruday morning.  It's all up to the person.

The current system isnt' tailord to enforce physical traiing and standards, and I'm posative that most people in the reserves know that its their job to stay fit on their own time.  Unfortunitly, I don't see a real way to change it because how do administer a fitness test, and then punish those who don't meet it?

On a side note, some of you may find it interesting that some units are actually taking steps to keep up the standards.  I know in my unit, A Coy for sure, last year worked up and DID complete a 13km ruck march as training and I know it was mentioned to my platoon a couple weeks ago at parade night.  So things are being done, just maybe not seen by all.

 

[Quimby]

How about reserve units offering a free or at least subsidised pass to a local pool/fitness facility?   My unit recently did away with a 50% subsidy to the local community rec center. I was looking to add some swimming while I recover from a running injury and was told the subsidiy was gone. Not a good message to be sending the troops.
On the issue of the tuition reimbursment program I'll agree it's a good concept poorly executed. I'm still waiting for my 2001-02 money having been assured, after repeatedly having my forms sent back for various mistakes our unit clerks didn't catch, that it's on the way as soon as the strike is over. I have however been informed that the program is still in place, but I place no faith in the source so I'd be curious as to what is going on.

 

[foerestedwarrior]

PT on your own time is WAY to easy to do. I am lazy as hell, but i still run atleast twice a week, bike once, and i am starting swimming in pools again now that the water is cooling down. If you really want to do it, you can make time, if you dont know what to do, your obviously have internet access, look it up.

And the education reinbursment program, i got an email a few weeks ago from my chief clerk with a link to the outline of the program, and the page was talking about it coming back or something, im not sure, it was on the DIN. In my experiance, there was alot of crap that had to be done to actually get the money, but in reality, if you get $1500 an year for 4 years, then that is $6000 that you didnt have to make to put toward any student loans.

 

[dglad]

How about reserve units offering a free or at least subsidised pass to a local pool/fitness facility?   My unit recently did away with a 50% subsidy to the local community rec center. I was looking to add some swimming while I recover from a running injury and was told the subsidiy was gone. Not a good message to be sending the troops.

Good idea...but very expensive.  The average annual membership to a commercial fitness centre is probably something like $300-$500 (based on my own experience, YMMV, of course), and they're usually tied to a specific individual, to they can't be "pooled" and used by a group.  Obviously, spending $300 to $500 per soldier isn't feasible.  It might be possible to find facilities that would offer a generic membership, so soldiers could "sign out" a membership pass and use it, then turn it back in so another soldier could use it another time, etc.  However, that doesn't necessarily mitigate the system's heartburn over liability; after all, you're using the SYSTEM'S membership when you drop the weights and break your foot.  Sorry to sound so negative over a good idea--I genuinely wish we could find a way of ensuring an adequate standard of fitness for Class A Reserves and giving them the means to achieve it.  It would, however, ultimately take the system deciding it was willing to accept potential liability for members injuring themselves while doing any number of unsupervised and possibly even unsafe things (I watch soldiers in the gym here on my own deployment and cringe over some of the things they get up, especially involving weights and a desire to impress their buds).

On the issue of the tuition reimbursment program I'll agree it's a good concept poorly executed. I'm still waiting for my 2001-02 money having been assured, after repeatedly having my forms sent back for various mistakes our unit clerks didn't catch, that it's on the way as soon as the strike is over. I have however been informed that the program is still in place, but I place no faith in the source so I'd be curious as to what is going on.

Great idea, but grossly over-engineered.  For the relatively small amounts of money involved, CO's should have sign-off.  Considering that the average Class A CO is given signing authority over anywhere to $100K to more than $500K in Class A funds, plus TD, O&M, etc., allowing sign-off for $2K or so for a soldier who produces the proper paperwork is a no-brainer.  The problem may have to do with the origin of the funds; I'm not sure if the Tuition Reimbursement funds came from the CF, or some other government department e.g. under an MOU or something similar.  If they did, it could be another government department's rules, and not the CF's, that are getting in the way.  The excessive accountability may also be peripheral fall-out related to other...um, spending issues the government has experienced over the past few years.

 

[pbi]

Great idea, but grossly over-engineered.  For the relatively small amounts of money involved, CO's should have sign-off.  Considering that the average Class A CO is given signing authority over anywhere to $100K to more than $500K in Class A funds, plus TD, O&M, etc., allowing sign-off for $2K or so for a soldier who produces the proper paperwork is a no-brainer.  The problem may have to do with the origin of the funds; I'm not sure if the Tuition Reimbursement funds came from the CF, or some other government department e.g. under an MOU or something similar.  If they did, it could be another government department's rules, and not the CF's, that are getting in the way.  The excessive accountability may also be peripheral fall-out related to other...um, spending issues the government has experienced over the past few years.

Dave-IMHO this may be the "real" reason-it wasn't actually an Army-driven thing, but instead sourced out of some other Command/Branch/etc or even OGD. I am still getting mixed signals about the current status of the program, but IMHO they have apparently screwed up a potentiallyt excellent idea. Cheers.