New Army AFCT set in stone. Again.

| March 24, 2022

Remember when the Army announced (several years ago now) that they were revamping the annual PT test? The goal was to create a gender and age-neutral test. A soldier would be tested not against some chart, but against the needs of their MOS. There would be a physical standard for an MOS. You met it or you didn’t.

That sounds remarkably simple and fair for the something Big Army would come up with. First, the program was beset by delays. The program began in 2013! Along the way, the requirements to be MOS-specific were dropped, then when it was on the verge of implementation a couple years back, Congress got upset that women weren’t given a different test.

Here we are with an “all new” annual PT test, the Army Combat Fitness Test, that took ten years, countless man-hours, and who knows how much money for studies from Rand to arrive at a test that breaks scoring down by age and gender. Old is new again! Naturally the Sergeant Major of the Army is toeing the party line. He says, “I’m really proud we’re moving forward, we’re there, we’re doing it. This is the test.”

Poetrooper and Jeff LPH3 send in the news. From Military.com;

The final version of the test goes live on April 1 with soldiers not having scores impact their record, a grading that can have effects ranging from promotion to expulsion from the Army, until Oct. 1. However, the Army will not immediately boot failures out of the force. Part-time National Guard and Reserve soldiers have until April 2023 before scores are entered into their record.

The most significant changes to the six-event ACFT is that it no longer is meant to prepare soldiers for combat [emphasis added] but instead built as a general fitness assessment. It will also have different scoring standards for men and women across different age groups, in most cases lowering them, following a congressionally mandated report from Rand Corp, a Washington D.C.-based think tank, that found nearly half of the service’s women could not pass earlier standards for the test.

For example, a female soldier between 17 and 21 years old now has to deadlift between 120 and 210 lbs. while a male soldier has to lift between 140 and 340 lbs. In that same age group, female soldiers have to run two miles between 23:22 and 15:29 minutes while male soldiers must perform that exercise between 22 and 13:22 minutes. That minimum run time for male soldiers is a minute longer than the previous version of the ACFT that the Army previously trialed, following data showing the run is by far the most failed event for both genders.

Well, if people are failing it, we should just lower the standard. Brilliant. We need more simple solutions for problems like that.

I await a complete re-write of the PT test in five years when they discover that too many people are being injured by the new exercises, and they just go back to push-ups, sit-ups, and running. Tests that don’t require special equipment, can be conducted literally anywhere, and can be proctored with minimal staffing.

Category: "The Floggings Will Continue Until Morale Improves", "Your Tax Dollars At Work", Army, Army News, Government Incompetence

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Anonymous

Only three of the events are absolutely required, too… How long before we go back to three events (one being the 2-mile run) again?

Last edited 2 years ago by Anonymous
rgr1480

The “Run-Stumble-and-Fall”?

Roh-Dog

Dr Everyone’sspecial or: More Attemptering to Get the Round Hole Where Pegs Should Be.

Kiss my DD214’s ass.

FuzeVT

Things will be so much easier when reality takes over again and the government is once again allowed to acknowledge that men and women are different – and that it’s OK.

I can lift more weight and run faster than my wife. She gave birth to my two boys. Who has contributed more to life? But of course lifting heavy things also makes it possible for me to drop those heavy things on people who want to do bad things to my family.

See? We all have a purpose.

Roh-Dog

Hate speecher.

FuzeVT

Fair enough. . . .  😟 

KoB

Sum ting dey forgets…The potential for anybody and everybody having to become an 11B is always lurking. See Bulge, Battle of, ect… jes’ sayin’

Roh-Dog

When this article popped I had an adrenaline/testosterone dump, WTFed loudly and threw an object across the room.

My gf of 7-years looked at me like I’d just wrung a puppy’s neck in front of her. So I told her a brief synopsis of the story.

Still, she didn’t get ‘it’.

Then I remembered I really hadn’t explained to her, in detail, what indirect fire is and how after Squad or Platoon Attack the steel rain cometh.

So I ran her thru the battle drill, what the timelines look like and how it was important to exfil with intel, weapons, casualties and corpses post haste… the sheer endurance and strength required.

She ‘got’ it.

Martinjmpr

Tests that don’t require special equipment, can be conducted literally anywhere, and can be proctored with minimal staffing.

It boggles my mind that Big Army doesn’t seem to get this. Deployed units would need a ConEx full of gear to conduct a test.

The advantage of the 3 event PT test was not that it was a great way to measure overall fitness. The advantage was that it was “good enough,” could be done anywhere with minimal training and preparation, required no specialized equipment, and could be judged pretty objectively (you either did the push-up or you didn’t; you either made the run time or you didn’t.)

For 30 years it was “good enough.” And then the “Department of Fixing Shit That Isn’t Broken” decided to step in.  🙄 

What a circle jerk.

(Spoiler alert: the next event added to the ACFT will be the Circle Jerk.)  😅 

SFC D

Negative on the circle jerk. It’s gender specific and therefore sexist, misogynist, patriarchal, and far too many -ists and -isms to be listed here.

RGR 4-78

Quadrangle rub.

Roh-Dog

Circle Jerk, eh? Which rule set? If it’s the ‘last guy gets the cookie/muffin/poptart’ version, brother you can count me out.

STSC(SW/SS)

It should be the pick and flick.

MI Ranger

Yep, and not only does each Battalion need a Connex full of equipment (which the Deadlift bars kept breaking), but now they need a facility to perform it in. So each Brigade will now get a covered, Astro-Turf area that the Sprint-drag-carry can be performed on without rain destroying it!
Instead of the Stopwatch, piece of string, and a ruler required before!

A Proud Infidel®™️

Speaking of said conexes of equipment, how about the Contractors who made dump truck loads of money making that equipment and selling it to Uncle Sugar for a fat profit?

Anonymous

Don’t forget the specially-constructed dedicated gym with the astroturf floor (for a consistent standard so scores can be validly established) each unit has to have built or have access to so it can give the ACFT.

5JC

IDK. Most of the Army lived on FOB’s in theater with PT tracks, gyms and cheesecake. I never saw any unit living outside the wire doing a PT Test or even heard of one. Do it before deployment and that covers the unit. Sure some Awhole commander may have dropped one on his unit but less likely.

Anonymous

PT tests while deployed blow. The “getting shot at is a privilege, but being a gym rat is a birthright” crowd think they’re da sh*t.

Pardon me, Mr. Enemy, we can’t do gettin’ rocketed right now because that’d interrupt our 2 Mile run underway.

Last edited 2 years ago by Anonymous
Green Thumb

Yeah.

How long to people start gettiong killed in combat?

Nine recycles, a “300” on the middle school scale, pregnancy ACU/ BDU does not fit, etc.

What a joke.

I hope our “historic first” as the SEC Army is cool with the outcome.

Stacy0311

AND if they fail the PT (or HT/WT), just flag them and deploy them anyway.
No medals for you slow fat boy

Anonymous

But they will have Pizza Hut…
comment image

Last edited 2 years ago by Anonymous
IZinterrogator

My battalion decided we all needed record APFTs by such-and-such date during the Iraq surge even though it was not required because we were in a combat zone. After the chaplain decided he had the right of way at an intersection because he was doing his two-mile run and a Stryker disagreed with his reasoning, the BC decided there could be some validity to Big Army waiving the APFT requirement.

A Proud Infidel®™️

I’m sure that more than a few people at Rand have been laughing and fucking their Mistresses to the bank and back for more than a few years while this boondoggle took place!

Anonymous

Cha-ching, baby!

RGR 4-78

They are not even trying to hide the waste and pocket greasing anymore.

Slow Joe

ACFT: great workout, horrible test.

They even dropped the leg tuck because females can barely do one repetition. Now to max it out we have to do a plank for 4 minutes instead of the 20 reps of leg tuck.

RGR 4-78

I vote for 4 minutes of the dying cockroach.

rgr1480

It sounds sooooo easy.



dying-cockroach-9843173.jpg
rgr1480

Oops … wrong cockroaches.

1960.jpg
5JC

When my son went to basic he could only do two. He wasn’t flabby, just undeveloped. After a year he could knock out 20. He did say that the women lacked the core strength to develop. While technically he is combat arms he is actually about as much combat arms as a non-pilot in the Air Force.

Odie

As a former air force member, I wonder what the fitness test would be if implemented across all branches of service, but specifically air force.

2 mile run, chow hall and tv in the break room?

KoB

Nope! It would be being able to complete all 18 stations on what used to be a real rifle or Artillery Impact Range…without using an electric buggy. And able to lift at least 12 oz at the 19th station.

Green Thumb

And a smoke.

Sapper3307

Be nice, how many years and billons of dollars did we spend on the Afghan P.T program.
Y8LSnuGTO5w

Roh-Dog

IMO, best comment on that vid, “It’s not about the technique it’s about the friends we made along the way”.

Kinda had that same feeling in OIF, especially after SOI paydays handing out fistfuls of freshly minted $100 bills.

Are we the baddies?

Sapper3307

Deep inside the Puzzle Palace.
NNl7GQFTULU

Roh-Dog

Army Combat Fitness Test brought to you by:

iu.jpeg
Stacy0311

Well if the Army kept MOS specific requirements every Becky and Mary Sue wouldn’t be able to live up to their potential of being a Green Beret sniper Ranger tanker infantry person.
And THAT would limit their career opportunities.  😉 

Anonymous

Aww…

Skippy

I’m so glade I have my 214 blanket

Andy

Yet again, you want something fucked up? Get Congress involved.

Prior Service

Ha ha. Sweet! I just put 73 points on my ACFT score, simply by being older than most in the army. Still not a max, but a lot closer. Now, if only I identified as a female, I could’ve added 123 points! Boom!

On another note, when I talked to my ortho doc about pending shoulder surgery, he was appalled that I still trained for all six events. (So am I, but I’m dumb that way.)

Ret_25X

Look, the original ACFT was fair, consistent, and actually tested the fitness needed in modern combat zones. Of course, it had to go.

No way that fat female COLs and SGMs were going to tolerate a test they could not game or pass.

Once again, men 1, women 0 all thanks to women.

timactual

Consistency is the key. No test devised by humankind will ever be perfect, nor will it fully recreate the physical stresses of combat. Perhaps one of the events could be digging a foxhole while lying down wearing full gear using what the British call a “digging spoon”.

Hell’s bells, it ain’t rocket science. Keep it simple, and keep it consistent.
And WTF are those costumes for? Is it a production of “Chorus Line” or a PT test? “All right boys and girls, fall out and change into your PT costumes; wouldn’t want to get those fatigues/BDUs/ACUs (or whatever the hell they are calling them this year) all sweaty!”

SteeleyI

The Army really did want a general neutral, combat oriented test. Congress intervened, and we have this.

SMA Grinston is a badass and a Soldier, and he is taking what he can get.

What he is getting is a test that incorporates strength and power. Soldiers training for the ACFT will be better prepared for combat than those training for the APFT, which favored slim runner types.

That said, the serious implication of this is that opening combat arms to women was predicated on gender neutral, occupation specific standards. Many women will pass the ACFT, access into the combat arms, and fail themselves, their squadmates, and get injured in the process.

All in all, the Army blinked. This will be like the old APFT. Everyone will take it and record their score. The fake Soldiers will pat themselves on the back for passing and take the next 4 months off from PT; the real Soldiers will take it and ruck up the next morning.

poetrooper

“Many women will pass the ACFT, access into the combat arms, and fail themselves, their squadmates, and get injured in the process.”

More like get themselves and their squad mates injured or killed, in the process…

As for SMA Grinston, he may very well be a badass, but he is for sure a very woke badass, who is eagerly foisting all this progressive nonsense on our Army.

SteelyI

Big talk. Meet him one on one and you’ll be standing at parade rest. If you have the cajones to show up at all.

He was dealt a bad us and is trying to move the Army forward. Work on your planks and quit bitching.

poetrooper

Not big talk and not bitching, Colonel, just reacting to what I’ve read about him in the news and watched him say himself on videos. He’s most definitely on board with the woke program. Do you deny that?

As for cojones (that’s the correct spelling by the way), well hells-bells, at 80+ years of age, I’m not sure I even remember where mine are.

And at no time here at TAH have I ever tried to portray myself as a badass. I was just another grunt NCO in an Airborne rifle company in the 101st in Vietnam and later in battalion hq. I was a good enough NCO for my brigade commander in the 82nd to promise me face-to-face the next E-7 stripe that came down (and that was with less than a year in grade as E-6) as well as a referral to OCS. I chose, instead, to return to college on the newly renewed GI Bill.

So, Colonel, I was a damned good Airborne soldier and sure as hell don’t need any snotty disrespect from you just because we disagree.

Hubristic Hubert

Poetrooper-

Please stop referring to SteelyI as “Colonel”. He is not a Colonel (O6).

SteelyI is nothing but a disrespectful, pompous know-it-all who does not deserve the respect that would be shown to a real Colonel (O6).

SteelyI knows that he is not really a Colonel, but we can see that he does not correct you when you refer to him as “Colonel” here in these comments. That is interesting behavior for a disrespectful, pompous know-it-all who tries to post authoritatively and constantly lecture us here on a website that deals with stolen valor, wouldn’t you say?

SteelyI POSing as a Colonel (O6) on TAH.

Tsk tsk tsk.

poetrooper

Hubert, thanks for the heads-up. Ol’ Poe’s memory is so bad nowadays he can’t even remember where he got the impression Steeley was a retired O-6. It was another website but who knows where.

You’re spot-on about him being a pompous know-it-all who likes to talk down to everyone.

Roh-Dog

re·​spect (noun) | \ ri-ˈspekt  \

2
: an act of giving particular attention : CONSIDERATION
3
a
: high or special regard : ESTEEM
b
: the quality or state of being esteemed

‘Considering’ that dude torpedoed any ‘esteem’ that otherwise may have been afforded to him by title (real or imagined), I consider worrying about his words, opinions, and doctrinal “this is the way it was back when” dissertations moot.

I’m not going to be preached to or admonished by someone worthy of scorn when absolute apathy is MORE THAN warranted.

Fuck him, keep being awesome Poe!

Infantry leads the way!

Steeleyi

hh, I’ve never referred to myself by any rank. Long ago, Ol’ Poe started calling me that as a jibe. Ask him why, I can only guess.

As far as respect, I give it to those that deserve it. I know what I know, and those that think I am pompous probably know less.

So, if you have an actual point, please make it.

SFC D

The point is that you’re an arrogant, egotistical prick and a fucking know-it-all. You could very well be the smartest man in the room, but since you present everything in an abrasive, condescending manner, the room gives you a collective “fuck you” and turns their backs.

poetrooper

Oh, and in your ad hominem attack challenging my personal courage, you failed to address my correction of your characterization of women in combat units getting themselves and their squad mates injured as more likely being killed.

You have no answer for that, Colonel?

Green Thumb

SMA Grinston is a fucking clown.

I wonder if he is still backing that 2LT that acted like a fool?

Roh-Dog

You mean the one: wasn’t displaying a tag appropriately, driving recklessly(speed), disobeying emergency lights, fleeing a traffic stop, disobeyed a lawful order by not getting out of his vehicle all while recording himself for some kinda at-a-boy kudos based on a perceived racial animus and EARNED himself a face full of spicy sauce?

Fuck that guy and anyone that knee-jerked in support of that piece of shit.

Prior Service

“Fortunately” most of those women will find themselves off the line, working in the 3 shop or someone’s driver. Of course that leads to a second problem….

SteelyI

Probably. Over time it will even out, the way the machine always does. There may be a few Amazon chicks that can hang; if so awesome.

poetrooper

So, we put the whole organization at risk just so we can prove that a few “Amazons” can cut it?

How many lives will that cost us?

And to how many mothers and fathers would you be willing to be the fabulist who explains that their sons and daughters died not in service to their country but in the furtherance of ridiculous progressive ideology?

Green Thumb

Up the recycles!

rgr769

I am also of the opinion that women have no business in the combat arms branches. All this proggy woke horseshit is going to get people killed. Moreover, it has to be detrimental to unit cohesiveness in addition to combat effectiveness.