Unfortunately during today's deployment to training ratio physical training sometimes falls short. My unit doesn't have many APFT failures, but our PT scores aren't soaring off of the charts. I believe that good cardio endurance is the key to passing and scoring well on all APFT events. If you can control your breathing, then your muscles will be able to process oxygen better. Next, I work on muscular strength and endurance, then I would focus on flexibility. For cardio, we would run 5-8 miles at a moderate (8 mile/min) pace. On Fridays I would do release runs to increase unit morale. Also, sprints/running combined events do help with cardio endurance. Honestly ability group runs would be the best exercise to help improve the 2 mile run. I would conduct circuit training with a variety of upper and lower body exercises to increase muscular strength and endurance. Before and after each exercise, I would implement intense stretching so that their muscles are fully stretched to increase their flexibility for better run results and to become stronger as a team.
**The two best components or physical fitness for my unit to work on would be cardio respiratory endurance and muscular endurance. We are a light reconnaissance unit. The result of this is that we have many first time deployers going to conduct dismounted operations in the mountains. I would put the major emphasis on cardio respiratory endurance with lesser emphasis on muscular endurance. I would conduct cardio respiratory endurance at a minimum of three times a week with activities such as running, swimming, road marching, and hiking up some of our local mountains. I would then conduct muscular endurance activities twice week with activities such as push-ups, pull-ups, sit-ups, crunches, and lunges with a focus on high repetitions. I would include stretching and exercises from both the old army PT system and the