Firefighter Fitness Programs & Fitness Accountability

Author note: I’ve written this piece out of love for the fire service, of which I’ve been a proud member for more than 30 years. I believe I can make these observations because I live it and teach it; I’ve “been there, done that,” and I’m still here doing it. I’ve hugged a brother firefighter dying in a hospital bed. I’ve suffered the loss of my own brother and, worse yet, my daughter. So when I speak of death and what it means, it’s from experience. I know what it is and what it feels like on every level.

Over the years, I’ve written about what I call the “firefighter fitness truss.” It consists of strength development, auxiliary activities, functional training both with PPE and without, flexibility, cardiovascular training, sound nutritional programs, solid “pre-covery” and recovery programs, and mental health. Just like a truss in a roof system, if any piece is missing, we may have a failure of the entire system as it relates to firefighter fitness. So each piece supports another, and there are many options for how to perform each one; in fact, I’ve written about several ways to accomplish each of these tasks over the past few years, as has Chief Mike Ong from the Phoenix Fire Department, as well as Chief Martha Ellis from the Salt Lake City Fire Department before us.

In addition to the “fitness truss” programs, we now have other programs like Heart Fit for Duty that use diagnostic tests on firefighters to determine where they need improvement. They then offer suggestions and recommendations for improving cardiovascular health. Because not all cardiovascular issues are fitness related, these types of programs are so vital–they help flush out other causes of cardiovascular problems and protect our firefighters.

Challenges to Peer Fitness
Programs like the Heart Fit for Duty are an ideal way to spend your money, if you’re looking to start or change your fitness routine. Many departments have tried other programs, such as the peer fitness program, but there are a few key reasons why we should consider whether this approach is truly effective: First, it’s expensive to train people through the program and it’s expensive to pay trainers the overtime they need to run it. So when there’s overtime money, we have trainers, and when there’s no money, you’re on your own.

Secondly, it’s impossible for the trainers to write programs and manage a bunch of firefighters who lose interest after a few sessions of exercise. Over the years, I myself have spent hundreds of hours writing programs for individuals, only to have them leave the program after a few short weeks. This gets frustrating in a hurry, and it’s easy for peer trainers to burn out in a short amount of time.

Answers to “Why?”
But with all the information available to firefighters in regard to health and fitness, why are cardiovascular diseases still killing firefighters at an alarming rate? Why are there still so many preventable injuries? Simple: Because we’ve made a big mistake of making minimal fitness mandatory without backing it up with punitive measures when the fitness level isn’t met. Do we go into burning buildings without PPE and SCBA? No. Why? Because the fire service requires that we wear them or we’ll be reprimanded. Do we pull lines into burning structures to support rescue and fire attack? Yes. Why? It’s mandatory, because if you fail to do these things, you could die or kill others. What we’ve failed to do is give the same weight to health and fitness.

And where does our model for fitness come from? Our leadership. If the supervisor isn’t enforcing fitness and/or serving as a model for what’s expected, then they’re contributing to the problem. A lack of fitness leads to early exhaustion and poor decision-making. Poor decision-making anywhere can lead to disaster, injury and death. Think about it: If fitness or the lack thereof wasn’t a burning issue in the fire service, I wouldn’t have had enough information to fill this article. If it wasn’t an issue, NIOSH, OSHA, NFPA, NFFF, IAFC, IAFF, etc., wouldn’t be calling for national solutions to the problem.

What the Fire Service Needs
So what does the fire service really need to put itself on course toward better, smarter fitness and improved health? First, it needs “herd fitness,” meaning everybody is shown a program that works and then they do it. I’m not talking about the latest fad; I’m talking about solid, foundational fitness.

We also need to hire well-trained, accountable people, and we need to be accountable for the people we hire by holding them to standards. In the fire service, we require our applicants to be EMTs, paramedics, Firefighter I and II–but then we only require them to perform at the bare minimum when it comes to the physical fitness test. We don’t require any fitness certifications for beginners, yet we expect them to stay fit. We choose to accept the costs of an unfit workforce rather than require new firefighters to come in fit and demand that they know how to stay that way through a certification that they pay for before they come through the door.

Think about other professions: Could you walk into an attorney’s office, tell them you want to be an attorney, and have them say, “Sure, which university would you like to attend? Harvard? Yale?” Of course not. Attorneys, physicians, accountants, etc., all demand prerequisite degrees and certifications. If we in the fire service want to be called professionals, then we have to act like professionals.

There are many other fitness needs within the fire service. Here are just a couple of them:

A Simple Gym
While we’re working toward our fitness goals or working to maintain them, we must all keep in mind that we aren’t bodybuilders, gymnasts or football players, therefore a strength-style gym is adequate for fire stations. The fire station gym is there to build strength and maintain it, to help us be the best firefighters we can be–not to satisfy our interest in the latest fitness craze. Our citizens join gyms for their fitness, and we can do the same for specialized training on rings, ropes, etc., if needed. We can require fitness from our firefighters without providing every piece of equipment known to mankind. Remember: Keep it simple; the basics are best.

That said, fitness is also a personal choice once you know the basics, which is another reason why it’s impossible to meet every individual’s wants in a firehouse gym. If you have budget issues, I’ve discussed in earlier articles many ways to train with equipment found in every fire station in the country–and none of it can be found in a gym.

Accountability
When it comes to excuses, I’ve heard them all; everything from, “You can’t hold me accountable for being fit, because I don’t know how”; to “You can’t hold me accountable for staying fit because you don’t provide us with fitness equipment.” These are the same people we trust with millions of dollars of firefighting equipment. These are also the same people we trust to run into burning buildings and treat the sick and injured. Given those facts, don’t those excuses sound silly when you consider that the average, self-motivated high school freshman who wants to play sports will do what it takes to stay in shape to make the team?

Note: The majority of firefighters I know stay in superior shape and are proud to do it–I’m not speaking to these people, or people like them. I am discussing the minority in the fire service, the 5%of the workforce that causes 90%of the problems.

Now Is the Time for Change
We’ve been dealing with the issue of cardiac problems and firefighter fitness for as long as I can remember. There are plenty of colorful sayings that cover what we’re doing here: “If you always do what you have always done, you will always get what you have always got.” Or one of my personal favorites–the definition of insanity: “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

The point: Change is needed right now. It’s time we developed our own fitness protocols based on our own job descriptions–and then hold ourselves accountable to meet them .

This article is dedicated to Brad Harper of the Phoenix Fire Department and the 19 firefighters from the Granite Mountain Hot Shots. All of these young men lost their lives in the line of duty in Arizona in July. We owe it to these men to do whatever we can as leaders in the fire service to prevent all line of duty deaths, no matter what the cause.