Taking the Exam

My gym is in a basement. After walking through the door, you walked down 12 steps at a 45º angle to get to the gym floor.

A few months ago I saw a guy jogging up and down these steps with a weight vest on. The vest contained I think 40 pounds of iron rods. Later, we would hold additional weight in his hands. I knew instantly what he was training for.

The firefighter's physical exam requires the applicant to run up 10 steps at a 45º angle, cross a small platform, and descend 10 steps. You then turn around and do it a total of ten times. To be clear, once up, across the platform, and once down is one repetition.

You're wearing and holding 100 pounds of gear during the exam.

I saw this guy again today and asked him how the exam went.

"Not too good. I had an injury two weeks before the exam."

"Oh man. So what happened?"

"I tore my plantar fascia," he tells me. "Took 14 seconds off my time."

The plantar fascia is the tendon that supports the arch of your foot. You need only consider the engineering of the foot for a moment to get an idea of how severe an injury that is.

Fourteen seconds doesn't sound like much, but it meant everything to him:

"The average for applicants in the State of New Jersey is 3:25. My fastest time was 2:51, but I only pulled a 3:05 on the exam."

His mood when describing this fairly amazing feat (sorry) was discouraged. He didn't say it, but he wanted to beat his personal best of 2:51 at that exam.

I replied, "I think it's important to keep some context here. Fourteen seconds is not a half a minute. You still beat the average."

You're probably wondering if this is a pass/fail exam or if a better time on the exam is meaningful. It doesn't matter. The exam, at that moment he took it, was meaningless. He purposely built this pressure on himself over the course of months so when it came to a head, he could perform his absolute best. And he didn't get a chance to do that.

I've no doubt that he'll become a firefighter in September, even if he says that's when he "finds out." And he'll probably have a great career. He never said it, but he's looking forward to the next time he has to take that exam, whether it's in a classroom or not.