Even an imposter senses how grueling
the OCS physical fitness test is

A reporter taking the physical fitness test senses the strain
even without the candidates' pressures.

Providence Journal reporter Richard Salit, does the physical fitness test at Kay Hall along with the new indoctrination candidates. Journal photo / Frieda Squires

By RICHARD SALIT
Journal Staff Writer

I feel like an imposter.

I am about to take the OCS physical fitness test, but I really don't belong here. I've had great sleep. No one's been yelling at me for two days straight. And the future of my career isn't on the line.

Taking the OCS physical fitness test without enduring the rest of the program's hardships is a lot like hopping on the T while pretending to run the entire Boston Marathon.

Just call me the Rosie Ruiz of OCS.

The cold, blustery weather on this February day has forced the test inside a gymnasium. A brand new class, one that came after Class 05-08, just arrived two days ago and is being put through the three-part test.

First come sit-ups. As the new students pair up, Candidate Officer Matthew Farver offers to hold down my ankles and count for me. I'll need to cross my arms across my chest and curl up until my elbows touch my legs. Then go back down.

The whistle blows.

Before I get to two minutes, I'm slowing way down. By the end, I simply can't squeeze out another — until a Journal photographer urges me to do one more just so she can better capture my pain. In the time it takes me to curl up off the floor, entire classes of students seemingly arrive, graduate and retire.

Still, I'm doing fine. I complete 92. For my age, I need 40 to pass. [The charts in the OCS manual don't even deal with people my age, 43, but the chief drill instructor lets me know where I stand.]

So does Adam Cole, whom I'm following for this series. He walks by and says, "You weren't going all the way down."

Farver adds that the new students missed breakfast to have blood drawn this morning and that he remembers not sleeping the night before his test. It's typical to do as many as 30 fewer sit-ups under such conditions, he says. I'm also well aware that not one Marine drill instructor yelled at me to correct my form as they did to others.

I carry on.

It's time for pushups. Let's just say my arms are a bit thinner than the Rock's. Okay, some people even call me Stick. Two minutes again. I may touch the floor with only my hands and feet, and must keep my butt down. If I don't, I have to immediately stop. I need to do 31.

The whistle blows. I do a bunch and then have to rest. I do some more and rest again. My whole body is shaking now as I freeze in the up position. I squeeze out another, giving the photographer a chance to get a shot of my face all red, a vein in my neck sticking out and my head looking ready to pop like a cork off my body.

When I collapse to the floor, Farver says I did 52.

Two down, one part to go.

Last is a 1½-mile run, which today will be 25 laps around the gym. I run and bike quite a bit, so I'm sure I'll do fine. I need only do it in 15:15, which is a 10:10 pace.

But as I'm on my way to being one of the frontrunners I make a huge blunder. I lose count of my laps. I think I have finished in 9:36, but realize as I complete a slow, cool-down lap that I probably had one more to go. Now the clock reads 10-something.

I have just made one of the biggest mistakes you can make at OCS: I have neglected to pay "attention to detail." It's a theme the DIs sear into the minds of their classes. Another student who loses count is looking frazzled and dazed while being confronted by a candidate officer about his run.

Did I pass then? Or did I fail?

When you're an imposter, what difference does it make?

rsalit@projo.com