How fit is Fit?

[Witchking]

Originally Posted by NineDaysDead

Not in 4th edition.

My apologizes I believe I confused them with Rapid Healing and Very Rapid Healing...snuck a quick look at the PDF's when the boss wasnot looking and curiously enough RH HT 10 min VRH HT 12 min.

Mea Culpa. Mea Culpa. Mea Maxima Culpa.

[safisher]

I'm not sure who gets Fit, though I'd use templates as the benchmark. However, I'd bet these folks probably all have Very Fit:
http://3100.srichinmoyraces.org/3100_04/bios

Yes, that's right, a run of 1,000 miles in 13 days, 5 hours, or 72 miles a day for nearly two weeks. Yikes.

[Cheathj]

Originally Posted by Xilodel

To answer your supplemental question (somewhat): I don't believe training a regular person to a Fit level would take that all-fire long. Certainly under a year, but this is just from personal experience working out so YMMV.

I agree completely with this. I've been in the army 13 years now and you can take any civilian that can pass the initial entry requirements and raise their fitness level by one in about 60-90 days. If unfit, they became normal, if normal, then fit, if fit, then very fit.

Now that's with 2-4 hours of physical activity/day (which you only have in basic and AIT). Once at a unit, most Soldiers only see about 60 min/day of PT. Infantry and others see more. Also, the other caveat would be that the groups have to be broken down into similar ability groups in military training. If you run a whole platoon together, they run at the slowest speed, which gives the Very Fit guy with a 12 HT no training whatever, and after a few months of this actually lowers his fitness level because he's not pushing his personal envelope.

And to justify the Fit to Very Fit in 90 days, you can train for a marathon in 16-20 week training programs if you have an effective running base. An effective base would be you run 3-5 miles at a time, 3-5 times a week (which consensus seems to agree is Fit), and then ramp up from there over 16-20 weeks. On my first marathon, I went from a normal base described above to race day in 18 weeks of training...and quickly dropped my miles after the race losing any VF I may have had.

[Agemegos]

Originally Posted by Cheathj

Also, the other caveat would be that the groups have to be broken down into similar ability groups in military training. If you run a whole platoon together, they run at the slowest speed, which gives the Very Fit guy with a 12 HT no training whatever, and after a few months of this actually lowers his fitness level because he's not pushing his personal envelope.

That's a good point.

I wonder whether something similar needs to be done with respect to degree of familiarity with the local gravity?

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by pawsplay

WWII gives Fit to the vast majority of soldiers who complete basic training.

Other GURPS supplements seem to imply the same. GURPS Special Ops 3E gives it to at least those with infantry MOS.

[cosmicfish]

I would think Fit is appropriate for anyone getting about an hour of solid cardio per day right now, with Very Fit representing 2 or more hours a day. As such, anyone graduating from USA or USMC boot camp is likely going to have Fit, but if they wind up in a low-intensity MOS that may disappear after a few months.

I think that a short period of reasonably intense work can change a fitness level for an individual - maybe 2-3 months at 3x the exertion levels above, 4-6 months at the levels above, or 6-12 months at the levels above. That would let someone entering basic get to Fit by the end, and let someone entering a Special Ops program (or just the Ranger School) with Fit progress to Very Fit by the end.

I think the same is true going the other way - someone who stopped exercising completely would probably go from Very Fit to Fit in 3 months, and lose Fit 3 months after that (if even that long!).

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by cosmicfish

I think the same is true going the other way - someone who stopped exercising completely would probably go from Very Fit to Fit in 3 months, and lose Fit 3 months after that (if even that long!).

My understanding is that peak performance disappears pretty quick, but if you don't go total slug, you can recover from Fit to Very Fit fairly quickly.

[Cheathj]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

We can't because the rules are broken. Just a short demonstration for you of this follows.

Take a person with HT 11, +1 Basic Move and Fit. This doesn't _sound_ that impressive, does it? It;'s far below even a Stat Normalizer's acceptable levels.

Fit Guy can expend 8FP before he has to slow to half speed. So how far can he sprint? Well, he has to roll (adjusted) HT or less every 15 seconds. Because of Fit that is 12 or less or roughly 3/4 rds of the time.

That adds up to an average of about 32 periods of 15 seconds or 480 seconds or 8 minutes.

With his Basic Move of 6.25 and a 20% Sprint Bonus that's 7.5 yards per second (except for teh first second of course) and in this situation you do not round down.

It works out that Fit Guy has run two 4 minute miles in a row for an investment of 20 cp.

Now, he doesn't run any faster in the 100 meters than the mile or 1600 meters which is certainly peculiar but I do hope it demonstrates that you can't map Real World endurance to Gurps stats and get any sensible answers.

I've been thinking about this one; I've always disliked this. Just checking world record times, you see a gradual decline in speed over distance
100m = 9.58 sec (probably with some extra effort in there as well)
400m = 43.18 sec
800m = 101 sec
1600m = 223 sec

Only athletes in great shape (or high running skill) can really hold a sprint for any length of time (more than a minute or so). I would suggest something like every 15 sec sprinting you roll against HT.
Crit succeed, no FP lost;
Success=1 FP lost
failure = 2 FP
Crit Failure = 4 FP.

This will keep most sprinters from sprinting more than 1-2 minutes, unless they have HT 14, Ver Fit and running at 16; and this seems a lot more in line with reality.

Keep slow paced running the same. The RAW say that slow paced running can run 2x the distance that the same person can sprint. This just doesn't seem realistic to me. Slow paced should dramatically outdistance sprinting (600m to 5 miles seems about right to me).

[Xilodel]

Originally Posted by DouglasCole

My understanding is that peak performance disappears pretty quick, but if you don't go total slug, you can recover from Fit to Very Fit fairly quickly.

This is true. Your cardiovascular system weakens pretty quick if you stop taxing it with exercise. If you've been in good shape in the past and start training again, however, you can bounce back much more quickly than someone who was never in shape and started exercising.

If I had to make an arbitrary - and somewhat oversimplified - ruling, I'd say a character needs 3-6 months of regular, intense training and proper diet to go up one fitness level ("Normal" to "Fit" or "Fit" to "Very Fit"). After that, they have to devote 1 hour a day (if "Fit") or 2 hours a day (if "Very Fit") to maintain that.

If they suddenly stop their training regimen, the gains are lost at a rate of one fitness level per month. If they start training again, it only takes one month of training and diet to recover.

[Crakkerjakk]

Originally Posted by Xilodel

If they suddenly stop their training regimen, the gains are lost at a rate of one fitness level per month. If they start training again, it only takes one month of training and diet to recover.

A marathoner who stops running entirely will be average after two months? I think that's a bit too fast.