FIT ENOUGH TO BE A GUARD?
Our reporter took on the ‘excessively difficult’ Garda fitness test, which 17% of cadets fail, to see if he could beat it
HOW hard could it really be? Many of us might assume we are fit enough to do a beat on the street and join the ranks of An Garda Síochána with relative ease.
The Garda fitness test has been criticised in recent days for being ‘excessively difficult’, so I decided to take the physical exam myself, with no preparation, to see if I have what it takes to pass.
I’m a 32-year-old male, and my overall exercise regime of late has been largely neglected due to a lack of self-motivation.
However, I still consider myself to be in reasonably good shape and I was fairly confident I could do better than the 17.5% of candidates who failed the test last year.
While my request to do the actual physical exam in Templemore Training College remains ‘under consideration’, I did the next best thing and got a personal trainer to replicate the course.
The test consists of multiple components, including a shuttle run or ‘beep test’, push-ups, sit-ups, an obstacle course and a push/pull machine assessment.
But failing any single component means applicants must repeat the entire stage and will be put to the back of the line before they can take the test again.
Dusting off my tracksuit for the first time this year, I met Ruairi
‘I fell to the floor, bowled over by exhaustion’
Mannion at the Swan Leisure Centre in Rathmines, Dublin, who prepared a daunting-looking course for me in the gym’s sports hall.
In keeping with the official test, I had three minutes and 30 seconds to weave through cones, jump over two benches stacked on top of each other, duck underneath an obstacle, and then run along a rope to simulate the balancing component of the test.
In addition, I was required to carry a 25kg weight a short distance and drag a pair of sand bags several metres across the floor.
I had to do this three times and I was determined to beat the clock.
As soon as the timer began, I pelted through the first two laps with confidence but the final lap took every bit of stamina I had left. When it was over, I fell to the floor, bowled over by exhaustion.
Catching a glimpse of our photographer, Seán, smirking at me from behind his camera I prayed that my breakfast of black coffee and digestive biscuits wouldn’t come back up.
Ruairi then gave me the news I was hoping for: ‘Well done. Your time was just over two minutes.’
Although it was a surprise, I couldn’t get too cocky as there was still a long way to go.
Given a few moments to catch my breath, I then had to complete 32 sit-ups in one minute. I didn’t find this task too demanding – despite what the photographic evidence may suggest – and I managed a score of 38.
Next up was the push-up challenge, which thankfully has no time restriction, but candidates in my age range (26-35) must do 22 push-ups to pass.
Again, I managed to impress my personal trainer and myself by doing 28 push-ups.
At this stage, my energy was near depleted but I still had to endure the next part of the exam, which was the part I dreaded most: the shuttle run or bleep test. I remember being forced to do this test repeatedly in secondary school. It involves running continuously between two points, 20 metres apart, at a set time that gradually decreases until the candidate cannot keep up.
Garda candidates of my age and gender must achieve a level of 8.1. However, deciding not to follow the sound advice of Ruairi, I tore through the first few laps at full speed, wasting away all the energy resources I had left.
By the time I reached the sixth interval I was gasping for breath and could no longer keep up with the bleeps. My sympathetic trainer revealed the bad news that
I had not reached the required grade, which meant that I had failed the entire physical exam.
And to rub salt into my deflated ego, I still had to undergo the push/pull test, which mimics the sort of struggle that might occur after a Garda chase. As we did not have an isokinetic machine of the kind used in Templemore training college, I took hold of a 40kg bench press and lifted it continuously while on my feet.
Candidates must do this for 20 seconds, but I somehow managed to do it for a whole minute.
Even though I did reasonably well overall, the bleep test was my downfall, meaning that I would have to repeat the entire test if I were an aspiring Garda recruit.
Earlier this week, Fianna Fáil justice spokesman Jim O’Callaghan said students here are at a disadvantage compared to their counterparts in the North, who get one minute extra to complete the mandatory obstacle course. It was also revealed that trainees in Canada have more time to complete parts of their fitness exam compared to Garda hopefuls in this country.
However, I believe that if I had had a few weeks to prepare, and if my ambition to have a career as a guard depended on it, I would have passed the fitness exam with reasonable ease.
But for now at least, the prospect of me joining the ranks of An Garda Síochána, and giving up my career as a journalist, is out of the question.