Trial-run fitness tests among Air Force top enlisted leader’s priorities

The Air Force’s top enlisted leader wants to lift the stress from airmen’s lives by revamping physical fitness assessments — and he wants to do it before his planned retirement next year in the fall.

“Right now, we use the carrot and stick approach to motivate people to pass the test,” Chief Master Sgt. of the Air Force Kaleth O. Wright said in an email to Stars and Stripes. “If you pass, you get a little baby carrot, but if you fail, we hit you with a big stick.”

One way to change that is to give airmen the option to take a no-fail, trial-run fitness assessment made up of the same physical challenges as the regular PT test, before they’re due to take the real thing, a spokesman for Wright’s office told Stars and Stripes.

“If you pass the test, it would count. If you fail, it wouldn’t,” said Senior Master Sgt. Harry Kibbe, a spokesman for Wright’s office. “But you would have to pass it before your test becomes overdue.”

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