Push yourself to the max!

Published Sept. 29, 2010
By Col. Michael Hornitschek
375th Air Mobility Wing Commander

SCOTT AIR FORCE BASE, Ill. -- At 6 a.m. Sept. 23, Lt. Col. Patrick Castle lined up on the James Gym track for his 1 1/2-mile run portion of the Air Force's annual fitness test, having just completed a marathon 11 days previously. Normally this is the time period for athletes to recover and slowly rebuild their muscles, not push them further in a sprint to break their own speed record.

But this is exactly what Colonel Castle set out to do. Never mind that he could seemingly easily jog the required 9 minute and 48 second pace needed to get the maximum points for men in his age group; his best time is 8:12. Since testing began under the new Air Force standards in July, the evaluators say his is the fastest time on base ... so far.

He said his goal was to break the 8 minute mark, and despite the conditions for him physically not being ideal, he challenged himself mentally to see what his body could do ... to push himself to the max! That is the attitude of a champion and that is the kind of mental and physical conditioning we must instill in our Airmen!

Too often I hear feedback from our frontline supervisors there are people approaching the fitness test with the exact opposite attitude. They approach this critical evaluation seeking to only to achieve minimum run time or minimum number of sit ups and pushups they need to pass. We must change this type of thinking because it's not about just passing a test, it's about being a Combat Ready Airman!

Every ounce of sweat you put into daily training to be able to run faster, lift higher, do more ... will benefit you when you deploy to austere locations and work in very different, gritty environments. But, it's not just on the frontlines where our conditioning is tested.

A consistent and daily conditioning of mind and body is how we build resiliency to perform under extreme conditions, handle challenges that come our way, and balance the mission, family and community obligations. In our lives, we can't afford to have the "I'll just meet the minimum requirements" attitude. That won't work in our marriages, our families, or friendships and it certainly won't work in our professional life either.

Maybe we're not a gifted athlete but they didn't wake up one day with all the skills necessary to be a champion. A superior athlete invests hard work and daily dedication to excellence to reach their goal. We must focus our sights on the right target. The achievement is nice, but the journey to get there is what really counts.

There's a sobering sports commercial where Michael Jordan is seen coaching a room full of young basketball hopefuls and he says: "Maybe it's my fault that I led you to believe that it was easy, when it wasn't ... that my highlights started at the free throw line and not in the gym. Maybe I made you think my game was built on flash ... and not fire. Maybe it's my fault that you didn't see that my failure ... and pain were my motivations. Maybe I led you to believe that basketball was a God-given gift, and not something I worked for every single day of my life. Maybe I destroyed the game ... or maybe you're just making excuses."

The Air Force is a place where "excellence in all we do" is our way of life. This excellence includes making fitness a priority in our lives and challenging ourselves to shoot for the max, not the minimum.

Instead of approaching the test with nervous anticipation, we should be approaching the test as a personal opportunity to achieve our best! Let your motivation be on a foundation of doing your best and putting in the hard work ... and then there'll be no regrets ... no excuses.

In the end, Colonel Castle completed his run in 8:10, besting his time by two seconds (our photo finish shows the clock at 8:11, but his official time is 8:10). He said he plans to try again soon to break 8 minutes. Let's all keep working to achieve our personal best and push ourselves to the max!