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Originally I wanted to join the Royal Marines and be that 00.01% special but I always had the parachute regiment in the back of my mind. Both are top notch don't get me wrong this isn't a 'X is better than Y'. but i find the Paras more appealing to me, and I've decided to go for it. I'm a little worried that down the line while I'm finding it hard in training i might start to think 'Oh no why didn't I go for the marines instead, its all I ever wanted', but I'm not to worried about that. A friend of mine who is a former Para was telling me all his stories and it just intrigued me so much that it changed my career ambitions. I'm now brushing up my knowledge on the Paras history and cracking on with the 'phiz' as normal. Heres my physical standards:
60 press ups(2 min)
70 sit ups(2 min)
15 heaves (much easier than marine style pull ups)

my cardio is weak at the moment:
1.5 miles in 10 minutes
3 miles in 23 minutes
4 miles in 30 minutes
8 miles in 1hr 5 minutes

Would I be good to go for the application process now ? (with the right mentality of course)

Cheers

The application process can take a few months so you wouldn't lose anything by doing it now. Your cardio isn't that weak, 4 miles in 30 mins is 7.5 mins to the mile, so that's not too bad (well better than me!). But best thing to do is speak to your Para mate, see what he thinks and pop down to your local AFCO, they will be able to tell you for sure!

Hope this helps!

David

If you can get your run time for 1.5 miles under 9:30min then you'll be fit enough to pass ADSC which is the army's recruit selection.

Even if you apply now it will take at least 6-8 weeks before you're sent to your nearest ADSC so you'd have plenty of time to improve your fitness.

Trust me you wont regret it. Just wait and see!

Its not 9.30 you want to aim for. You have to get 9.18 unless you can dead lift 116kg, which I can't, so if you can then ignore me and just get under 9.30. But seriously I do reckon they would like under 9mins.

I can dead lift that amount, how many reps would I need to do though?

Cheers

With all this talk of run times, does anyone know of anyone actually getting binned for having a slower time than 9.30 (obviously not taking the piss)?

At 4 PARA we did a 1.5 miler squadded, I snuck a watch out and timed it at 8.27. For the official one, we ran for a couple of miles before hand at a fast pace and then did the 1.5 miler, my time was 9.47 and I think I was fifth to finish out of 30 odd.

plastic wrote:With all this talk of run times, does anyone know of anyone actually getting binned for having a slower time than 9.30 (obviously not taking the piss)?

At 4 PARA we did a 1.5 miler squadded, I snuck a watch out and timed it at 8.27. For the official one, we ran for a couple of miles before hand at a fast pace and then did the 1.5 miler, my time was 9.47 and I think I was fifth to finish out of 30 odd.

If you ran a couple of miles at a fast pace before your PFT, then it wasn't very official. It's 800m in five minutes as a warm up, then best effort for 2.4km.

People failed my selection for not getting a good run time. Think they do take everything into account, but I was told as long as I got 10 pull up's and under 9.20min on the 1.5 miler, then I would pass.

Not sure about this dead lift thing which bobishungry is on about. We did a static lift but I was never awear that if you did well on it you could run a slower time? Could be wrong though

nufc.9 wrote:People failed my selection for not getting a good run time. Think they do take everything into account, but I was told as long as I got 10 pull up's and under 9.20min on the 1.5 miler, then I would pass.

Not sure about this dead lift thing which bobishungry is on about. We did a static lift but I was never awear that if you did well on it you could run a slower time? Could be wrong though

But were they getting excessively bad times? I.e 10 mins +

Not too sure mate, it was a while ago!

I was the only bloke wanting to join the Para's, but I spoke to a couple of lads who wanted to go infantry and they failed, not sure about their times. sorry

There is no point in going to Catterick if you can't get under 9.20 mate!

Thanks for the advice, now whats the best way to train to get below 9 mins. Right now I'm doing 400meter sprints x 8 three days a week, just started it yesturday. Any advice would be great!

Cheers

Yeah that interval stuff works well. Just running it is the best way really. Do it a couple of times a week. Like anything, the more you do it, the better you become!

Does any one have a link to a good bodywork out circuit, I cant seem to function the search button and the internet is full of rubbish, keep getting woman workouts
Cheers

Dont waste time searching for good training sessions on the internet. Its simple just get training! Do as much running as you can, Hill reps etc all that good stuff. Then bang out pressups and situps in the evening. Get training joe!