Navy PRT Changes: Sailors Ditch Sit-Ups for Planks, Add Rowing to Fitness Test

Right?

Not for those that are in a field or specialty where is a need. Some of the best performing sailors during my career were not the most fit. Basic set of standards for healthy fitness, but not up to SEAL standards.

MCPO Roger Collins - I agree, not SEAL standards, but seriously planks?

PO3 Craig Phillips We have regulations regarding obesity, my comments are more in line with the continued my guys are more fit than yours competition. I went in the Navy at 143 lbs, went up to a heavy 195, and retired at 163, now a skinny old white guy. With the exception of my early career, good to excellent performance reviews. And I hated JFKs and barely passed them quarterly when we were required. As this article states, fitness should be driven by health considerations. Not everyone needs tone at the level of SEALs or SPECOPS in general.

https://www.navytimes.com/news/your-navy/2015/07/30/new-body-fat-rules-big-changes-to-navy-bca/

LT Brad McInnis, the services have a way of finding out what they need to know! I went to enlisted SF Phase 1, APR-MAY70. Back then, an SF applicant simply had to affirm they could swim fifty (I think) meters.
At some point in time, they made us get on a zip line, of sorts. It had no harness or anything like that. You simply had to hold on to a bar for the entire trip! Almost at the end was a lake/pond, and the instructors would yell at us to drop off in the middle of it and swim to shore. Naturally, those that had fibbed on their paperwork couldn't swim and the instructors picked them up in an aluminum rowboat. They were eliminated from the program and returned to their previous unit of assignment!
If you can't swim, learn!
CPT (Join to see)

Got into perhaps the best shape of my life via competitive rowing in college - doubt that is what the USN has in mind. Swimming? I was taught that to include drownproofing (SEAL trick?) in the Boy Scouts! Always thought it odd when Navy friends told me they never learned to swim.
https://www.askmen.com/news/fine_living/man-survives-falling-overboard-by-using-this-obscure-navy-seal-trick.html

CPT (Join to see) - I rowed, too, but most of my fitness was due to the miles and miles of running for cardio...

Agreed, running/cardio was a big part of rowing fitness. Likewise, the related crew team training (erg work, stadium steps, weights, etc.). Logged countless miles rowing on the Raritan River while @ Rutgers and at regattas. To prep for the IRAs we'd shift training from the Raritan to Lake Carnegie @ Princeton which had and still has a phenomenal course and facilities. Great times. Still in touch w/alums.