Aerobic conditioning is important, but anaerobic conditioning is crucial for police occupational task performance

Aim: To determine the relationship between metabolic fitness test scores and performance in police occupational tasks. Design: A retrospective cohort study. Methods: Retrospective data from 106 law enforcement officers who completed two metabolic fitness assessments (anaerobic: a 20-meter (10-m and 20-m splits) sprint, aerobic: 20m-Multistage Fitness Test (MSFT)) and three routine occupational tasks (1.22m Fence jump (FJ), 8.5m Victim Drag (VD with 102.3kg) and ‘Get-up’(GU)) were collected. A Kendall’s Tau-b correlation coefficient was used to assess the relationship between the fitness tests and occupational tasks. Results: There was a significant positive correlation between the 10-meter sprint scores and FJ (r=0.415 p<0.001), VD (r=0.417, p<0.001) and GU (r=0.392, p<0.001). Similarly, the 20-meter sprint scores were significantly and strongly correlated with FJ (r=0.437, p<0.001), VD (r= 0.450, p<0.001) and GU (r= 0.419, p<0.001). These anaerobic tests predicted approximately 20% of the performance in the occupational tasks analysed. The MSFT fitness assessment had a weak, albeit significant negative correlation with the three tasks: FJ (r=-0.252, p<0.001), VD (r=-0.192, p=0.007) and GU (r=-0.305, p<0.001). Conclusion: High levels of metabolic fitness correlated with faster performance in police officer occupational tasks, particularly ones of an anaerobic nature (i.e. the maximal sprint tests). In addition to typical aerobic fitness conditioning, anaerobic fitness conditioning could be vital for optimal performance in physically demanding tasks required of police officer.