BRIEF REVIEW BODY COMPOSITION AND MILITARY PERFORMANCEdMANY THINGS TO MANY PEOPLE

Friedl, KE. Body composition and military performancedMany things to many people. J Strength Cond Res 26(7): S87– S100, 2012dSoldiers are expected to maintain the highest possible level of physical readiness because they must be ready to mobilize and perform their duties anywhere in the world at any time. The objective of Army body composition standards is to motivate physical training and good nutrition habits to ensure a high state of readiness. Establishment of enforceable and rational standards to support this objective has been challenging even at extremes of body size. Morbidly obese individuals are clearly not suited to military service, but very large muscular individuals may be superbly qualified for soldier performance demands. For this reason, large individuals are measured for body fat using a waist circumference-based equation (female soldiers are also measured for hip circumfer-ence). The main challenge comes in setting appropriate fat standards to support the full range of Army requirements. Mil-itary appearance ideals dictate the most stringent body fat standards, whereas health risk thresholds anchor the most lib-eral standards, and physical performance associations fall on a spectrum between these 2 poles. Standards should not ex-clude or penalize specialized performance capabilities such as endurance running or power lifting across a spectrum of body sizes and fat. The full integration of women into the military further complicates the issue because of sexually dimorphic characteristics that make gender-appropriate standards essen-tial and where inappropriately stringent standards can compro-mise both health and performance of this segment of the force. Other associations with body composition such as stress effects on intraabdominal fat distribution patterns and meta-bolic implications of a fat reserve for survival in extreme environ-ments are also relevant considerations. This is a review of the science that underpins the U.S. Army body composition standards. KEY WORDS body fat, physical activity, metabolism, chronic health, appearanc