Description of the anthropometric and physiological profile of tactical officers

Abstract

Scope and Method of Study:

The purpose of this study was investigate the current physical and performance characteristics of tactical officers on full-time, part-time and multi-jurisdictional teams and to identify the underlying physical fitness components required to perform the essential job-tasks of SWAT. A descriptive statistical analysis, One-way ANOVA with Tukeys' post-hocs and independent sample t-tests were used to compare differences in mean anthropometric and performance scores among three groups of tactical officers. In addition, a discriminate analysis with stepwise linear regressions was used to predict group membership. One sample t-tests were utilized to determine differences between the mean scores of the tactical officers and traditional law enforcement officers, as well as the Cooper Single Standard -Fitness Norms.

Findings and Conclusions:

The full-time tactical officers had significantly less fat mass and scored significantly better on measures of muscular endurance and anaerobic power than both the part-time and multijurisdictional tactical officers. In all cases the tactical officers scored significantly better on measures of body composition, muscular strength, muscular endurance, anaerobic power and aerobic power when compared to traditional law enforcement officers and the Cooper Single Fitness Norms at the 50th percentile.