How long does it take to be ready for the PARE and POPAT?

Being prepared is important. You already know that. Or you thought you did and quickly realized how under prepared you were after your first experience with the test. So you start scrambling to figure out how to get better, searching for tips and advice so you don't get caught with your pants down  your ankles. Which is probably how some of you have found me (although I hope your pants were on).

You wonder how long will it take to be ready to not only pass the test, but to pass it with flying colours. The answer, like most things in life, is it depends.

Your current, as well as your past fitness levels, will determine your readiness. If you're a natural born athlete who failed for some reason, it may only take a few tweaks here and there. In a matter of weeks, you'd be ready for the test. If athleticism and fitness doesn't run in your blood, then it's gonna come down to other factors.

One last thing, depending on the test you're taking can determine how long it will take to be ready. Therefore I'm going to break it down between the PARE and the POPAT.

PARE Test Prep Timeline

I can say with near certainty that preparing for the PARE can take as little as 2 months. And I'm talking about going from zero level fitness to passing the test. Before you get excited, just remember I said near certainty. There are always exceptions, and I've had a few. But time and time again I've trained people with little fitness, be ready to pass in a few months time. They're not exceptional times, in some cases barely passing, but passing nonetheless. What this does is give the person a foot in the door to move on to the next stage, which means more training time to be faster and stronger for the next test.

Because of the time requirement to pass the PARE (4:45) is reasonable, I make sure my low fitness clients get into reasonable shape. If they're on the ball and start their fitness training before they even apply, even better. They won't have to struggle their first time around. We can take the time to build a stronger body that can withstand the demands of conditioning training

In my early years of police fitness training, I had one client come to me with no athletic background and not fitness background. She was wanting a career change, and policing had always interested her. She was smart enough to try a practice test, and she came away from it shocked. She couldn't believe how out of shape she was, especially for something like the PARE.

We trained for nearly 3 months before her first official test, and I will admit I was tentative. I felt she had a 60/40 chance of failing, but we did enough work for her to pull off a 4:36 time (which included 2 mat faults). Nothing spectacular, but a pass is a pass and it got her to the next stage of the process.

She continued training with me, and 6 months down the road she was told to redo her PARE. In that time between her first and second PARE, I placed an emphasis on strength training. By the time she ran her second PARE, she was repping out push-ups, deadlifting her own bodyweight, and working on her pull-ups. Conditioning was still on the menu, but it wasn't the primary mode of training. Enough was done to keep up the fitness. The weeks leading up to the test we shifted to conditioning training, and in the end, she pulled off a sub 4 min PARE, finishing in 3:56 (no penalties).

Being ready in the short term is possible, but give yourself time to prepare and you will see better results.

POPAT Prep Timeline

The POPAT is whole 'nother beast. If you thought the PARE was difficult, then you haven't tried the POPAT. There are similarities, but you can think of the PARE as the tamer little cousin compared to the POPAT.

It's a little more difficult to gauge how long it will take to prepare for the POPAT. In some cases it's a couple months, in others it's as much as 6+ months. These are some of the characteristics I've noticed in those being successful in 2-3 months:

- about 5'6" in height or taller

- strong (ie bang out at least 10 push-ups with ease, deadlift at least their own bodyweight)

- running 1.5 mi in 11:00-11:30

- having some form of athletic background, especially in competitive soccer and running (and by competitive, I'm talking elite level competition)

Remember this: if you possess these characteristics, it's no guarantee of success. The chance of failure is still a possibility if you don't prepare adequately. If you focus on the wrong areas of training, or if you don't practice aspects of the test, the chance of failure increases.

For those that don't possess the above characteristics, have expectations that it will take you a little longer to be ready.

For example, one of my clients stands at about 5'3" and weighs a buck twenty five, buck thirty (give or take). For someone her size, she is quite strong, so she certainly meets one of the characteristics. When we started, though, her cardio fitness was lacking, which greatly affected her performance not only on the obstacle course, but the push/pull machine and vault as well. Naturally she possesses strength, but cardio was another ballgame.

We got to working on her cardio conditioning through running and non-traditional cardio training. Since there wasn't an immediate test date, I didn't have to rush her with lots of running and lots of high intensity work off the bat. We could take our time building up her tolerance for high intensity work. It also gave us a chance to adapt the body to the stresses of running. No need doing lots of HIIT running and breaking her down before she even tested.

I used the 1.5 mi run as a gauge of her aerobic fitness. In one month she dropped her time by nearly a minute, going from 14:18 to 13:21. Once a month we would re-test and each time she would run faster. By August, she was running under 12:00 consistently.

I also used my mock tests once a month as another performance marker. Here too we can see improvements being made. But ultimately to see the real fruits of her labour, she would need the real test.

Although we saw improvements in cardio, passing on test day would prove elusive for another couple months. In terms of her cardio fitness, she was ready. What was becoming her downfall was the push/pull machine.

At the time I still didn't have the machine to practice on, so we would run simulation after simulation to prepare as best as possible.

And since her cardio fitness was no longer a weakness, I shifted the focus back to strength training.

Strength training was being maintained all throughout, but it wasn't being emphasized for the first 5 months. So we got to work, focusing on the basics (deadlift, bench press, push-ups, pull-ups, squats, plus a few accessory exercises) and lifting heavy. Cardio training was being put on maintenance mode.

I mentioned strength wasn't an issue for her, but being short at 5'3" meant she didn't have a lot of leverage to work with on the machine, especially for the push. We would have to take advantage of whatever leverage she did have, and add more strength on top of that.

Although cardio was being maintained, there was enough high intensity work (ie 400 repeats, hill sprints, suicides, controlled falls, etc.) being done so the body didn't forget how to work hard.

By the end of October, on her second official test, she passed. Barely, but she passed, and it was enough to get her foot in the door and on to the next stage of the process.

It was a 7 month journey that took not only a physical battle to get through, but mental as well. But she got it done, and she's not stopping there. Just because she passed, doesn't mean she can't get herself even better. Not just for the test, but for the academy, and for duty.

The Take Home Message

If you're athletically gifted, give yourself some time to adequately prepare. The test is still something you've never done before, so you'll want to be prepared. It may take a few weeks, but give yourself that time.

If you're not athletically gifted, definitely give yourself time. If you haven't applied but plan to, start your training NOW. Build your body up gradually and progressively so it doesn't break down on you at the wrong time.

I've given you two examples of clients where it took months to get them where they needed to be.

Remember this though, you're not only training for the physical test, you're training to perform and to be fit for duty.