Aptitude and Fitness Assessment
Core ideas
The aptitude and fitness assessment usually combines physical tests, a medical examination, and psychotechnical exercises. Physical preparation should develop cardiovascular endurance, muscular strength and endurance, flexibility, agility, and coordination. A sensible programme progresses gradually, includes warm-up and cool-down, and mixes running, body-weight strength work, and mobility. Medical fitness screening checks vision, hearing, blood pressure, respiratory health, and general condition; answer honestly and disclose relevant conditions. Psychotechnical tests measure attention, reaction time, memory, spatial orientation, and stress tolerance. Practise timed tasks, but sleep well before the assessment and avoid last-minute overtraining.
Traps
Candidates often overtrain in the final week, dehydrate, skip warm-ups, or hide a medical condition that later affects performance. In psychotechnical tests, guessing wildly can lower accuracy; work steadily and read each instruction twice. Do not compare your results with others during the test, and do not change a correct answer without a clear reason.
Worked example
For a 2.4 km run, start at a pace you can hold, aim for even splits, and sprint only in the last 200–300 m. Rule of thumb: train at least three times a week for several weeks, increase weekly distance by no more than about 10%, and treat pain that persists as a reason to seek advice.