A 30-year-old man passed away yesterday after collapsing outside Maju Camp. He had just completed his NS FIT training at Maju Fitness Conditioning Centre. The circumstances to his death is not yet reported.
How did NS FIT come about?
Before we talk about NS FIT, we have to talk about IPPT aka the Individual Physical Proficiency Test. I think it’s normal for men in Singapore to have a love hate relationship with IPPT. Love hate, in this context, would be you either love or hate it. For those who do well in IPPT, you get “free” money under the IPPT Incentive Awards scheme. As long as you pass, you get $200. It goes up to $500 for gold and $300 for silver.
The problem is when people don’t pass. What happens then? Well, you have to do nine sessions of NS FIT workouts plus one IPPT. Each session is an hour to an hour 15 minutes of exercising.
The man who collapsed either didn’t pass his IPPT or didn’t take his IPPT at the previous window. The IPPT window is a one-year period, starting from your birthday after you completed serving your national service. All NSmen with PES A, B/ B1/ B2/ C1 status must take the IPPT. Otherwise, you have to do the 10 sessions of NS FIT.
What happens if you didn’t do your NS FIT?
If you didn’t complete the NS FIT, you will have to do an additional 10 more in the next window. It’s not the worst cos I honestly thought they will just fine you or send you to jail.
I am also surprised that you can get out of your NS FIT sessions early as long as you pass your IPPT. I think this is good motivation for people to make effort to pass their IPPT.
Who designed the NS FIT?
Based on the OneNS website, the NS FIT is developed withS Health Promotion Board (HPB) and Sport Singapore (SportSG). There is honestly quite a good variety to it. I thought all NS FIT sessions will be held in a SAF army camp but that is not the case.
NS FIT is available four Fitness Conditioning Centres (FCC, aka army camps) as well as 32 other sites (according to OneNS). They also have virtual NS FIT that you can do in the comfort of your own home. A Straits Times infographic listed nine sites. I am not sure which is the more accurate list but there are a lot of options!
The FIT@Park are held at BishanAng Mo Kio Park, Marina City Gallery @ Marina Bay, and Punggol Park. They also have FIT@SAFRA Gyms, which I would assume comes with aircon?
Is NS FIT punitive?
I thought the NS FIT was meant to be a punitive measure. I had the impression it was about making your life miserable if you can’t pass your IPPT. From what I am seeing so far, it seems like they have come a long way.
The way NS FIT is structured (i.e., can stop early as long as you pass your IPPT) suggests that their intention is genuinely about people clearing their IPPT.
If I am not mistaken, you also get half day service pay for attending a NS FIT session. They didn’t have to do that! What is crazy is that you get reimbursed I think $20 for each session so technically the nett amount you received is $200, which is comparable to an IPPT pass with incentive. But yes, you still need to take that extra 11-12 hours, excluding transport time, to clear it.
In my opinion, NS FIT doesn’t seem like a punishment. But I guess if you hate exercise and don’t put in any effort to pass your IPPT, it’ll be punitive no matter what.
What happens during a NS FIT session?
I have not attended a NS FIT session before so I can’t tell you what goes on in one. But there are Reddit threads that discussed NS FIT.
From what I gather, FCC uses a self-select tagging system. You get to pick a tag prior to each session. The coloured tag will determine the session that you will be undergoing for that day. The tags are:
- Blue tag: gym session, half the session doing a workout set and the other half doing cardio (e.g., bicycle)
- Red tag: running to improve 2.4km run timing
- Brown tag: IPPT-specific training to help you pass the IPPT stations, also include some running
- Green tag: for individuals with higher BMI
- Baby blue tag: for first timers
- Special Tags: zumba or special events
It is unclear if Maju FCC follows the same system. If so, it is not reported which type of training did the deceased serviceman undergo prior to his collapse.
Time-based circuit training for NS FIT at Maju Camp
These information are what I saw on Reddit. I am not sure how credible they are. A couple of people have mentioned time-based circuit training so I am guessing that would be part of the NS FIT session.
An example given was 30s high knees, 100m jog, 30s deadlift squats, 100m jog, 30s half squats, 100m jog, 30secs push-ups, 100m jog, 30secs plank, 100m jog.
I do wonder if it is HYROX inspired.
No exercise is inherently safe
Recently, I wrote about safety of chiropractic in Singapore. One of the things that I mention was that there is nothing that is inherently absolutely safe. The example I quoted was the 23-year old man who passed away at this year’s 2XU Compression Run.
Of course the risk of dying from exercising is fairly small but it is not a true zero. There is always some risk. The risk can be mitigated based on exercise levels that are suitable for fitness levels. I think the NS FIT programme did well by using a tagging system.
The tagging system is self-selected, which I assume moves part of the liability to the NSman. There is some onus on the individual to choose appropriately based on their current fitness level and how they are feeling that day.
For the deceased NSman, he reported feeling well after the session and booked out. He collapsed only five minutes after leaving the camp.
Is there a safer way to train for IPPT and fulfill NSFIT obligations?
I feel like one of the logistics challenges of running NS FIT is that it has to be done in a group setting. It is impossible to offer one-on-one training for everyone just cos of resource constraints. Not only will it be expensive but where will you find so many trainers to run them?
I bring up one-on-one training because I do feel that it’s safer. One-on-one training means higher attention to the individual and being able to cater the exercises more closely to the fitness level of the person as well as how they are feeling that day.
Of course it’s ludicrous to suggest that SAF provides one-on-one NS FIT training. As a taxpayer, I certainly don’t want my money to be going into free personal training sessions for people who can’t pass IPPT.
Personal training to meet NS FIT obligation
An alternative system may be to have a register of personal trainers for NSman to train with to fulfill their NS FIT obligations. It may sound farfetch to you but it isn’t really so.
I do have several male clients who would ask for IPPT-specific training a few months prior to when their IPPT window closes. Imagine asking a chiropractor to help you prepare for your IPPT!
There is one client who had never passed his IPPT before but passed for the first time after we done some IPPT prep work together. Sure, it is not easy but it does deliver superior outcomes than the group workout programmes that are currently offered.
People are willing to pay money to pass their IPPT so they don’t have to do the ten sessions of NS FIT. Besides being safer because of the individualised attention, personal training is also more engaging and provides better motivation for people to get fitter. In that sense, the objectives are aligned with NS FIT. The government should consider this subset of people and allow personal training hours to account for NS FIT requirements.
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