#1

Take the power test.

How do you know if you are losing power? One of the most time-tested ways to tell is the sit-to-stand test, which also gauges one’s risk for falling. Sit in a chair with a straight back and no arm rests and cross your arms over your chest, resting your hands on your shoulders, feet flat on the floor. Start a timer for 30 seconds and count how many times you can move from sitting to standing.

Men over 65 should be able to do 12 or more; women over 65 should do 11 or more. If you score below that, you may be low on power.

While there is no defined standard for younger adults, one studysuggested that men under 60 should be able to complete at least 17 repetitions and women 15.

Unpaywalled article: https://archive.ph/SONon

Related: The Sit to Stand Test:

The Brazilian Longevity Study was first published in the European Journal of Cardiovascular Prevention in 2012. In essence it is a simple test that looking at a person’s ability to get down onto the ground and back up again without using their hands. As you can imagine it requires good hip strength and flexibility.
The test is simple: All you have to do is go from standing to sitting (cross leg style) to standing again. You start with 10 points, and loose a point every time you loose balance and put a hand or knee down.
The study has some surprising results.
The researchers tested 2,002 adults 51 to 80 years old, and then followed them for 6 years or until a participant died. In that time, 159 people died. Those who had the lowest score of zero to three points had a risk of death that was five to six times higher than those who scored eight to 10 points. The conclusion is that people who couldn’t do this simple move (sit rise test) had a greater chance of dying in the 6 years following then those who could do it.

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#2

We talked about this in an earlier thread.

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#3

For the chair test I did 16 repetitions for 30 sec. For the second test - stand-sit-stand I got 10 points and have been getting the same score for at least 5 years. Both were easy for me probably because of my comparatively low weight.

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#4

I do a bar hang. I started at 60 seconds on Jan 1 2024. I’m up to 95 seconds on my way to 120.

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#5

I like this test as well. Since many of these test are simple to perform I wonder if we can easily combine them. Would our scores on a combined test be more meaningful than one fitness test alone?

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