Love You Hon!! Firefighters Rock

FIREFIGHTERS AS GOOD AS WORLD CHAMPION ATHLETES

(I was part of this study hon...cool huh?)

SEPTEMBER 03 -- MISSOULA, MT: If you thought Lance Armstrong was tough, consider this: Hotshots require nearly the same amount of energy as the Tour de France champion — just to do their jobs. Unlike in professional sports, where an athlete's calorie and water input and energy output are carefully recorded and charted in training logs, wildland firefighters' progress is usually gauged by the miles of line they can build in a shift.

Researchers at the University of Montana and Montana University have been studying the physical strains on firefighters, according to an ABC News report, to help supervisors better supply them with adequate food, water, and rest schedules.

The U.S. Department of Defense, along with the Forest Service, has provided funding for the studies.

"I think the attractiveness of the firefighter model is we're not faking anything," says Brent Ruby, an exercise physiologist at the University of Montana in Missoula. "That means you get a non-simulated combat field-like environment — physical and psychological stress included."

The Montana researchers selected the toughest of the tough — hotshots — as their test subjects. There are 1,360 hotshots in 68 crews nationwide; to measure the energy output of these crews, Ruby and Steve Gaskill, also an exercise physiologist at the University of Montana, used a testing device known as "doubly labeled water." This water solution is packed with tracers in the form of isotopes — elements that are naturally heavier or lighter in mass.

The harder a person works, the more calories a person burns, and the more tracer isotopes leave the body. To measure calorie output, Ruby and Gaskill had men and women hotshots firefighters drink small cups of the water solution every morning for a week; they then took urine samples each morning before the 'shots set off to work. The results, published in the journal Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, showed that daily energy expenditure ranged from 4,000 to 8,000 calories a day. In comparison, Tour de France trainers have reported their cyclists in the three-week race typically burn about 6,500 calories a day.

"It's staggering," he says. "This is one of the highest values in an occupational setting."

The Montana team also found that women firefighters burn an equivalent number of calories on the job as their male counterparts when figures were adjusted for weight differences.