CFA Prep

[thunderbird12]

I am a candidate for the class of 2015.
Can anyone suggest any good CFA preparation workouts? I just finished school and i have time now to put more effort into preparing for the CFA and i was interested in daily workouts.
Is there some place that i can go to find this information as well?
Thanks

 

[Christcorp]

A lot of running. A lot of pushups. A lot of pullups. A lot of situps. Pretty simple actually. good luck. mike....

 

[Mikeandcris]

Basketball Throw

In order to improve the basketball throw, you need to build the shoulder and work on technique. An exercise baseball players use is "long toss." Simply throw a baseball or softball back and forth and further and further until you're throwing your maximum distance. (Don't overdo this...give your arm some time to get built up and DON'T hurt yourself!!!) We found it really helps to have a partner throw the ball back....because throwing and chasing the ball by yourself gets old fast. (jk) Actually, my son throws a lot further than me, so I'd throw the ball back with a lacrosse stick. Also, the basketball throw is "technique" as much as anything else. Because you're on your knees, your hips, quads, and core muscles come into play as well. So in addition to long toss, practice actually throwing the basketball from your knees. Incorporate as much of your hips, quads and core in order to get a catapult effect as your shoulder whips the ball downrange.

 

[OBXmom]

I recommend doing a practice test first. My son's coach had gone online and printed the maximums for the CFA. He then gave them to my son and told him they were the minimums! He told my son to practice over the summer and give him a call when he was ready to take the test. (gotta love coaches!)

This did a couple things.
1) Taking a practice test allowed him to see that its not just the push ups or sit ups or pull ups themselves...its doing each activity one after the other with only the prescribed rest period in between that adds to the challenge. It adds the cardio element to the basic strength movements.
2) It allowed him to see where his weak spots were, and focus on honing those muscles, or a particular technique. (the basketball throw starts off feeling very unnatural!)
3) Once he felt he perfected another aspect, he'd grab a friend and retry the whole test. (It becomes your workout.)

Needless to say, since he thought those were the minimums, when he finally called the coach and took the CFA, he rocked it!!!

 

[PDub]

http://www.stewsmith.com/linkpages/serviceacademycfa.htm

 

[goldfarb1]

Don't focus so much on the basketball throw and shuttle run. Instead put more emphasis on sit ups, pushups, run, and pullups.

For pullups I suggest the Armstrong pullup plan (look it up). It was created by an officer in the USMC. Pretty much everybody training for the Marine PFT uses it. It got me to 13 pullups in about 8 weeks, and I used to not be able to do one. I've now switched to a program called recon ron to get me the final 7 pullups so I can max out on the Marine PFT.

For pushups what I did was start a few sets of pushups in a decreasing rep scheme. Initially I started off at 20, next set 15, next set 10, next set 5. Every week I increase it by 5 pushups. If I struggle to do 5 more for that week, I'll repeat the last week. So for me by now it looks something like 40, 35, 30, 25, 20, 15, 10 and 5.

For situps I just add core excercises whenever I'm at the gym. Sometimes its leg raises, weighted situps, crunches, etc. I don't really have a set excercise for situps, I just do them.

There's a ton out there for the mile run. One program you could do is this. Run 3 times a week. Monday do a 3 mile run. This will be for stamina. Wed. do 3 sets of a one mile run, this will be so you can get used to the mile. Friday will be sprints. This will focus on speed.

Hope this gave you some guidelines to work with. Good luck! And don't forget the key isn't necessarily what plan you use, but rather dedication to a plan.