“Don’t look at it as, ‘Here’s where I am,’” Lesley Richmond tells me. “Look at it as, ‘Here’s where I need to be.”
Lesley has had to quickly slip into fitness grief counselor mode after I’ve learned that I am a 175-pound weakling. After trying to squeeze the life out of a hand-held strength measurement device for 15 seconds, the device has laughed in my face (is that sand in my eyes?) and dubbed me “below average” when it comes to “muscular strength.”
“But I do strength training!” I plead in what even I recognize as a pathetic suggestion that the device can’t possibly be right. Even more pathetic: The hordes of other folks doing this five-point fitness assessment offered for free by Be Active North Carolina are taking far worse news with far more grace.
Be Active NC is a non-profit founded in 1991 by Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina. Its goal: to get North Carolinians off the bench and into the game. It tries to reintroduce the concept of physical activity into the public schools with its Just Push Play and Energizers programs. It tries to get inactive adults moving with its Be Active Steps program, which encourages folks to walk the recommended minimum of 10,000 steps a day by giving them a pedometer and place to log their walks. It goes after seniors with its array of Be Active Aging programs. And it goes after everyone across the state with its Be Active Van, which goes everywhere from the Lexington Barbecue Festival to the North Carolina Pickle Festival to let people like me discover not where they are, but rather where they need to be.

To do this, the Be Active Van and its swat team of health & fitness advocates put people through the 5 Components of Health & Fitness, including the one that kicked sand in my face and stole my girl.

• Cardiovascular fitness. Do step-ups for two minutes at a moderate pace, wait 30 seconds, then grab a bar that measures your heart rate. The faster your heart beats, the more challenged it is getting blood and oxygen to the rest of your body. Thus, a slower heart rate means your heart is more aerobically fit and doesn’t have to work as hard. (My result: 79 beats per minute, deemed “excellent” for my age range of 50-54.)
• Muscular Strength. My aforementioned Achilles heel, this is a measure of how much force your muscles can exert in one shot. Lesley, who coordinates Be Active’s Youth Programs, further tried to calm me by pointing out that this simple hand-grip test only measures grip strength — muscles elsewhere in my body may not be below average.
• Muscular Endurance. A muscle’s ability to do the same thing over and over. “Muscular endurance is very important for people playing sports and for those who must sustain an activity for long periods of time,” according to a Be Active flier. Muscle endurance is especially important if you’re into sports (and, in my opinion, far more important than Muscular Strength). Muscular Endurance for Be Active test purposes is measured in number of crunches you can do in a minute. (I did 53, “excellent” for my age group.)

• 

  Flexibility. Defined as a joint’s ability to move through a range of motion. Here, that entails sitting on the ground, legs straight, and seeing how far you can stretch your hands. A flexible body is a body capable of doing more things. (My result: 10 centimeters, earning a “good” rating.)

• Body composition. “The ratio of lean body mass and fat mass,” says Be Active. Lean body mass — that would be the dread Body Mass Index — includes muscle, bone, cartilage and “other internal organs,” fat mass is just that, all the fat in your body. If you have a BMI of 18.5 or less, you’re considered underweight, normal is in the 18.5-24.9 range, you’re overweight if your BMI falls between 25 and 29.9, and people with BMIs of 30 or greater are considered obese. As for fat mass, 2-4 percent is considered the bare minimum for men, 10-12 percent for women; male athletes fall in the 6-13 percent range, females 14-20 percent; fitness buffs: males 14-17 percent, females 21-24 percent; an acceptable fat mass is in the 18-25 percent range for guys, 25-31 percent for gals; men are considered obese if their fat mass is 25 percent or higher, females who clock in at 32 percent or more. (My result: 25.9 percent on the BMI, 19.2 percent for fat mass. So actually I’m a tubby 175-pound weakling.)

But, as Lesley again reiterates, the purpose of the Be Active Van is not admonishment, but encouragement. You get a copy of your results, Be Active keeps a copy as well. The copy I got back included a blank category: “Goal/Target.”
“Come back in six weeks and see where you are,” Lesley advised.
Hopefully by then I won’t be so traumatized by where I was.

Go here for a list of scheduled appearances by the Be Active Van.