The presidential fitness test: An exercise in humiliation?

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• 00:02

  I remember it vividly.

• 00:04

  I was in sixth grade gym class.

• 00:06

  We all lined up on the basketball court, and the dread sank in.

• 00:11

  It was time to take the presidential fitness test.

• 00:16

  We had to do push-ups, climb up a rope, run a mile, toe reaches, and pull-ups.

• 00:24

  Pull-ups!

• 00:25

  I failed miserably.

• 00:27

  My scrawny 11-year-old arms could not pull me up if my life depended on it.

• 00:32

  I felt like a failure.

• 00:33

  And this happened once every year.

• 00:36

  If you went to American public schools before 2012,

• 00:40

  that's when the Obama administration retired the program.

• 00:43

  You probably also experienced the presidential fitness challenge.

• 00:48

  For many students, this was just another day in gym class.

• 00:51

  But it turns out lots of people shared my feelings about it.

• 00:55

  Every time they announced, like, oh, we're going to do this.

• 00:58

  fitness test again.

• 00:59

  It was just, you know, just feelings of dread.

• 01:04

  The Post recently put out a call to readers asking them what they remembered about the test.

• 01:10

  People responded by the hundreds,

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