Four-alarm workout - profile of fire fighter Eric Torres' physical fitness class - includes related article on physical training

Men's Fitness, Oct, 1998 by Jim Gerard

How to experience the firefighter's burn without getting scorched

A static-distorted "10-75" (fire in progress) crackles over the PA, and we bolt into action, quickly donning our coats, air tanks and masks. Hauling our gear, we clamber onto the truck and roar into city traffic, siren yelping and lights flashing. At the scene of the fire, we hoist ladders and mount stairs, leaden hose packs digging into our shoulders. We kick open doors, pull down ceilings and carry trapped victims out of harm's way - all the while avoiding blistering flames and suffocating, acrid smoke ...

All right, there weren't any flames. Not even a smoke machine. And I'm not really a firefighter, OK?

Before you dismiss me as an escapist indulging in a hook-and-ladder fantasy, let me say one thing: It's all Eric Torres' fault. Torres is a personal trainer and New York City firefighter, and I've just finished taking his "Firefighter Training" class at Crunch Studios in Manhattan. This 60-minute fitness fantasia uses familiar gym accoutrements - speed ropes, steps, several sets of dumbbells, and body bars - plus realistic props such as hose packs, flashing lights and a 135-pound mannequin "victim" to simulate the firefighting experience.

Torres has finely hewn features and a granite-like physique; even if he wasn't a firefighter, he could play one on TV. He had the idea for the class after participating in several Combat Challenge competitions, in which firefighters compete in a series of timed events. His aim, he says, is to give his students the mind-set of being real firefighters. Toward that end, he's devised a realistic scenario into which he seamlessly weaves exercise commands and facts about his chosen profession.

Torres' rationale seems quite smart. On the marketing side, it allows easily bored humans - that's most of us - to find a new approach to cardio, and to keep us coming back to classes. After all, the body craves newness, and as it adapts to the rigors of a treadmill, stationary bicycle or another "new" step class, it can become bored easily - especially when you know you've got to pound out between 45 and 60 minutes per session in order to maximize cardio benefits. When that adaptation and boredom set in, interest in cardio often wanes, and you may drop out. Torres aims to maintain an air of freshness and excitement.

On the total-workout front, Torres again scores. Not only does his approach push the limits of your aerobic capacity (i.e., ability to continue sucking down oxygen and increase the distance to the wall you don't want to hit), the workout's construction ensures that you hit virtually every major muscle group. In effect, Torres' approach burns calories, builds some muscle and improves metabolic function. That, combined with what Torres calls the "fireman mystique," attracts curious students - mostly men - and keeps them coming back.

After a brief warm-up and pep talk, the class begins with a taped dispatch from the "chief," followed by throbbing dance music (for that "Disco Inferno" effect, I guess).

I'm ready to write this off as an exercise in kitsch. But then we start climbing, which is what firefighters seemingly do more than anything. Torres tells us to scale 40 flights; we simulate that by performing step-ups - targeting the quads and glutes - on the step platform while carrying a 25-pound hose pack (half of what real firefighters have to lug). We do another round, only this time pumping dumbbells over our heads - hitting all three heads of the shoulder muscles - to mimic climbing up a ladder. (It's hard to concentrate; I'm gasping so hard that I'm ready for the air tank.) Torres then shouts, "We've got a second alarm. Let's go, rookies!"

"10-4!" we bark back. That's firefighter-speak for "affirmative," or, in my case, "Yeah, yeah, let's go back to the station house and play cards."

But there's no room for slackers; Torres reminds us that this is a life-and-death job. So we clear a path around the stepper, which has now metamorphosed into a window. Squeezing ourselves and our hose packs through the imagined opening, we drop the packs inside, then dash back outside the building (i.e., around the stepper) and back in again. By now, it's my quads that are on fire.

We get a quick breather from this frenzied activity as we carefully scan the room for the source of the "fire." I try to imagine what a real firefighter must endure, and I'm not the only one. Fellow "rookie" Robert Fasone, a high-school teacher in real life, confides to me, "All I can think about is doing all this during a real fire. I mean, if I'm sweating like this now, what would it be like when I'm wearing all that stuff?."

A point well taken. I imagine having to do all this grunt work sporting Torres' standard ensemble-which consists of a helmet, heavy quilted coat and pants, thick gloves, knee pads and three-pound boots - all weighted down by a 16-pound air tank.

Torres wrenches me out of my daydream: "Backdraft! Get down!" A backdraft - an explosion resulting from a mixture of air and the gaseous products of incomplete combustion - is the most dangerous phenomenon a firefighter encounters, he says. So we hit the deck. In class, "Get down" means "Do a squat thrust," so once again I'm burning my quads and shoulders, but also targeting my pecs.