Metabolic Demand of Hiking in Wildland Firefighting

The greatest metabolic demand during wildfire assignments occurred during ingress hikes. On average, this was close to the estimated metabolic demand of the job qualification arduous pack test. However, greater metabolic demand occurred for periods during both shift (on the job) and training hikes. These data quantify the demands associated with actual wildland performance of WLFFs and can help define future work capacity testing and training procedures.