Oh, look. Another day, another article breathlessly declaring some grueling ordeal as the “best fitness test of all time.” This time, Men’s Health is platforming a burpee challenge from former CrossFit champion Jason Khalipa. The premise is so charmingly simple it’s almost insulting - do 15 unbroken burpees every minute, on the minute, until you physically can't anymore. Your score is how many minutes you survive.
Sounds fun, right? Like a party where the only guest is a panic attack. But as your coach, I feel it’s my solemn duty to cut through the hype. Because while it might be a decent way to ruin your afternoon, calling it the “best fitness test of all time” is a stretch so big it might pull a hamstring.
So, it's the "Best fitness test of all time"?
Let's get one thing straight. This is a test of one thing: your ability to endure burpees. It's a fantastic measure of glycolytic capacity and muscular endurance under cardio-respiratory distress. In other words, it tests how good you are at doing a high volume of a single, metabolically demanding movement. To call it the “best fitness test of all time” is to have an incredibly narrow view of what “fitness” is.
What about maximal strength? Power? Agility? Mobility? Skill-based movements? This test tells you nothing about your one-rep max deadlift, your 40-yard dash time, or if you can even touch your toes. It’s a CrossFit-style metcon masquerading as a universal diagnostic tool. It's like judging a chef's entire skill set based on how fast they can chop an onion. It’s part of the picture, but it sure as hell isn't the whole masterpiece.
Let's dissect these "Benchmarks"
This is where it gets truly comical. According to Khalipa, surviving a meager 3 minutes is the ‘minimum standard.’
Excuse me while I reboot my sarcasm processors. Three minutes. That’s three sets of 15 burpees, for a total of 45 burpees in under 180 seconds. Let me be perfectly clear - for the average person who doesn't live and breathe HIIT, that is not a 'minimum standard.' That is an accomplishment. Telling someone who just started their fitness journey that they’re below a ‘minimum standard’ for tapping out at 2 minutes is elitist, gatekeeping nonsense and a fantastic way to make someone quit.
The other benchmarks are equally... ambitious.
- •5 minutes (‘train hard’ category): 75 burpees.
- •10 minutes (‘Jason Khalipa standard’): 150 burpees.
- •15 minutes (elite): 225 burpees.
- •20+ minutes (‘a league of your own’): 300+ burpees. At this point you aren't human, you're a biological burpee machine.
These aren't benchmarks for general fitness; they're benchmarks for competitive functional fitness athletes. Don't let these numbers define your worth or progress. If you try this, just look at the Workout tab in our app. Did you do one more rep or last 10 more seconds than last time? That's a win. Progress is personal, not defined by some champion’s arbitrary ladder.