![]() The problem is that fighter pilots lose a lot of water before they even get in the cockpit, Lee explained. And yes, staying hydrated actually makes a difference here: according to one study from 1979, just 3 percent dehydration can reduce a pilot’s G tolerance by 40 percent. Sleeping right, working out, and staying hydrated is very important for fighting Gs, Lee said. Still, the long-running joke is that bananas are the best food to eat before flying, because “they taste the same coming up as they do going down,” Lee said. “It’s like that.”īuilding up a tolerance is also how fighter pilots keep their food down in the middle of a roller coaster maneuver. “The other day my shoulder was sore from pulling weeds,” he said. In some ways, getting used to Gs is a lot like getting used to any other activity. “They had a good time but they are extremely drained, nobody’s used to these forces on the body.” Lee said you can see the difference whenever fighter pilots take crew chiefs or celebrities for a ride. Pilots also build up a tolerance to Gs by flying a lot and by strapping into a G-force centrifuge that spins pilots around in a controlled environment. I didn’t realize the importance of physical fitness” for fighting G-LOC.Ī G-suit helps of course, “but it comes down to how good of a shape you’re in,” he added. “HIIT training, deadlifts, squats, sprints, box jumps, all that stuff, but the basics is working out the legs,” he said. Having strong leg muscles helps blood from pooling into your legs, Lee explained. How do you get in shape for something like G force? Four words: never skip leg day. If left unchecked, that loss of blood from the brain can lead to G-induced loss of consciousness (G-LOC). That’s a huge strain on the pilot’s body, which is why Air Force pilots wear specially-designed G suits to keep blood from draining out of the brain and into the pilot’s abdomen and legs. In plain English, that means a pilot who weighs 160 pounds at one G would weigh 960 pounds at six Gs. But when a fighter jet accelerates, the pilot feels a build up of Gs that multiplies the normal pull of gravity. The normal pull of one G keeps us all from floating into space. “He paused it and said, ‘How did you ever expect to win today? I have 15 years of experience flying fighters, and granted, you don’t have anywhere near that, but I’m also in better shape than you.’” “In the debrief, after the flight, my labored breathing was evident in the tape,” Lee wrote in a July blog for Sandboxx. An older instructor wiped him out not just because the instructor had more experience, but also because he was in better shape to handle the Gs. But winning a dogfight takes a surprising amount of physical endurance. Lee found that out the hard way when he was a student learning dogfight maneuvers. The Air Force is often referred to by other services as the ‘chair force,’ because many of its career fields involve sitting in a chair inside the wire. Justin “Hasard” Lee took the time to tell Task & Purpose about the human side of flying a high-performance aircraft. So how do you stay alert, comfortable and healthy while flying a multi-million dollar jet armed with explodey bits? And when the bullets start flying, how do you deal with the strain of G-force? F-35 instructor pilot Maj. ![]() Unlike a long car ride, there are no rest stops to stretch and get a Big Mac. ![]() But pilots are human too, and sometimes flying a fighter jet is less like Ace Combat 7 and more like a long road trip at 30,000 feet. Everybody knows fighter pilots are pretty cool: they fly supersonic jets, drop explosive ordnance, and wear awesome sunglasses. ![]()
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