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VALDOSTA STATE MAGAZINE 29 school offered Air Force ROTC and in-state tuition for Florida residents. That August, Dunham showed up to take the Air Force ROTC Physical Fitness Test. The test scores cadets on pushups, sit-ups, and a mile-and-a-half run. Points are given in each category according to how well they perform, and cadets must accumulate a certain combined score to pass. What sticks in Dunham’s mind are the pushups from that test. He pumped out one after the other — 10, 15, 25, 30. His aim was to attain the highest score possible, which meant he had to do 67 or more in a minute. He made it to 41. He only needed to complete a minimum of 33 pushups, so in that sense he passed with room to spare. But he still walked away dejected and disappointed. The minimum was not good enough for Dunham. “I wanted to be above that,” he said. He wanted to be elite. He did not want to be the middle schooler who had quit playing sports because he thought he was too small and too weak. Dunham began searching online for ways to improve his upper body strength. That is when he stumbled across calisthenics. Calisthenics includes many commonplace exercises, such as pull-ups and pushups, but at the advanced level there are much more extreme manipulations. Planches are when people use their arms to hold their bodies parallel to the ground, giving the illusion that they are floating. Superman pushups require people to leap into the air from the pushup position, remaining horizontal and shooting their arms out in front of them before returning to the ground. “I just thought it was cool because nobody I knew was doing it,” Dunham said. I’ve always had the willpower to do whatever I wanted to do. Even before I started working out, I had little goals here and there, and I always put my head to it, and I always get things done eventually. I’m just a consistent person, I guess. — AUSTIN DUNHAM “ “