The Alaska Army National Guard raised fitness test scores by an average of 26 points and grew its certified Integrator bench 85 percent, without an embedded performance team.
The Problem
Active Component H2F rests on a single assumption: the performance team and the Soldier occupy the same footprint every day. Strip that assumption out and most of the delivery model stops working.
Major General Charles Kemper IV, Deputy Director of the Army National Guard, states the problem in the form that makes it tractable holistically preparing Soldiers on the other twenty-eight days a month, when they are not in uniform (Rhoades 2026b). In Alaska, add an Arctic operating environment, vast distances between the communities Soldiers live in, and the ordinary competition between civilian careers, families, and drill obligations.
The Army’s own economic modeling reflects how hard this is. In the return-on-investment evaluation, Reserve Component values were discounted by a fidelity factor of 0.65 specifically because the Reserve delivery model relies on hub-and-spoke regional support centers, mobile teams, and asynchronous access to SME’s rather than embedded proximity (Thompson et al. 2026). The structure differs by design: Reserve Component performance teams work for their Adjutant General or major Army Reserve command rather than a brigade commander, precisely so they can address problems COMPO 1 formations do not face (Rhoades 2025).
What They Did
Alaska’s approach rests on four things: proactive leadership, multi-component networking, digital outreach, and targeted education (Rhoades 2026c). In practice that produced a portfolio rather than a program.
Get Fit and aviation remedial physical training, structured programs aimed at the Soldiers furthest from standard, which is where the largest readiness gains sit.
Monthly Food for Thought sessions, recurring nutrition education at a cadence a part-time Force can actually sustain.
Project Odyssey — an external partnership the state credits, alongside Food for Thought, with the improving trend in its health and quality-of-life survey results.
The H2F and Family Programs (J9) Wellness Course — R2 supported with the deliberate inclusion of families, who are the actual environment a Guardsman returns to.
Embedded Holistic Health Assessments and Quality of Life surveys — the instrumentation that turns a portfolio of activity into a trend line.
The connective tissue was partnership rather than resourcing. Colonel Aaron Kelsey, the Alaska Army National Guard land Force commander, credits deliberate integration across the State Surgeon’s Office, behavioral health, chaplains, and active-duty counterparts with creating what he describes as a total-Soldier system spanning the state enterprise (Rhoades 2026c).
What Changed
Participants in the Get Fit and aviation remedial physical training programs averaged a 26-point increase in Army Fitness Test scores. Certified H2F Integrators within the formation grew 85 percent over two years. Holistic Health Assessment and Quality of Life survey results trended upward following implementation of the monthly Food for Thought sessions and the Project Odyssey program (Rhoades 2026c).
Why It Worked
Density substitutes for proximity. If the performance professional cannot be near the Soldier daily, the answer is not a longer drill weekend, it is a denser network of trained Integrators already inside the formation, present on the days the professionals are not. An 85 percent increase in certified Integrators is not an administrative statistic; it is the delivery mechanism.
Partnership beats requisition. The State Surgeon’s Office, behavioral health, and the chaplaincy already existed and were already funded. Alaska’s contribution was organizing them around the same Soldier. That is a coordination cost, not a resourcing cost, and it is available to every state now rather than after the next program cycle.
Instrumentation converts activity into evidence. Embedded assessments and recurring Quality of Life surveys are why Alaska can report a trend rather than a testimonial. Any state program that skips this step will eventually be asked for numbers it does not have.
Families are part of the delivery model, not an adjacent courtesy. For a part-time Force, the household is where sleep, nutrition, and recovery behavior actually get executed.
The strategic significance is larger than one state. The Army has funded a four-state National Guard pilot that is producing positive outcomes, and the Director of the Army National Guard is working toward expanding H2F resourcing to all fifty states and four territories (Rhoades 2026b). That means Alaska’s model is about to be tested at scale, and results like these are the reason the 0.65 Reserve Component fidelity discount in the current economic model deserves to be treated as an open empirical question rather than a settled parameter.
Replicate It
Nothing below requires an embedded performance team; Alaska did not have one.
Set an Integrator density target and brief it like strength. Certified Integrators per company is the readiness metric that most directly predicts delivery in a part-time formation.
Map partnerships before building programs. State Surgeon, behavioral health, chaplains, family programs, and active-duty counterparts are capability you already own.
Instrument from day one. Put assessments and Quality of Life surveys on a schedule before the first event, not after someone asks for results.
Solve for the twenty-eight days. Digital outreach and recurring low-cost touchpoints reach Soldiers where they actually are.
Aim remedial programs at the Soldiers furthest from standard. A 26-point average gain came from working the bottom of the distribution, which is also where the readiness risk concentrates.
Include families deliberately. Build it into the program structure rather than offering it as an option.
Implement With or Without an H2F Performance Team
Alaska is close to a worked example of ‘doing it without’ already. Four additions make it executable by a single battalion or a geographically isolated company.
Start with the partnership map, not the program. On one page, list every source of support your Soldiers can already reach: the State Surgeon’s Office or supporting MTF, behavioral health, chaplains and unit ministry teams, Army Community Service, Army Wellness Centers, R2 Teams, and any nearby active-duty counterpart willing to share capacity. Most of these will say yes to a formation brief if asked.
Run remedial PT with Master Fitness Trainers and Integrators. A 26-point average gain came from structured programming for the Soldiers furthest from standard, not from specialized equipment. An ASI-qualified H2F-I can build and lead it.
Make one recurring monthly touchpoint and protect it. A monthly nutrition or sleep talk that actually happens beats a comprehensive program that gets cancelled. Rotate the topic across the five domains and let Integrators deliver it.
Instrument with whatever you have. A ten-question survey at the start and again at six months is enough to show a trend. Consult the right SME in the Unit or request assistance from a supporting organization, or from the H2F Directorate directly. Units that skip this step cannot easily track action and change, or make their case later, and the cost of the omission only becomes visible when leaders seek to refine and enhance the program or someone asks for numbers you don’t have.
References
- Rhoades, Hunter. 2025. “Army Expands Program That Transforms How Soldiers Prepare for Combat.” army.mil, December 8, 2025. https://www.army.mil/article/289422.
- Rhoades, Hunter. 2026b. “Warfighter Performance Experts Share Lessons Learned at H2F Symposium.” army.mil, May 14, 2026. https://www.army.mil/article/292501.
- Rhoades, Hunter. 2026c. “Human Performance Programs Recognized for Excellence at Symposium.” army.mil, May 18, 2026. https://www.army.mil/article/292580.
- Thompson, Andrew G., Manoj Subedi, Alexander E. Morrow, Chance L. Smith, and Kevin A. Bigelman. 2026. “Evaluating the Return on Investment of U.S. Army Holistic Health and Fitness Performance Teams: A Matched Difference-in-Differences Study of Readiness and Economic Outcomes.” Sports Medicine 56 (7): 1801–1831.
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