Can you carry a forty-pound kid two miles?

Quick answer: Load a pack to your child's weight and walk two miles. However that goes, it's your starting line. Walk loaded once a week, do heavy carries twice, and break in your footwear now, not during the emergency.

Pick up a 40-pound bag of dog food. Hold it against your chest and walk a mile without setting it down. Now picture it crying, squirming, and gripping your collar.

That's a small child. It's also the most realistic survival fitness test most parents will ever face, and most of us would fail it by the half-mile mark.

The job is walking, not sprinting

Forget the movie version. Nobody outruns a wildfire on foot, and nobody needs a muscle-up to leave a flooded neighborhood. The real task is dull and heavy: cover a few miles on bad footing, possibly in the dark, with a scared child who can't walk it themselves and a pack that has to come too.

A four-year-old can often walk the first quarter mile and then, understandably, quits. A tired kid also goes limp, which makes the weight feel worse than the number says. So the question isn't how much you can lift once. It's how long you can move with 40 to 60 pounds on your body, kid and pack combined, without your form falling apart.

Most gym routines don't build that. Most people who run five miles a week don't have it either. It's a specific skill, and it's cheap to build.

Run the test this weekend

Check your child's weight. Then build a stand-in with the same load:

• A full 5-gallon water jug weighs about 42 pounds. Water is 8.3 pounds a gallon, so you can also fill a pack with gallon jugs and do the math.
• A 50-pound bag of play sand runs a few dollars at any home store. Double-bag it so it doesn't leak down your back.

Put it in a sturdy backpack, or carry it in front in your arms for the bear-hug version. Walk a two-mile loop with a few hills. Time it and write down what hurt.

Your feet will probably complain first. Then your lower back or shoulders. Grip, if you carried it in your arms. That list is your training plan.

If you have a heart condition, bad knees, a bad back, or you've been sedentary for years, talk to your doctor before you do this. Start lighter and build.

Build it in three pieces

Loaded walking, once a week. Start with a pack at a weight you can carry a mile without suffering. Add a few pounds every week or two, or add distance, but not both at once. Boring and effective. Pick a route with a hill and some uneven ground, because a sidewalk lies to you about what a trail does to your ankles.

Heavy carries, twice a week. About twenty minutes. Pick up something heavy and walk with it.

• Farmer carries: a heavy kettlebell or dumbbell in each hand, walk 40 yards, rest, repeat.
• Suitcase carries: one heavy weight, one side, then switch. This one humbles people, and it works the muscles that keep you from tipping sideways under a kid on one hip.
• Sandbag bear-hug carries: the sand stand-in again. It shifts and fights you, which is the point.

A 35-pound kettlebell is about sixty dollars. The sandbag costs less than lunch.

Legs and back. Step-ups onto a bench or sturdy box, squats, and deadlifts. If you've never deadlifted, pay a qualified trainer for two or three sessions to check your form. A bad hinge with a load is how people get hurt, and a hurt parent can't carry anybody.

Carry the actual kid

A sandbag doesn't hug back, so practice with the real thing. Make it a game and nobody gets scared.

• Toddlers under about 40 pounds: a framed child carrier is the right tool. They run $200 to $350 and spread the weight onto your hips. It also frees your hands. Fit it, load your kid, and walk a mile before you need it.
• Older kids: piggyback for stretches, then switch to a hip carry, then give them the walk. Switching sides every few minutes keeps your back from locking up.
• Your pack: keep it light and tight to your spine, so the child's weight and the pack's weight don't compete.

Both parents should practice. Dad shouldn't be the only one who can do this, and Mom shouldn't assume she's the one holding the diaper bag. If you have two kids, work out ahead of time who carries which one. That conversation belongs in the same plan as who goes where if someone breaks in at 2 a.m., and it's much easier to have over dinner than in the hallway.

What goes wrong

Blisters. They end more walks than anything else. A 12-mile day isn't the issue. Brand-new boots on mile one is. Trail shoes or boots run $100 to $180, and good wool socks are $15 to $25 a pair. Break them in over a few weeks. If you feel a hot spot, stop and tape it right then.

Downhill. Going down with a load punishes your knees more than going up. Shorten your stride and keep your knees soft.

The wall at mile one and a half. Almost everybody hits it on the first test. It's why you test.

Carrying only the kid. Water, a light, a phone and a small first aid kit still have to come along. If you can't carry the kid and the essentials together, the plan has a hole.

Carrying a firearm. If you carry lawfully, that weight and the holster on your belt are part of the load. Train with it on, as you'd actually wear it, and keep everything else locked away from children at home. Carry laws vary by state, province and city, and nothing here is legal advice. Check local law with a qualified attorney or certified instructor.

Leaving is the first move

Avoidance comes before everything else in this magazine, and that goes for fires, floods, storms and trouble at the door. The best thing you can do in most emergencies is leave early, calmly, and with everyone. Fitness is what makes leaving an option instead of a hope.

If the walk ends up in the trees, read what to do in the first hour you're lost in the woods. It pairs well with this one.

When a class beats a blog post

Take a wilderness first aid course. It's usually a weekend, runs a couple hundred dollars, and covers things no article can: how to splint, how to treat a twisted ankle you still have to walk on, how to recognize heat illness in a small child. Hands-on practice from a qualified instructor is the only way to learn it. Do it before the training plan, or alongside it.

Two miles with your kid's weight on your back, three weeks from now, is a goal you can hit. Hit it, then add a mile.

You'll never regret having been stronger than the day required.