Jeff Finley was always active. He worked out as a youth to feel good and hone his sports skills.

But when he became a St. Charles police officer, the workouts became almost a matter of life and death.

"I found the need to stay in shape. I would be wrestling with kids or chasing them with 20 pounds of gear on and wanted to hold my own," said the crime prevention and DARE officer.

Finely is one of a growing number of officers who believe hitting the track or picking up a barbell should be as much a pat of the job as picking up a badge.

"It is important to be physically fit no matter what you do, but as a policeman you are the thin blue line between the public and crime, and officers can’t afford to lose," Batavia Police Cmdr. Gregory Thrun said.

The fatal heart attack of St. Charles Sgt. Daniel Figgins, 53, during a foot chase April 9 has highlighted the need for police to stay in top shape.

"Probably some of this will be a wake-up call to a lot of people," said St. Charles Police Chief Jim Lamkin.

But police departments are looking for personal changes not policy changes. Money and manpower constraints will keep many from mandating any health changes.

Fox Valley police departments all require a fitness test to get a job, but fitness requirements are more limited after that. All the departments encourage good health and many have fitness coordinators to advise officers. Only the Illinois State Police makes passing an annual physical test an employment requirement for all officers.

Fox Valley police say generally only half of their employees work out regularly and are considered in good shape. Still, officials say generally the patrol officers, particularly the younger ones, are shedding the stereotype of the doughnut eating corp.

"We certainly are a more physically fit society," Thrun said. "Overall, it appears that policemen are more healthy looking, not as overweight, more physically fit, than they were 20 to 30 years ago."

Figgins had a regular workout routine, but heart disease set in anyway.

State police officer Lewis Gutierrez said the union signed off on their department’s program, but some other police departments say the word "mandatory" raised the hackles of their union representatives.

Making ongoing fitness testing mandatory for new hires and voluntary for veteran officers has been a compromise several suburban departments are broaching with unions as contracts are renewed, said Dan LeTourneu, director of risk management services for the Intergovernmental Risk Management Agency. The agency manages liability claims for 77 are municipalities and 70 police departments.

Last year, the company started offering training seminars on fitness testing in the hopes of getting the majority of its clients to implement a health program, complete with annual testing, within the next five years. Willowbrook and Glencoe have signed on with voluntary programs, but even those are being tweaked.

"It’s probably 20 years overdue", LeTourneau said. "It is not something we are going to stop pushing. The majority of towns want to do it. It’s just a slow process getting it implemented and working with the unions."

The average person who forgoes exercise has twice the chance of dying from heart disease as someone who exercises for 30 to 60 minutes most days reaching at least half of their maximum exertion level, according to the American Heart Association.

For police, the dangers of inactivity are compounded by a career choice that bombards them with heart dangerous activities: sedentary jobs punctuated by periods of extreme adrenaline rushes, swing shifts, physical altercations and often unhealthy eating habits formed by long hours on patrol.

Police have shorter life spans than the average person, and higher rates of heart disease and digestive cancers, according to reports from the Law Enforcement Wellness Association Inc.

Every year, on average nationwide, 13 police officers suffer debilitating or fatal heart attacks or strokes while on duty, according to the National Association of Police Organizations.

Since 2000, heart attacks occurring on-duty have killed 39 officers, including three in Illinois, according to the Officer Down Memorial Page, which tracks fatalities. In 2002, Barrington-Inverness police officer Steven Graham, 53, died of a heart attack while struggling with a suspect. In 1982, Kane County Sheriff Sgt. Mighael Babb, 43, also had a heart attack during a struggle.

Figgins became the latest fatality April 9 when he collapsed chasing teenagers.

By all accounts the 53-year-old exercised regularly. He had recently lost 30 pounds. And a few months ago, he ran onto the track in full uniform to run with and encourage recruits half his age struggling with a 1-mile exercise.

Still, genetics and lifestyle choices took their toll anyway. Kane County Coroner Chuck West said heart disease, caused partially by lifestyle choices, contributed to the fatal heart attack.

In February, West gave a lecture to firefighters, police and hospital personnel n the Elgin area on how to better manage critical incident stress and improve health in the hopes of reversing the trend of heart attacks in people in their 30s and 40s and in law enforcement or fire fields.

"They are not active 90 percent of the time, but when they are active it is tremendously active," West said. "It’s hard on your heart."

The state police hope their fitness testing will better prepare officers’ hearts to handle those bouts of adrenaline.

Although it’s too early to tell how the 4-year-old program will affect department health costs, officials say they have seen fewer sick hours and haven’t had any recent heart attacks.

"It has been good for the department overall, not just for the officers but for the citizens as well, knowing our officers perform 100 percent," Gutierrez said.

The cardio and weight testing, adapted for ages and physical limitations, mimic chases, arrests and struggles that officers must perform on their job. Officers take the tests during their shifts and can earn time off for good scores.

Municipal and county departments say they lack the manpower to do testing during shifts and face budget constraints calling officers in on their off days to test and get two or three hours of overtime.

"Our county can’t afford things like that," said Kane County Sheriff Ken Ramsey. "I personally believe it saves money in the long run, but you have to have the money to pay for that."

Geneva tried mandatory testing about a decade ago, but as the department grew the overtime costs overwhelmed the limited budget. Now, it makes do with providing workout rooms at the stations, training fitness coordinators to act as athletic mentors and using city or village health fairs that offer blood tests to determine overall health.

"Most of the officers that need to take advantage of it do," said Geneva police Lt. Joe Frega. "We have officers that come in regularly before or after their duty shifts to work out."

Individual departments also put their own spin on health. St. Charles and Aurora offer a stipend to officers to join area health clubs.

Geneva and Aurora offer annual voluntary fitness testing, reminiscent of the tests taken to graduate police academy.

Batavia plans to implement by the end of the summer a voluntary annual fitness test with some type of incentive such as the time off offered by the state police.

About a decade ago, St. Charles tried something similar, offering better raises to those who passed a fitness test. But without a penalty, some officers simply chose to skip the raise and stay sluggish," Finley said.

What many officers want now is free annual stress tests, he added.

Aurora made it mandatory in its union contracts that each officer must have a stress test done by a personal physician. While medical privacy rules keep the results away from department management, the testing serves as a wake-up call.

"It’s a step in the right direction," said Aurora Sgt. Bill Hull. "The officers are aware of their physical ailments. A lot of people suffer heart attacks because they didn’t have a stress test and didn’t know there was a problem."