When I went to bootcamp, back in the day - late 1980's, to qualify the response here. I was immediately grabbed (By my own volunteering with four others) and put into the Drill and choir group my first week. After 9 days I was essentially done with the company, they forced us to take the final bootcamp physical training test and if we passed it, we were done with PT tests for the rest of Boot Camp. We had a different schedule than the other companies, we got up earlier every day and did real simple calisthetics, breakfast and then drill/choir training for about three hours then it was off to lunch and afternoon classroom navy military training stuff. After 4:00 PM everyday we were back in the barracks adn we did not have to do anything with thcompany like marches or anything else. It was pretty easy and low stress compared to how the rest of our boot camp company training went. It was pretty sweet deal back in Orlando at the time. I was there over Easter holiday, and we sat in the Pool/Gymnasium (WSPT building in Navy Terms) watching movies and ate pizza with the staff all day. I look back on that whole 8 weeks and I hardly even remember anything bad because it flew by and I was glad to be over with that "recruit" stage.
We had a really fake ship mockup, the USS Bluejacket to pretend to do Battlestation drills and run around to different locations. It was not all that realistic, no sound powered phones ar any fun navigational stuff. Bootcamp seems long but it sure has its purpose. The guys who served as drill instructors all tried to explain the their philosophy to me which was "We create a product for the Navy". When each sailor leaves bootcamp, they know how to salute and the basic rank structures and the terms used in the navy. They strive to hit that mark with every graduate. So, whoa be fall you, the first week out of Bootcamp and you ignore saluting the Captain of "A" School. They know everyone was taught how to do it and when at Boot camp. No sympathy from anyone about that kind of stuff. The montra, "never Volunteer for anything" may be true at times, but in boot camp when I volunteered for the drill team it worked out for the best I think.