Photo By Staff Sgt. Leon Cook | Soldiers from the 555th Engineer Brigade participated in a three day Best Sapper...... read more read more
Subscribe
JOINT BASE LEWIS MCCHORD, Wash. - Soldiers across the Army are intimately familiar with the Army Physical Fitness Test. Across the service, Soldiers know they will do two minutes of pushups, two minutes of situps, and a two-mile run.
What if you had to do five minutes of pushups and situps? Imagine going right into three minutes of pullups without even getting a chance to rest. Now imagine that the familiar two-mile run was twice as long, and you had to wear your body armor while you did so. Fortunately, you can complete this test with your best buddy by your side, trading off when you get too tired and motivating each other to keep going.
This daydream was a reality during the 555th Engineer Brigade's Best Sapper competition, held Dec. 9-11 at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Washington.
The non-standard PT test was only the first event of a grueling three day competition. Six two-man teams, ranking from junior noncommissioned officers to company grade officers, braved the harsh rains and cold temperatures of the Northwest to show off their expertise at basic Army tasks and their knowledge of sapper skills.
Some of the challenges included range qualifications, written exams, ruck marches, land navigation, tower rappelling and explosive ordnance disposal lanes.
“I haven’t really gotten to do anything I learned in Sapper School since graduating so this is a good opportunity to relearn and practice what I gained from that school,” said Lt. Kathryn Marr, Company A, 14th Brigade Engineer Battalion.
After a long two days, competitors had one mystery event to complete before they could find out the winners. Initially, all they were told was to do 25 burpees each and then start running. They didn't know how far or how long they would run, and had to complete tests of endurance on the way, including carrying water cans half a mile, carrying each other half a mile, performing lunges with a log on their shoulders, flipping a tire for a quarter mile and running with protective masks on for a mile.
In the end five teams completed the competition and the top three teams won the prize of competing in the all-Army's Best Sapper competition at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, scheduled for April 2016.
During the award ceremony Col. Larry Dillard, commander of the 555th Engineer Brigade, congratulated the remaining five teams on their completion of the competition.
“Sappers lead the way,” said Dillard as he reminded the competitors and audience of the major contributions combat engineers have made throughout Army history. Dillard told the participants how proud he was of each one of them and how much they mean to the unit and the Army.
| Date Taken: | 12.11.2015 |
| Date Posted: | 12.15.2015 17:15 |
| Story ID: | 184613 |
| Location: | JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, WA, US |
| Web Views: | 316 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, Best Sapper Competition at JBLM, by SGT DJ Borden, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
No keywords found.
LEAVE A COMMENT