Raider Scouts win Marne Gainey Cup

Photo By Staff Sgt. Quanesha Barnett | 3rd Infantry Division Scouts cross the finish line at the Marne Best Scout Squad Competition. The team from B Troop, 5th Squadron, 7th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Armored Brigade Combat Team won the competition and will represent the division at the Army competition at Fort Benning, Ga., in late April.  

FORT STEWART, GA, UNITED STATES

03.22.2019

Story by Maj. Peter Bogart 

1st Armored Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division

It was a 1-2 finish for "Garryowen" at the Marne Best Scout Squad Competition as the team from B Troop, 5th Squadron, 7th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Armored Brigade Combat Team edged out the team from A Troop and will represent the division at the Army-wide Gainey Cup Competition in late April.
The winning squad was led by Staff Sgt. Kristofer Sprunger who said it is more than just an honor to win the Marne Gainey Cup and represent the division against the rest of the Army’s top squads.
“The best part is working with this group of Soldiers,” said Sprunger, who is from LaGrange, Ind. “I’m thrilled that they’ll get the experience to train and do their job as scouts at the highest level.”
The competition began with a recon run which set the pace for the challenging five-day competition. The run was of an unknown distance at an unknown pace with a written test at the conclusion worth 100 points. The distance ended up being five miles at an eight-minute per mile pace with teams deducted 15 points from their written score for each team member who finished more than one arm’s length from the final rank of the formation.
Over the remaining four days, the teams were tested in a stress shoot, call for fire, mounted and dismounted land navigation, gunnery skills test, and a 24-hour reconnaissance lane before the final charge on Friday morning.
Pfc. Mason Chapmond has been in the Army just over a year and a half and said that the hardest event for him was the final charge.
“It was our fifth day going hard and we’ve been gassed all week,” said Chapmond, a Hot Springs, Ark. native. “As a team we just had to dig deep and get through it.”
The final charge was the culminating event of the week and included tire flips, kettle bell squats, sprints, litter pulls, burpees, iron mikes, high crawl, and a final three-mile ruck march to the finish line.
“After just getting back from Korea and having so much going on it’s really special to see the squad succeed,” said B Troop 1st Sgt. Evan Reed. “It’s so exciting to see six of our Soldiers come together to train and win.”
Sprunger and Chapmond were the senior and junior members of the squad, the other four scouts were Sgt. Steven Holy, Spc. Daniel Satterwhite, Spc. Jonathan Hoskins, and Pfc. Mark Saenger.
The 2019 Gainey Cup is from 29 April - 3 May and is open to all scouts serving in reconnaissance organizations and includes 24 teams from active duty, national guard, and international units. The competition is designed to test scout squad proficiency in conducting reconnaissance and security in close proximity to enemy forces and civilian populations to provide commanders with fresh, accurate information about the terrain and the enemy. Scouts must be experts in employing fires, and other enablers, and rapidly developing the situation allowing battalions and brigades to concentrate their combat power at the decisive time and place.

• Date Taken: 03.22.2019
• Date Posted: 03.24.2019 07:23
• Story ID: 315475
• Location: FORT STEWART, GA, US