By: Capt. Michael Greenberger
2nd Brigade Combat Team
FORT DRUM, N.Y. -- About 36 officers from the 2nd Brigade Combat Team gathered in Remington Park to compete in a quarterly session of "field grade" physical readiness training Aug. 8.
The grueling PRT session was comprised of seven stations all around the park. Officers split into six teams and had to swim through the 59 degree waters of Remington Pond to retrieve their team's Zodiac boat. Once the whole team was aboard the black raft, they rowed to each station around the pond to complete the tasks.
Before the event 2BCT commander Col. Dennis Sullivan told the officers the purpose of the PRT session was mainly teambuilding following a large turn-over of senior leaders. The crowd included lots of new faces in several battalions throughout the brigade. Before hitting the course, officers took turns introducing each other and their new duty positions.
Stations included casualty evacuation, weapons assembly, and individual movement techniques. Each station held extreme physical activities in store for the teams. At the "vehicle maintenance" station, teams had to flip two massive tires, weighing more than 250 pounds each, end-over-end uphill to complete the station.
At the IMT lane, the officers had to complete 3-5 second rushes, high crawls, and low crawls for more than 150 meters.
While some were scurrying through the mud, others across the pond were hauling Meals, Ready-to-Eat boxes and other supplies up and down a hill before moving to haul a mortar tube up the very same slope. During this maneuver, only two team members could set up the mortar position -- the others did push-ups while waiting for the task to be completed.
One of the most challenging of the stations was "clearing an obstacle", where massive railroad ties had to be transported more than 250 meters by hand, as well as other debris.
"The worst part had to be the tire flip," said Maj. Jeremy Chapman, 2nd Brigade Special Troops Battalion Operations Officer. "And the runner up would be the log carry."
Drenched in sweat, Chapman's team mates couldn't agree more as they cheered each other on after being the first team to complete all the stations.
"It was some good training," Chapman said. "It was a good hour and a half of PT. The best part about it was the camaraderie. Getting (everyone) together and doing some good PT -- it was a good team event."
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