More than 40 Warrior Transition Battalion Soldiers participated in a sitting volleyball training and qualifying clinic Feb. 28 at Specker Field House, each hoping to represent the Army at the 2013 Warrior Games May 11-17 in Colorado Springs, Colo.
The Soldiers came to Fort Belvoir from installations across the country. They engaged in a week-long training and qualifying program designed to help Warrior Games coaches evaluate skills and assess development. The coaches also assessed fitness levels in their effort to select the final 50 athletes who will represent the Army in the sitting volleyball, wheelchair basketball, swimming, cycling, track & field, archery and competitive shooting events at the games this spring.
"The selection process, across all the sports, is a delicate balance of where people are based upon disability categories," explained Master Sgt. Jarrett J. Jongema, noncommissioned officer-in-charge, Adaptive Sports and Reconditioning Branch, Warrior Transition Command. "For the sitting volleyball team, according to the Paralympics Committee requirements, no more than four athletes can be in the 'open category' or able-bodied, which includes athletes with post traumatic stress disorder or traumatic brain injury. Then you can have a mix of moderate to major disability, from people with spinal cord injuries to amputees, to make up the 12-person team. Also, you can't have more than two able-bodied athletes on the court at one time."
Jongema said the level of competition is high to make the Army team, an athletic unit representing a branch of the service which, like the U.S. Marine Corps, has a large number of personnel and athletes in its ranks.
"The Army and the Marine Corps has no problem producing (Warrior Games) team members; if they told me I had to have 12 people who were all amputees I could do that based on our population," he said. "There are 42 people at this particular camp alone. They have to show me their commitment to being selected to the team, how much they're training (outside of these clinics) like at a college such as the University of Texas at El Paso, where they have the same shooting program we use at the Olympic Training Center, or in an archery league. Their coaches can send me their results. If they ran the Army Ten Miler they send me those results. I had one kid who filmed himself swimming the 50 and 100 meters, and then uploaded the video. And I could set my own stopwatch."
Even using an iPad archery app and sending in a screenshot and spreadsheet document of an athlete's results is helpful in demonstrating that commitment, Jongeman added.
Whatever preparation the athletes training at Specker Field House had put themselves through prior to the clinic, each Soldier gave 100 percent to his efforts in mastering his or her volleyball skills and demonstrating them to the coaches and trainers overseeing the session, which included Kari Miller, a 2012 London Games Olympian who is deeply involved with the WTC adaptive sports program.
Many of the Soldiers competing for the volleyball team slots originally discovered the Warrior Games through other NCOs, who convinced them the program was well worth a try.
"The master sergeant at home mentioned the Warrior Games and I just decided to do it," said Spc. Quinton Picone, Fort Sam Houston WTB. "It got me out of my room and kept me busy."
For Staff Sgt. Michael Lage, Fort Sam Houston WTB, making the Warrior Games Army team would be the culmination of a tremendous amount of effort he's put into his preparation.
"It involves a lot of training; Master Sgt. Jongema sets up the camps for each sport. You try to get out to each of the camps, where you have professional coaches to help you improve, to prepare for the selection process," Lage said. "And when you're not at the camps, you train on your own. You know the standards; you know what you have to meet. I mean, they have 300 applicants trying out and only 50 get to go. I hope I make it; it's too bad everyone can't make it. But it would be an honor to play for Team Army."
The Warrior Games showcases the resilient spirit of today's wounded, ill and injured servicemembers from all branches of the military. After overcoming significant physical and behavioral injuries, these men and women demonstrate the power of ability over disability and the spirit of competition, according to the U.S. Army Warrior Transition Command.
Since 2010, nearly 200 wounded, ill, and injured servicemembers and Veterans have competed annually at the Warrior Games, a unique partnership between the Department of Defense and U.S. Olympic Committee Paralympic Military & Veterans Program. Athletes compete in sitting volleyball, wheelchair basketball, swimming, cycling, track & field, archery & competitive shooting. Gold, silver and bronze medals will be awarded to the athletes or team members who place 1st, 2nd and 3rd in their events, respectively.
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