2010 Warrior Challenge

Warrior Challenge

Saturday was the 2010 Warrior Challenge held at Avon by the Sea, NJ.  It was a competition and fundraiser benefiting Task Force Dagger.  All told the event raised over $10,000 to go to the Army Special Operations community.

This year the Army had representation from Special Forces in attendance.  They had a tent set up with a variety of small arms and equipment--M9's, multile M-4's with various optics, M-110 SASS, Barrett 0.50-cal, Russian RPD, RPG, High Altitude High Opening freefall gear (HAHO), and more.  Very cool stuff.

It was a great event and competition and a great day at the beach.

Competition

This year's competition portion was much like last year's, and was made up of 3 events:

1. A 1-mile soft sand run, 1/2 mile performed while carrying a sandbag (50# men, 25# women), 1/2 mile performed without.
2. Max deadhang pull ups
3. Max burpees in two minutes

For the run, which was double the distance of last year, I paced myself much better.  Last year I shot out at a very fast pace and was near the front of the pack for a portion of the run.  I then began struggling with carrying the sandbag over one shoulder and with the pace, and believe I ended up finishing 4th or 5th in the run last year.  Because my pace was so fast, I felt like my heart was going to explode and I never fully recovered for the other events, remaining nauseous until the end.

This year I set a better pace for myself and continued to pass people throughout the run.  Carrying the sandbag on my neck/both shoulders worked well for me.  I finished 4th in the run this year, and I felt a million times better afterward than I did last year, and felt comfortable in the events to follow. 

Max pull ups, pretty straight forward.  As many deadhang pull ups as you can do, no time limit.  I did 23.

Max burpees in 2 minutes.  Chest to the ground and jump in the air with hands above your head, no clap overhead necessary.  I did 50 (last year I did around 35 while balancing with trying to not throw up).


Results

My personal goal going into this was set pretty high and I wanted to win the event.  I came up short, finishing 3rd overall, and was pleased with myself for "placing" although only 1st place gets an award.  There were about 75 participants, mostly male.

The results from the competition can be found here.

Bib# 156, Bryan, finished 1st overall (3rd place in run, 25 pull ups, 55 burpees)
Bib# 178, Jon, finished 2nd (1st place in run, 23 pull ups, 50 burpees)
Bib# 191, me, finished 3rd (4th place in run, 23 pull ups, 50 burpees)


Media 

Here's a video I threw together





and here are some photos from the event