Bolos and Bugouts

I just signed up for Military Science 280, Raider Operations, which is basically a scaled down version of the Army's Best Ranger Competition. From 6:00 pm March 9th until 6:00 pm the next day, Chad and I will be running in fatigues and combat boots, swimming, climbing ropes, doing pushups, orienteering, and many many other adventures. Unlike a typical multisport event, we won’t know the order of events or even exactly what’s included in the competition.

In order to bypass the prerequisite courses, Captain Rick Storm introduced us to Col. Hunt who, after making sure that we weren’t out to join the competition with the intent of slandering the Army, made a great suggestion for our race day presentation. Since no one will recognize Chad or I from the ROTC program, the Colonel posited that I should speak very ambiguously about just getting back from "one of the Stans,” and I’m heading back soon, hence the beard. I should also mention how I’m curious as to the preparatory practices for cadets, since I’ve seen the end result in combat and haven’t been too impressed. Of course, I can’t really talk about it.

Chad will be working with “one of the IA” departments as an intel officer. To play up the intrigue even more, we’ve just met and teamed up for this little “exercise.”

Tomorrow at 0900 hours we get our gear: Combat boots, fatigues, rucksacks, IE belts, and packlist. By next week we need to have drafted up a training calendar which we’ll submit to a Sergeant for approval. The training is almost exclusively up to us, but since it’s technically a class for credit, we have to show up Tuesdays and Thursdays at 0600 to check in and do a bit of training. Stay tuned.