Learn what it takes to compete with a Combat Team

Hello Steven can you tell us a little bit about yourself and your team? We are a team of six firefighter/EMT/medics from the Greater Cincinnati Northern Kentucky area. We are a combination of fulltime, part-time and volunteer. This team has been evolving over the last three years with this season being our most successful. A lot of our success can be attributed to our wide variety of personalities. Steven can you tell us exactly what the Scott Fire Fighter Combat Challenge is and how long it has been taking place? ESPN nicknamed this event, “The Toughest Two Minutes in Sports”; it is a combination of strength, speed and endurance. The Challenge seeks to encourage firefighter fitness and demonstrate the profession’s rigors to the public. While wearing "full bunker gear" and the air pack, pairs of competitors simulate the physical demands of real-life firefighting by performing a linked series of five tasks including climbing the 5-story tower, hoisting, chopping, dragging hoses and rescuing a life-sized, 175 lb. "victim" as we race against our opponent and the clock. The competition is now in its 15th season and going strong. When did you and your team begin competing with this organization? We began with STG this year and so far it has been a great match up. As a team we have been together for 3 years. What did Team SupplementsToGo have to do to be competitors in the Scott FireFighter Challenge? Most of us have been competing for a number of years. This year we have the honor of representing STG. Can you tell everybody what it takes to compete at this level? To compete at the level we are takes an enormous amount of time. As a team we workout four to five days a week with a combination of weight, strength and speed training either at the gym and or on the course. Diet is also extremely important, lots of protein, clean carbohydrates and the proper supplements. This year, for the first time, we have also teamed up with a local sports training facility (Adrenalinesf.com) which specializes in the conditioning of high school, college and professional athletes in multiple sports. We feel this added edge has had significant impact on our increased performance this year. Do you guys train and prepare for competitions year round? Yes. After the World Finals in November, we relax and enjoy the holidays, and then it’s back to work at the first of the year to get ready for the up coming season. With our career we are always doing some sort of work out whether its strength training, intervals, plyometrics or speed work. What drove you to begin competing at this level? The first time you compete in the Combat Challenge the goal is to finish. Then after your first run you think, I can do better than that, and for us it snowballed from there. We’re all very competitive, now we want to be one of the best teams in the world. All of us competed in sports in high school, and some in college, so it just seams like a natural extension. Which event at a competition is your personal favorite and why? Each of us has our favorite, obviously which ever we excel at, and that’s one of the reasons why we have developed into a good relay team this year. Each of us has our strengths; we capitalize on that in the relay. How many competitions do does your team compete at in a year? We usually travel to four or more regional competitions throughout the regular season, plus U.S. Nationals and then Worlds. How many teams usually compete at a competition? It depends on the event, early in the year the events are a little smaller, so there might be eight to ten teams. The closer you get to Worlds there may be anywhere from ten to twenty teams at a single event. I know that you have been having an impressive year so far. Can you tell us which competition has been the most memorable and why? Every competition has had its moments, from our first regional win at FDIC in early April to Evansville this past weekend. Five of the top teams in the World were there and we came out on top in the relay competition. We also solidified our standing among the elite teams in the World. Where is your team currently ranked within the organization? Currently we are ranked 6th in the U.S. in both the Team and Relay categories. Back to your Training, is there particular muscle groups you like to focus on when training for competitions? We have to concentrate on our legs and cardio but for the most part this is a total body event so we have to work on everything. If you have any weaknesses this competition will identify those for you! I believe you have Nationals coming up in November at Vegas. This is a huge event for you guys. Are you preparing any differently for this event? Well it is actually the World Finals in November, teams from the US, Canada, England and Germany will be there to compete. All year we gear our training so that we peak at Worlds. So the training doesn’t change too much just a little more intense, with a good taper and proper diet. I know your team uses alot of Supplements. Can you tell us which ones you use and why you take those particular Supplements? Most of us use the same supplements and we tend to favor Beverly International products. Our daily nutritional supplementation consists of a combination of Ultimate Muscle Protein, Beverly Mass Maker, Beverly Creatine, Beverly Ultra 4 multi vitamin and Beverly Ultra 40 beef liver tablets. Pre workouts we use BSN’s NO-XPLODE and Beverly Mass Amino Acids. During our workouts to help maintain our energy levels we use Beverly’s Glutamine Select. Post workouts we use Endurox R4 and BSN’s CELLMASS to help us recover faster. Since our training is a combination of strength, speed and endurance we need to take advantage of the great supplements that are out on the market today. Where do you see this sport going in the next 5 years? It continues to grow and attract more and more competitors. I’d like to see it become a more visible tool to the majority of the public to show them how well conditioned some firefighters are. How many more years do you expect you and your team to compete? We plan on competing as long as we continue to have fun. Our success comes largely because of the camaraderie of not only our teammates, but the other competitors we meet around the country and the support we receive from our families. This sport is a great way to showcase our athletic abilities within the fire service, but it is more than that, it’s proving to ourselves that we can do one of the toughest jobs in the world to the best of our abilities.