UA Army ROTC Wins Brigade Ranger Challenge

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – The University of Alabama ROTC Ranger Challenge team is headed to West Point.

UA won the Brigade Ranger Challenge — a regional tournament involving the winners of five Southeastern states and Puerto Rico — Saturday at Camp Blanding Joint Training Center in Starke, Florida. UA won five events: fitness, weapons qualification, hand grenade assault course, casualty care and the ruck march. The team also took fourth in weapons assembly and third in the one-rope bridge.

UA’s Ranger Challenge team will compete for the first time in the finals at the Sandhurst Competition at the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, where they’ll face the winners of eight other brigades, international teams and teams from West Point. The Sandhurst Competition will be April 7-8.

“I am very proud of how far the Ranger Challenge team has come,” said Brandon Sinnott, cadet and UA senior. “During the competition, we were met with physical tasks greater than most of us have encountered in our ROTC career. We pushed through these and motivated and encouraged each other throughout the day. Our feet hurt and our bodies ached, but the team was motivated by the incredible cadets around them and the heat of competition.

“It is a great feeling to be a part of history here in the UA ROTC program, and an even better feeling to be on a team with such determined and like-minded individuals.”

Cadets arrived at Camp Blanding on Friday night and began the competition at 6 a.m. Saturday. The cadets moved nearly 20 miles while wearing 40 pounds of gear by the end of the competition at 1 a.m.

UA started the competition by winning the first four events, including a 60-point advantage in the hand grenade assault course. Georgia Southern then won weapons assembly and land navigation, events in which UA finished fourth and third, respectively. The University of Florida won the one-rope bridge event. UA had to finish ahead of Florida in the 10k foot march to punch its ticket to West Point, and it did with a time of 1 hour, six minutes and four seconds.

Florida finished second, while Georgia Southern, Louisiana State, University of Puerto Rico-Mayaguez and the University of Mississippi finished third through sixth.

“Our Ranger Challenge team continues to excel and epitomize the Army values and Warrior Ethos through their many accomplishments,” said Lt. Col. Jonathan Goode, UA professor of military science. “This team continually displays its character, leadership abilities and ability to work as a team, never putting the needs of the team before the themselves. We are extremely proud of the example these young men and women set for our program, the University of Alabama and the Army.”

The UA Ranger Challenge cadets are: David Receniello, Macomb, Michigan; Dylan Deflorio, Sudbury, Massachusetts; Cody Rosenberg, Clarksville, Tennessee; Terry Hancock, Kissimmee, Florida; Dalton Phillips, Hazel Green, Alabama; Jordan Pieczynski, Pickerington, Ohio; Brandon Sinnott, Wildwood, Missouri; Mary Sandlin, Scottsboro, Alabama; Bailey Connor, Sumter, South Carolina; Garrett Preston, Jacksonville, Alabama; and Conner Salisbury, Lorton, Virginia.