UA Army ROTC Set for International Competition at West Point

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — The University of Alabama’s ARMY ROTC Ranger Challenge team will compete for the first time in the Sandhurst Competition at the U.S. Military Academy, April 7-8, in West Point, New York.

UA won the Brigade Ranger Challenge – a regional tournament involving the winners of five Southeastern states and Puerto Rico – in January and will face the top teams from West Point ROTC programs that won the other seven brigade rounds and teams from military academies across the world.

UA’s 11-member team will fly to West Point Sunday.

“This round will be extremely challenging because we won’t know the full events list,” said Cadet Brandon Sinnott, a senior operations management major and commander of UA’s Ranger Challenge team. “They can throw a lot at us, and we’ll be facing teams that train all year for this. But the feeling right now is pretty surreal because our program has never made it to West Point.”

West Point teams and Canada typically field the strongest teams each year, and only eight ROTC programs from across the country will be represented in the competition. The ROTC programs will not be as strong in events that feature battlefield tactics, which weren’t in the last round, because of resources, Sinnott said.

But UA’s strengths of fitness and experience provide a solid base for what will be a physically and mentally taxing event. The Brigade round lasted from 6 a.m. to 1 a.m. and covered 20 miles of terrain.

Since January, the team has dialed back its training from five days to four to boost morale and provide extra rest. Additionally, cadets have practiced marksmanship and first-aid, two battlefield aspects they know will be in the lineup next week.

“We’ve seen some videos on past competitions, so we know a little bit of what to expect,” Sinnott said. “There will be land navigation, so we can practice for that. We worked with M16s and practiced marksmanship at Fort McClellan last weekend. We’ve been training on how to treat a gunshot wound, treat for shock, how to administer all of that on an active battlefield and how to move a casualty away from the enemy and treat them better.

“It’s been a little nerve-wrecking trying to prepare for the unknown and a competition that will be longer and more stressful than the previous two.”

UA won five events in the Brigade round: fitness, weapons qualification, hand grenade assault course, casualty care and the ruck march. The state and regional rounds featured similar events lineups that also included one-rope bridge, weapons assembly and marksmanship.

Team members are selected after a rigorous tryout period in which their fitness and their ability to think quickly and make accurate decisions are tested.

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; Jordan Pieczynski, Pickerington, Ohio; Brandon Sinnott, Wildwood, Missouri; Mary Sandlin, Scottsboro; Bailey Connor, Sumter, South Carolina; Garrett Preston, Jacksonville; and Conner Salisbury, Lorton, Virginia.