“Down payment in agony: Enlistees prepare for boot camp with brutal workouts” |
| Down payment in agony: Enlistees prepare for boot camp with brutal workouts Posted: 27 Feb 2011 02:00 AM PST Their lungs burned. Their muscles failed. Some keeled over the stainless-steel sink in the corner of the gym, or staggered outside and slumped toward the gutter to empty their stomachs. The group of 56 recent enlistees into the U.S. Marine Corps — known as "pullies" because they are pulled together from various recruiting stations — experienced a little slice of hell Saturday morning at the Rock Boxing Gym in East Salinas. They endured about two hours of physical and mental training to prepare for the nightmare that awaits each them: boot camp. They suffered. They screamed. They glared angrily at the Marine staff sergeants who barked commands and exhorted them to work harder. Pain is a temporary thing, they were told — a sign of weakness leaving the body. Push through and it will magically go away. The pullies work out weekly with their recruiters, and meet at least once a month in a large group, often at the Salinas gym, to gird themselves for basic training. "This is to give them a little taste of what's to come," said Danny Corona, who owns the gym with boxing coach James Jimenez. "We'll drill them here for an hour-and-a-half, but at boot camp it's going to be 24/7, and they'll be carrying 65-pound backpacks. They'll be running through mud and sand and rain. We're just trying to help them get ready for all of that." Corona, Jimenez and the staff sergeants may seem merciless and ferocious, but it's tough love. "This is the toughest branch of any of the services, and the one guarantee we make to them as recruiters is that boot camp will be the hardest thing they'll ever do, both physically and mentally," said Staff Sgt. Ricardo Rocha. "The purpose of this is to sharpen their skills a little bit. We're getting them a little bit stronger, a little bit faster, so boot camp isn't as much as a culture shock and isn't so hard on their bodies."The pullies were driven through a merciless series of conditioning exercises — repetitions lasting six to nine minutes without a breather — at about 10 separate stations. They did crunches to a standing position and push-ups with their feet in stirrups hovering a foot off the ground. They hammered a truck tire with medicine balls. They repeatedly pushed a 44-pound weight plate wrapped in a blanket from wall to wall, then back again. They dangled one foot in a stirrup, hopped on the other, and bounced a heavy medicine ball that bounced back to them only reluctantly. They lifted weights. With agony written on their faces, they were sent outside without a break for a brisk three-quarter-mile run through the streets. The run ended with another indoor session at a new exercise station. The indoor-outdoor cycles continued until each enlistee completed every work station. "This is tough, very tough, but I don't hate any of the exercises," said John Estrada, 22, a former King City High School soccer and football player. He will report to boot camp next month, and then hopes to be deployed to Afghanistan. "I wanted to sign up for the Marines when I was in high school, but my mother wouldn't let me. I wanted this for the challenge, and I know I'll be challenged in the Marines." His mother, Aracely, said, "When he first told me of his decision, I felt very sad. I cried." Her younger son, 19-year-old Robert, also enlisted. "But now, I feel happy about it because I know my sons are doing exactly what they want to do. I support them." Recruits who enlist now will report to boot camp in November. Men go to San Diego, women to Paris Island, S.C. "I've been wanting to join the Marines since the fourth grade, and I wanted to sign up right out of high school," said 18-year-old Maggie Valenzuela, a track, cross country and basketball athlete at Alisal High. "My mom wanted me to focus on my education, so I enrolled for a semester at Hartnell College, but when they called in December and said they had an opening, I wanted to enlist. "This (conditioning) hurts, but you've got to keep going, you know?" said Valenzuela, who leaves for boot camp March 21. "Your legs tell you to stop, but, like they were telling us, the strongest muscle in your body is your heart." Afterward, the reward for all 56 recruits was Marine-issue MREs — "meals ready to eat" — prefab concoctions sealed in individual cardboard and waterproof packaging. "The way we recruit is by asking what they have to offer the Marine Corps," said Staff Sgt. Isaac Elizondo. "We ask, 'Do you want to be a Marine or not? If not, go somewhere else.' We don't have much of a dropout rate at all because the only kids who join the Marines are the ones who want to be Marines. Those kids stick it out." Dennis Taylor can be reached at dtaylor@montereyherald.comor 646-4344. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
| You are subscribed to email updates from Content Keyword RSS To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610 | |
No comments:
Post a Comment