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Firefighters take part in world challenge

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By Ryan Gauthier, Staff Writer 7:25 PM Monday, November 23, 2009

It has been referred to as the “toughest two minutes in sports.”

A team of four Middletown firefighters were in Las Vegas last week to compete in the Scott Firefighter Challenge World Championships. Tate Cobb, Steven Ludwig, Jon Meyer and Pawel Mieczykowski were among hundreds of relay teams from across the U.S. and from as far away as New Zealand, Slovenia and Germany.

Cobb said things went fairly well, though the relay team missed qualifying for the finals by 4.75 seconds. The team managed to finish 68th, but Cobb said members are already looking forward to next year’s competition.

“We figured out we definitely need to train more,” Cobb said. “But just being there and watching some of the greatest firefighters in the world run this challenge was incredible.”

The contest centers around firefighter fitness and job proficiency, mimicking activities teams would perform in the field. Competitors start off by throwing on a 42-pound pack and sprinting up five flights of stairs and then go on to hoist up a coil of hose. They then run back down the five-story tower hitting every step, pound a 165-pound five feet with a sledgehammer, run through a series of cones, haul a charged hose line 75 feet and spray down a target, then drag a 175-pound dummy 106 feet to the finish line.

And, ideally, finish in two minutes.

“People don’t have any idea how excruciating this thing is,” Cobb said. “I mean when you run it for time as hard as you can go, it really takes just about everything out of you.”

City Manager Judy Gilleland said she is proud of Middletown’s team, which managed to fund the trip through donations, fundraising events and out of their own pockets.

“The men who participated in this event represented Middletown incredibly well in an international venue,” Gilleland said. “And they managed to demonstrate what top-quality employees we have here.”

Cobb said the team plans to begin training alongside other fire departments within Butler County — as well as with a crew from the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base — in hopes of making the finals in 2010.

Contact this reporter at (513) 705-2871 or rgauthier@coxohio.com.

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