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New PT venue preps Luke Airmen for combat

  • Published
  • By 2nd Lt. Ryan DeCamp
  • 56th Fighter Wing Public Affairs
LUKE AIR FORCE BASE, Ariz. --  Luke Air Force Base held a ribbon-cutting ceremony in front of about 75 members of the Luke community Oct. 29, officially opening a facility which is designed to improve the combat fitness level of Airmen on base.

The new combat PT course complements Luke's fitness center, gym annex and CrossFit facility.

"This new course allows units to conduct physical training using equipment easily found at deployed locations," said Lt. Col. Rodney Nichols, 56th Force Support Squadron commander. "This facility improves our capabilities even more by giving our Airmen experience in PT sessions similar to those done downrange.

A month after Colonel Nichols took over as commander of the 56th FSS, he was charged with adding to the base fitness infrastructure.

"General Neubauer (Brig. Gen. Kurt Neubauer, 56th Fighter Wing commander) said he had a task for our squadron," Colonel Nichols said. "I want you to look at ways to increase our available fitness facilities. We've got a great fitness center, gym annex and CrossFit gym but they're limited in the numbers of folks they can take care of at one time."

The gym annex and CrossFit gym are not nearly as large as the main fitness center on base, but 56th FSS statistics show members of Luke have logged more than 24,000 individual workouts in the 2,888 square foot CrossFit venue since it opened in January.

The new course is 7,100 square feet, almost two and a half times larger than the CrossFit gym. The course is outside with tarps overhead to block the sun and features exercises directly linked to combat. The added space alleviates some of the congestion in Luke's other fitness venues.

After the ribbon cutting, a quartet of 56th Security Forces Squadron Airmen ran through the venue's first training session, hitting every piece of equipment on the course.

The team started with pull-ups, followed by a roughly 25-yard low crawl in a sand pit at the opposite side of the course. The team split into pairs, flipping tires fit for a monster truck the length of the sandpit and back, after which, they pulled themselves over a high bar five feet in the air.

After doing log sit-ups as a team, they pressed ammunition cans over their heads and finished the workout by climbing a rope ten feet in the air twice.

"It was a pretty intense couple of minutes," said Staff Sgt. Anthony Quinn, 56th SFS physical training leader who went through the workout. "I felt like it's a 'combat' challenge, going up the ropes and going over obstacles because that's what we do when we go overseas."

Sergeant Quinn heads to Afghanistan early next year and said he knows these exercises will help in combat.

"I've never actually had to low-crawl, but with the job I'll have in my next deployment, I will be doing that so it will come into play," Sergeant Quinn said. "This will also definitely keep you in shape."

Airman 1st Class Keegan Donnelly, 56th SFS PTL, teamed with Sergeant Quinn on the workout and agrees with him, especially with the physical training test getting tougher next year.

"It's an incredible workout for such a short period of time," Airman Donnelly said. "For the few minutes that it took, it's very tiring."

Airman Donnelly will also head to Afghanistan early next year and said this workout will help him when he deploys.

"If you have to go outside the wire, this venue will be good training because we're pushed to our limit like we are in combat, when you don't know when the fighting will end," he said. "The low-crawl is good practice to be able to build that muscle endurance too."

Members of the 56th FSS said the combat PT course took just three months to design and build. Much of the equipment was donated, keeping costs down.

"The security forces, civil engineer and logistics readiness squadrons provided the ammo cans, sand bags, tires and sand," Colonel Nichols said. "Some backbreaking effort from volunteers along with my fitness center staff helped build the park, too."