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Combat Cadet Competition (April 2007)
![Welbeck Defence Sixth Form College (DSFC)](javascript:PopupPic("/military/images/cc_team.jpg");)
On the 19th of April, nine students from Welbeck cut short their Easter break and travelled back 3 days earlier than the rest of the college to compete in Exercise Combat Cadet 2007 accompanied by Ma’am Bowen and Major Commander. This is the story of how they got on.
The team met up at Loughborough Station on Friday 20th April, not look best pleased to be cutting their holiday short, but still looking forward the competition and being able to play soldiers again. One member of the team, Leigh Glasper had to fly from Portugal and so was not happy to be back so early.
After the usual greetings and stories from over the break, the team got on with the activities that the IC, Kieran Rimmer, had already organised. These consisted of a run, a quick practice of all the drills we needed for the weekend, and then kit issue and kit inspection. From there it was straight onto the mini bus for the 2 hour journey to Stanta training area in Suffolk, where it just so happens one of our team members, Dave Wilby, was from and so knew the area very well.
Once we had arrived, we quickly set up our 12x12 tent, and got some hot water on the go ready for a brew. From there it was just a bit of admin and scoping out of the other teams to see what the competition was like. We decided on a quick run to the Tesco’s just down the road, where the team stocked up on food, and also bought a frying pan, some oil, and a lot of eggs and bread, in order for us to have Egg Banjos (AKA sandwiches) in the morning for our breakfast. Our IC went off to his brief about the start of the competition in the evening, and then came back to brief the team on the kit they would need for the next day.
It was a 0530 start that morning, and the team were straight up to have their Egg Banjos and get themselves washed and sorted out for the days activities. Everyone knew it was going to be a long day, and so everyone ate plenty for breakfast and took on a lot of water. We moved out at 0700 to start our first stand, the assault course walkthrough talk through, at 0730. It just so happened that this was the only stand of the day where we had to get wet, and it was our luck to have it first. However, everyone was enthusiastic, and the day got off to a good start. From here we moved round the rest of the stands, which included a fighting withdrawal with a casualty, a section attack, air rifle shooting, command tasks, and a signals stand. Everyone was getting very tired during the day, and the skills were dropping slightly, but after a bit of an inspirational speech from the OC Major Commander, the team picked themselves back up and performed excellently on the rest of the stands.
![Welbeck Defence Sixth Form College (DSFC)](javascript:PopupPic("/military/images/cc_brief.jpg");)
The stands finished at 1730, and so it was straight back to the tent for a quick wash, change and some food, before heading out on phase 2 of the competition, which was a timed night navigation where we had to find checkpoints and collect the stamps, and in some cases speak to some staff to get small amounts of data off them for extra points. We started off the exercise very well, collecting 6 check points out of the 10 in only 30 minutes, meaning we had over 30 minutes to find the rest. Unfortunately, we had some trouble with a particularly well hidden checkpoint, which we found in the end but in a very long period of time. This meant we had to miss the last 2 checkpoints in order to get back to base in time; otherwise we would lose more points. All in all in was good work by the team, as we ran a lot of the way round, just a slight problem with map work which meant we wasted time on 1 check point.
The team were straight to bed that night, ready for a 0600 start the next morning to do the final phase of the competition, the assault course followed by a 1.8 mile march and shoot. The assault course was no problem for the team, as we had had plenty of practice on them and so got over all the obstacles with ease. From there, it was a 10 minute breather before starting the 1.8 mile run. This we did very well on, seeing as the team were extremely tired and had just done the assault course. We came in with a respectable time, but as a whole the team decided that a bit more effort could have been put in, but we still thought it was a good time. After another 10 minute breather, we headed out to do the shoot with a set of laser guns from a laser entertainment company. We shot at stationary targets with the laser guns, and then waited for the moving targets to appear, but they didn’t for a long time. When the stand was over and we saw our time, the team wasn’t impressed, especially as we didn’t understand what we were meant to do. Still the team were happy with the overall result and so headed back to the tent to get washed for changed for the final parade and prize giving.
As we had a long time to wait until the parade started, some of the team went in the mini bus with Ma’am B to Tesco’s, but unfortunately they never got out of the training area, as they had to find an alternate exit to get out because the marches were still going on. When we finally got to the parade we found that we had come 6th in total.
We left the competition with our heads held high, and happy with the result, although we were hoping for something slightly better. Still, we knew we had learnt valuable lessons, and are determined to put another team in next year and win!
David Baxter, Trenchard 06E
