Landon made it through the first week of OCS in Newport and is pushing on through week two. This week included the 3rd class swim test, LOADS of drill, and the first Friday Cruise. Everyday he wakes up half and hour early (4:30 am) to shave and be completely ready when the reveille goes off at 5, that way he is all set to be at attention on deck when the DI (marine drill instructor) and candios (OCS candidates in the final weeks of training) come marching down the hallway.
The indoctrination candidates are lead through a series of stretches and exercises on a daily basis in order to maintain physical wellness. Landon was selected by his class team (the DI) to be the PT Body. In the photo above he is the lonely one leading the circle of candidates through their pushups. Landon mentioned that he somewhat regrets taking this position as trying to shine, stand out, and take on leadership positions is exactly opposite of what you should do at OCS unless you really enjoy pushups and running since it's the leaders that are punished if the class does not perform well. Landon's role requires that supervise the wellbeing and physical performance of his classmates and will be held responsible if any of his fellow candidates do not meet the requirements. Perhaps the opportunity for leadership development will be seen in a better light later in the training.
The 3rd class swim test is pretty straight forward and probably somewhat of a joke to Lando, since he is a big time swimmer. The test consisted of these 4 exercises:
- Abandon Ship Jump: Jump from a 10 foot tower to simulate abandoning ship.
- 5 minute Prone Float: Remain afloat face down, utilizing survival floating skills, for five minutes.
- Shirt and Trouser inflation: Fill a shirt and pair of trousers with air to remain afloat.
- 50 yd Swim: Using any single following stroke or combination of the crawl, breaststroke, sidestroke, and elementary backstroke
In the second picture, Landon is in the pool holding onto the wall, the second one in from the front. This is the best shot I've found of him with his buzzed head. What a cutie right?? :) I talked about the sunburns in the last post, but notice how most of their scalps are still pink from their many hours in the sun during the previous Friday. In the next picture, he is sitting on the front row benches, third from the right! He looks completely petrified, but I think he is just one of the only ones sitting at attention like they should be. Usually Landon is quite the joker, I have never ever seen him be so serious for so long! It kills me! It's crazy how fear and pain can motivate people to do some of the wildest things. The good news is that he said that although he can scream and yell and be serious 24/7 when he needs to, he in no way enjoys it. He said it gets old really fast and and he just doesn't really understand the purpose behind the constant yelling. Although I know he will have grown and changed in so many ways, I still hope he will snap back to his normal goofy self once this is all said and done.
Landon talked TONS about drill in his letters and phone call this week, since that seems to be what they fill the other 200 billion hours with throughout the week. Drill, drill, and more drill. From his own account, drill is basically marching while performing various manuevers with old, decommissioned M-16 rifles. He seems to like it and says it is pretty cool when they do everything right, but overall drill practice sucks because they are still far from perfect and unfortunately that means they get to do lotsss of pushupsss. At least he has to be getting super buff right?? haha. I told him we will have to have a drill competition when he gets back since military drill downs were always my absolute favorite back when I was on the high school "drill" team once upon a time :) He would most likely kick my butt. Actually I'm positive he would. And he is excited to share this marching and maneuvers with my little bro Jaden, who is an avid rifle spinner on his junior high color guard team. Jaden might just have a good shot at this little competition too. Yeah watch out.
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