I was recently selected by the unit to become a Combat Rescue Officer

I hope you are having an awesome Christmas season. It’s been way too long, over 11 years I think, since being a lab rat for you and Jordan in Jackson back when it was Mountain Athlete (I still have the T-shirt, it’s pretty haggard at this point, but has been some rad places). I just wanted to reach out to you to thank you for taking a young guide who didn’t know how to train and bringing me into that family. I honestly have never had as much fun in a gym as those seasons working with you guys. It also started a life-long love of ice climbing.

I ended up trying out for and becoming a PJ with the Air Force, and have been doing that gig for the last 10 years. Stationed in Albuquerque, Vegas, five years in Italy, and now full time with the Guard in Alaska. I feel really humbled and honored for this journey and to be here. For us there are really two varsity teams: one in North Carolina if you love kicking down doors and doing the kinetic side of the job, and Alaska if you love rescue. We average around 80-100 missions a year and I’ve been blessed to do some pretty sweet high-angle hoist rescues and a glacier missions on skis during nasty storms last spring that really dial in why we train so hard and how rad it is to be able to help folks when no one else can.

I really feel that I have you guys to thank for teaching me how to train, what grinding through a workout feels like, and getting up to do another set when the timer beeps. That mentality and God’s grace got me through selection, a decade of deployments to sandy places doing hard things, and a lot of time climbing and teaching folks how to move through the mountains.

I was recently selected by the unit to become a Combat Rescue Officer, and have the privilege of going back through selection as a 36 year-old with a bunch of 18-20 year-old kids from the AF Academy! I bought your Phase II training plan and have been working with our coaches to train for the class in March. Working to become a full-time endurance athlete again has been a humbling process, but I keep thinking back to that gym in Jackson, hearing, “Climber, get back on the wall!” and I am filled with gratitude for the coaching you guys provided all of us.

If you are ever up in Alaska, please hit me up, I’d love to bring you by the unit for a workout and introduce you to the team. I’d offer to take you skiing, but right now there’s no snow worth riding so it’s a good time to be stuck under a sandbag anyway.