Currently I'm enjoying some down time in my hometown, Wilmington, DE. I report Fort Sill, Oklahoma at 0800 on 09 JUL and will be there through to 22 NOV. I'm attending whats known in the army as FA BOLC-b or Field Artillery Basic Officer Leader's Course. BOLC-a was all the studies and training I received through ROTC at Dartmouth. BOLC-b is branch specific, as in Infantry and Armor (tanks) lieutenants all attend a different course. This is different from the Marine Corps, as they all attend TBS (The Basic School) before they attend their more specific course. All army BOLC-b courses do have about 2-3 weeks of similar training which includes rifle marksmanship, convoys, and combatives.
Here's the link to the course I'll be attending if you're interested:
Afterwards I'll head to follow-on training that is unit specific (i.e. airborne school for airborne units) before being placed in a unit in Ft Hood, Texas.
I'm pretty excited and ready to go. I suppose the only thing I've been doing differently from most other jobs to prepare is keeping a pretty regular fitness plan. Nothing too complicated, I just alternate days of running and push-up/ab circuits. The army physical test is push-ups, sit-ups and a 2 mile run so as of now I'm training for the test, rather than for general fitness. Not really how I'd prefer it, but I'd like to to score well on the first test on post. I'm also hoping to do a lot more swimming once I get out there, as its much easier on my body. After 16 years of injury-free swimming, I've had my first training-related injury. Shin splints on my right leg have progressively gotten worse (despite dropping $130 on some Brooks Glycerin shoes, which otherwise are great) - I've switched to biking at the gym which isn't nearly as much fun but will hopefully maintain my cardio base while I heal. Nothing some icing, ibuprofen, and an ace bandage won't fix.
I'm also a bit of a gear nerd so I've been gathering up the lost bit of equipment I'll need. Although I'm not sure how much training we'll be doing at night I needed a new headlamp and decided on the Tactikka. I chose its longer battery life over the increased lumens of Princeton Tec's model:
I've never used a penlight before but I'm stoked to give this a try:
Well I'll close out my first post here. I'm planning on writing another entry as soon as I get some time at Ft. Sill. Dartmouth blitz shuts off in a couple of hours, so if you'd like to get in touch with me, I'm on gmail:
christopher.koppel@gmail.com
