{"id":171403,"date":"2024-05-08T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-05-08T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=171403"},"modified":"2024-05-08T13:40:16","modified_gmt":"2024-05-08T13:40:16","slug":"u-s-army-reserve-civil-affairs-team-runs-marathon-together-in-prague","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=171403","title":{"rendered":"U.S. Army Reserve Civil Affairs team runs marathon together in Prague"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n U.S. Army Soldiers assigned to the 415th Civil Affairs Battalion pose together before the start of the Prague International Marathon at Prague, Czech Republic, May 5, 2024. The team spent the previous two months training to run the race together. (U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Jameson Harris)
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\n U.S. Army Soldiers assigned to the 415th Civil Affairs Battalion pose together after finishing the Prague International Marathon at Prague, Czech Republic, May 5, 2024. The team successfully finished the race faster than expected without injury. The medals are a recognition of the accomplishment of successfully making it 26 miles. (Courtesy Photo)
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\n U.S. Army Soldiers assigned to the 415th Civil Affairs Battalion pose together with their medals in Poznan, Poland, May 5, 2024. The team ran the race together as a team-building event, increasing the physical fitness, competitiveness and esprit de corps within the unit. (U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Jameson Harris)
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PRAGUE, Czech Republic \u2014 Through the classical streets in the Czech Republic on May 5, 2024, thousands of runners follow the cobblestone paths highlighting the history, architecture, and culture of Prague. The Prague International Marathon attracts runners from all over the world, and this time around, a team of U.S. Army Soldiers from the 415th Civil Affairs Battalion were there among them. For them, each step of the marathon was a symbolic gesture \u2013 a reflection of their commitment to bridging the gap between the military and civilian worlds.<\/p>\n

It all started with U.S. Army Maj. Brian Melton, the civil liaison team chief for the 308th Civil Affairs Brigade. An avid runner himself, he began researching different European marathons once they had rotated to Poland in September. Rather than doing one alone, he invited the rest of the Civil Affairs team to join him in Prague. Five of his comrades answered that call.<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought this would be a good team-building event within our organization,\u201d said Melton. \u201cI was pleased to see Soldiers willing to do this with me.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the weeks leading to the marathon, the team started training. Melton committed himself to running 45 miles a week around Poznan, Poland. The rest of the group did their own shorter strength-training routines during the week, saving the weekends for longer distance runs. During one of the more memorable training sessions, the team took a 15-mile route around a lake in Poland a couple of weekends prior to the race. Two of the team members, U.S. Army Master Sgt. Scott Sinclair and Sgt. Joseph Montez, both assigned to the 415th Civil Affairs Battalion, did not sign up until two weeks before the race so they followed a much more condensed training plan, consisting of strength, mobility and short, consecutive runs.<\/p>\n

\u201cI did not want to risk injury during the marathon by overtraining the week before so I only did a couple of 5-8 mile runs,\u201d said Montez.<\/p>\n

Naturally, the team grew competitive together over the final times the runner would achieve. That spirit built up even more of the motivation and drive to excel during the international event. For U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Karissa Martin especially, she had never run a marathon before so it was a new experience for her. She was determined to beat U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Allen Ruffles, as he was also running the race for the first time.<\/p>\n

Sinclair himself drove the team down there to Prague on Friday, two days before the race. That gave the team a day to get their minds ready for the endurance needed. At nine in the morning on Sunday, shoes were laced and hearts were pounding at the start line, in the center of Prague\u2019s Old Town. With the sound of a whistle, thousands of racers departed with over 26 miles of Prague\u2019s historic districts awaiting them. Being the experienced runner himself, Melton came back first, finishing in 3 hours and 45 minutes.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a well-organized race overall,\u201d said Melton. \u201cI was worried a little bit that the cobblestone path would make it tougher, but thankfully that wasn\u2019t too much of a factor as far as I could tell.\u201d<\/p>\n

Coming in after him was Montez with a time of 4 hours and 21 minutes. After him, Ruffles made it across the finish line, successfully beating Martin to the finish line. It came at a cost. During the second half of the race, he struggled with nausea and queasiness. At mile 20, he lost that fight, throwing up on the side of the road. He did not let that stop him though, keeping the pace going to finish at a time of 4 hours and 41 minutes. Afterward, Martin came in at exactly 5 hours.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll my life, I had always heard about \u2018walls\u2019 during physical exercise but never really experienced it, even during all my sports,\u201d said Ruffles. \u201cThat last six-mile stretch though, I got to feel what that feels like. The walls are real.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m bummed that I didn\u2019t beat Allen, but that\u2019s okay,\u201d said Martin. \u201cHe got the win.\u201d<\/p>\n

Finishing out the race were Staff Sgt. Alex Maxted and Sinclair. Sinclair and Melton were both pleased to see everyone finish with better times than the average person \u2013 injury-free.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was extremely proud of everyone,\u201d said Melton. \u201cThere were no injuries and everyone finished faster than they initially expected.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like this brought the team a lot closer,\u201d said Sinclair. \u201cLeading up to it, we had to plan the trip together and train together, so that really brought everyone together.\u201d<\/p>\n

The team returned to Poznan the following day, now having the shared experience of overcoming physical adversity and completing a major milestone. The close-knit bond formed between the team will come through greatly as the Civil Affairs teams continue to play a role in V Corps\u2019 work in strengthening partnerships in Eastern Europe. Running marathons while working closely with local communities, diplomats, militaries and governments is just another way Civil Affairs allows U.S. Army Soldiers to Be All You Can Be.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

1 \/ 3 Show Caption + Hide Caption \u2013 U.S. Army Soldiers assigned to the 415th Civil Affairs Battalion pose together before the start of the Prague International Marathon at Prague, Czech Republic, May 5, 2024. The team spent the previous two months training to run the race together. (U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":171405,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-171403","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171403","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=171403"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171403\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":171409,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171403\/revisions\/171409"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/171405"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=171403"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=171403"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=171403"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}