They’re training for the toughest two minutes of sports.
Climbing stairs, hoisting equipment, forcing entry, running with hoses and rescuing a 165-pound simulated-victim mannequin, four Parry Sound firefighters are testing the limits of their strength, skill and stamina as they train for FireFit tournaments.
For Steve Fleming, Oliver Moloney, Craig Hadenko and Glenn Robinson, it’s serious competition, with bragging rights at stake among fellow firefighters.
Yet they all agree, the real test of this rigorous training arises when they’re back in Parry Sound and the fire pager goes off.
“When we get our calls to house fires or any fire or rescue, it’s hard, but it’s a lot easier when you’re actually trained and ready to do the job,” says Moloney. “We’re on call 24/7. We don’t know when we’re going to be going out, so it’s imperative that we stay physically fit and in shape to serve our community, at a moment’s notice, at any given time.”
Since February, Fleming, 26, Moloney, 23, and Hadenko, 32, under the mentorship of veteran FireFit competitor and deputy fire chief Robinson, have been pushing weights, running, building cardio and doing circuit drills with mannequin Rescue Randy, sand-filled hoses, mallets, and heavy over-sized truck tires.
On August 1 and 2, the local firemen, calling themselves the Black Helmets – after the free T-shirts they were offered – got their start at the Eastern Ontario Regional Scottt FireFit Championships held in Kingston.
It was an eye-opener.
Fleming remembers wondering what he was getting into, as he watched the competitor ahead of him being rushed off to hospital. Moloney was having an outstanding race but tripped; Hadenko let Rescue Randy slip, losing precious time; and Robinson “hit the wall” totally winded from over-exertion. But they all finished with respectable times, competing against some of Canada’s top contenders. Fleming finished in 2:00.85, Moloney in 2:04:35 and Hadenko in 2:29.81.
“We did the team relay with four guys – never practiced it before – we did it in an unbelievable time that qualified us for the finals, and in the finals we shaved off another ten seconds,” recalls Fleming. They lost in the first knockout round to Lambton College, a team that had won the relay race at the Brantford competition three weeks before.
“My biggest challenge is the stairs – they’re very narrow,” explains Fleming. “They are six flights, with a 45 pound hose on your shoulder, and with all the equipment, that averages out to 75 pounds of extra weight on your body. I excel more on the Rescue Randy and the hose drag.”
Maloney’s biggest challenge at the regional championships was pulling 50 pounds of hose up four storeys.
“It was a lot heavier than I thought it would be and it’s a long way up there,” he recalls.
Robinson finished the course in 3:39.52, placing fourth in the over 55 years category. In his first firefighter challenge he was fourth in the over 50 category. He first began training for competitions in October 2003 with a fellow firefighter Brian Middaugh. The motivation, he recalls, had a lot to do with them both approaching fiftieth birthdays.
“We were working out to get in better shape and thought, well, maybe we can do this,” Robinson recalls. The event was in July 2004. Along with Robinson and Middaugh, who placed first in the over 50 class, Gavin Courvoiser, a co-op student with the local department also competed.
For several years, Robinson eased off his training, but just as he was approaching his fifty-fifth birthday, eager young firefighters Hadenko, Moloney and Fleming expressed an interest in competing and were looking for an experienced leader.
“So I just started training with them on the course Brian Middaugh and I had put together,” says Robinson, who didn’t make the commitment to compete until the morning of the event.
Now the Black Helmets are building endurance for competition on September 20 at the Bracebridge Fair. Robinson expects it will be a modified course, a little bit shorter and not quite as gruelling.
“But that also means more people would try it,” he expects. “And it should attract more local firefighters.”
The Black Helmets say they compete for many reasons: the pride, the challenge, the fitness, honing skills, networking with other departments, the physical demands, sheer exercise and the fun.
“And to win,” says Maloney. “Anyone who says they’re not there to win is crazy. But it’s a lot of fun,”
The team also wants to put Parry Sound back on the map again. Excelling in firefighting competitions is a long-standing tradition with the Parry Sound Fire Department, says Robinson, whose family has been fighting fires with the department since the early 1920s.
The town’s fire department started in May 1890, and team photos, trophies, and winning banners from as early as 1913 prove that the Parry Sound brigade was up to any challenge offered by departments in the region. Some of the earliest events included horse-drawn hose-wagon races. Some of the tournaments listed in the department’s records were held in Midland, Penetang, Orillia, Parry Sound, Huntsville, Gravenhurst, Burks Falls, Barrie, and Oshawa.
The Parry Sound North Star advertised a special train to the Fireman’s Tournament at Orillia on the Civic Holiday of 1922: “First special train since the war. Come along and swell the crowd.”
The local team returned with the victory banner from that Northern Volunteer Firefighters event, as well as wins in 1921 and 1923. That banner – along with an array of trophies – is still displayed upstairs in the fire hall.
Those were exciting times, when watching firefighters test their skills against those of neighbouring rivals, attracted quite a local following.
Robinson would like to recreate some of that firefighter camaraderie, and spectator interest generated through these action-filled competitions.
“We’ve submitted a package to the Town to try to host one of the FireFit events next year,” he notes. “There’s a lot to do. It costs $8,000 to host a one-day event or $10,000 for a two-day event, and then they have suggestions on how we can get sponsorship. We’re just starting the process.”
Having an event conveniently close to home, he hopes might also persuade more area firefighters to try the FireFit challenge.
“We’ve got fire departments in McKellar, Carling, McDougall, Whitestone, and Seguin,” he says. “With enough teams like that going to competitions, like the one we’re going to in Bracebridge, it will almost be like re-creating the Northern Volunteer Firemen’s Association’s competitions.”
Robinson isn’t sure when or why the Parry Sound Fire Department’s interest in firefighting competitions faded, but was pleased to see it rekindled in 2001 by Jim Bernas, Jason Provencher and co-op student Andrew Johnson.
Today, the Black Helmets are keen to keep the tradition of competition alive.
For Hadenko, now living his childhood dream of becoming a firefighter, the Scott FireFit challenge in Kingston “was everything he expected and then some.”
“It’s definitely the toughest two minutes in sports,” he says. “It really hit home on a personal aspect that I accomplished something that I trained so hard to do. It wasn’t about winning awards for me or getting the top score, it was about achieving the goal I had set in my mind.”
They find the training and competition helps immensely in improving their strength and skill level as firefighters.
“We’ve had a couple of calls lately where there have been a lot of going up stairways and we just fly up them – so it does benefit us greatly,” comments Fleming.
Moloney likes both the competition and the camaraderie.
“It’s a really cool experience to be out there with a bunch of other firefighters that share the same passion, and do the same job every day,” he says. “And to compete against them and compete against yourself.”
A lasting impression Hadenko had of the competition was how it offered the public a glimpse into the world of firefighting.
“Everything that the FireFit challenge is based on, is what we would do at typical fires,” says Hadenko. “I think people underestimate what we do. They see us riding around in the red trucks. They don’t see what’s actually happening in the background – the physical and mental demands firefighters face on a day-to-day basis.”
Black helmets, carrying on a tradition
For Steve Fleming, Glenn Robinson, Craig Hadenko, and Oliver Moloney, it’s serious competition, with bragging rights at stake among fellow firefighters.
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