The Best Ranger Competition 2012

Over the weekend, Fort Benning held the 29th annual Best Ranger Competition with fifty pairs of infantrymen. The grueling competition is known to be one of the Army's premier showdowns, a 60-hour grind that tested their mental strength, physical endurance and heart.

Photos can be viewed on the Military Channel site.

"Every BRC is special," said Sgt. 1st Class Mike Dean, a spokesman at the Ranger Training Brigade, in a USASOC News report. "We are always coming up with new and exciting events and always trying to do it bigger and better. This is an opportunity to come see our nation's finest demonstrating what we do best."

Beginning at 6 a.m. on Camp Rogers at Harmony Church, in the Georgia red clay,  competitors moved about 50 miles during the first day in a pair of foot marches, an urban obstacle course and orienteering during daylight hours.

Three teams from Fort Bragg represented the 82nd Airborne Division, two teams from USAJFKSWC, and one team from USASOC - who happened to win the competition.

History

The Best Ranger Competition was started in 1982 after Dick Leandri found a way to honor his personal friend, Lieutenant General David E. Grange, Jr.

Leandri wanted to recognize his friend, past director of the Ranger Department and former Commanding General of Fort Benning, Georgia, with a perpetual event. He and several other professional businessmen formed Chairborne Rangers, Inc., to help support the initiation of such an event.

The competition has evolved over the past twenty seven years from one that was originally created to salute the best two-man “buddy” team in the Ranger Department at Fort Benning. Every year the competition is reviewed and tweaked, to what is currently in place for this year, to determine the best two-man team from the entire United States Armed Forces.