SAN DIEGO — The UCLA cadets went to sleep at 9 p.m. and woke up three hours before sunrise. By 2 p.m. they had sprinted, jogged, climbed and hauled equipment for more than eight miles up and down steep brush- and dirt-covered terrain, most of it while carrying more than 45 pounds of military gear, including rubber ducks, or replica rifles. Three of the cadets were first-years and had only been in ROTC for less than a month.
“It was challenging as hell, but it was worth it,” said James Mumma, a second-year kinesiology student at California State University, Northridge who is part of the Bruin Battalion, UCLA’s Army Reserve Officers Training Corps program. “Maybe not now, but it will be.”
Story by: Kristen Taketa