COB ADDER, Iraq – They were locked in combat, visibly tired and trapped on the edge of the ring. Their fellow students were yelling at them.
Keep your head up!
Get out of the corner!
Get back to the center!
Get your hands up!
Get in there!
The bell rang and Staff Sgt. Aaron Martinez, a combatives instructor with 4th Brigade Combat Team, 1st Armored Division, motioned to one of his students. It was his turn to spar. The student put on his gloves and stepped into the ring.
It was boxing night at the “Zoo” in the Sprung Fitness Center at Contingency Operating Base Adder, and Martinez’s students were busying sparring as their peers gave ring-side advice.
“We’re always infantrymen first and I think that this is the best way to better our Soldiers,” said Martinez, a Des Moines, Iowa, native who teaches Modern Army Combatives to Soldiers five nights a week.
Martinez hopes that by teaching Soldiers how to fight in close-quarters hand-to-hand combat at the gym, they’ll have enough confidence and experience to survive unarmed combat on the battlefield.
“You put them through drills and you put them through scenarios and they start feeling confident; he has a little more confidence to fight and get inside that door,” said Martinez.
Martinez stressed that learning how to fight is more than learning how to hit.
“We’re strict on diets; we’re strict on conditioning,” said Martinez. “Every time we start we stretch, we get our muscles right, we get our joints correct, we get our mind right and we get our cardio right.”
On boxing night, Soldiers practiced their footwork and punches by shadow boxing around the ring. They then did combination drills where one partner yelled out a specific series of punches the other partner had to execute. Late in the night, Soldiers sparred.
The constant throughout the evening was the insistent clang of the electronic bell, which told Soldiers when they could fight and when they could rest. “I’ll set it for three minutes, I’ll give them the drill and they’ll do it straight for three minutes, and it gives you a thirty second break,” said Martinez. “The guys hate hearing that; it’s just false motivation for them because I make them keep going.”
Despite the draconian measures adopted by Martinez, about a dozen Soldiers showed up to the advanced class.
Some came to relieve stress, like Sgt. Hector Saillant, an administrative specialist with 720th Civil Support Command.
“I love it,” said Saillant, a native of Albuquerque, N.M. “When I don’t train, when I’m not at the gym, I’m stressed out.”
Others came out of curiosity, like Sgt. Thomas Sneed, a water treatment specialist with 121st Brigade Support Battalion.
“I’m here just to see what the workout is,” said Sneed, a native of Houston. “When mixed martial arts became the big thing, I decided to check it out.”
Other Soldiers simply came for the exercise, like Sgt. Fedra Toy, a medic with 4th BCT, 1st Armd. Div.
“I just want to get a workout,” said Toy, a native of El Paso, Texas. “I got my ass kicked when I was at basic, but I’m just trying to get better.”
“There are lots of people here who are just catching on fast,” said Martinez, noting Saillant, Sneed and Toy. While some Soldiers in the group have been fighting since grade school, Martinez said he enjoys teaching Soldiers from the ground up.
“You get a lot of guys who have never been in organized sports, wrestling, football, anything like that, and they come in here and they start showing confidence in themselves,” said Martinez.
“It happens all the time,” Martinez added. “It’s happening right now.”
“That’s the only reason I love doing what I do,” Martinez said. “This is where Sgt. Martinez wants to be, bettering their combat skills.”
