By Army Sgt. Darron Salzer
National Guard Bureau
ARLINGTON, Va. - In June 2005, the
selection process for the Soldier and noncommissioned officer of the year for
the Army National Guard was a very different process.
Known then as the Soldier and NCO of the
Year Competition the regional winners from throughout the Army Guard had to
then compete at the First Army level, then again at U.S. Army Forces Command,
before reaching the Department of the Army competition.
For Command Sgt. Maj. John Gipe, who in
2005 was the command sergeant major of the Army Guard, that process seemed to
need a revamping.
Since the Army National Guard was a
three-star command, just like First Army, Gipe said that as he watched the
Guard competition unfold in 2006, it didn’t make sense to him why Army Guard
Soldiers had to compete at another three-star command to advance to the DA
level.
“But more importantly, as the largest
organization within the Army, I felt that it was important to the Soldiers of
the Army National Guard to have their own [Noncommissioned Officer] and Soldier
of the Year Competition … within our own organization,” said Gipe, who now
serves as the senior enlisted advisor for the Office of the Assistant Secretary
of Defense for Reserve Affairs.
He approached the Army Reserve command
sergeant major to see if there was any interest in creating a similar
competition within the Army Reserve, as they too had to send their Soldiers
through First Army as well.
The two sergeants major were in
agreement and they approached the sergeant major of the Army about changing how
the Army Guard and Army Reserve competed.
Gipe also wanted to revamp the
competition itself, in addition to the process that Soldiers and
noncommissioned officers competed.
At the time, the competition included
Soldier tasks, an Army Physical Fitness Test and weapons qualifications, but it
in no way compared to the Army’s new competition, which was much more
physically and mentally demanding.
“I knew what I wanted to do,” he said
about the change. “I wanted to make sure our guys went in to this [Department
of the Army] competition knowing they are the best prepared and the best
trained they can be – and if they won our competition, they can win any
competition.”
Gipe’s next step was a call to the Army
National Guard’s Warrior Training Center at Fort Benning, Ga.
“I wanted our competition to be harder
than the (Department of the Army) Best Warrior Competition; to stress our
Soldiers to the point that when they went to the Army’s Best Warrior
Competition, they had the confidence to know they could compete with anyone,
anywhere – and win,” he said.
The Warrior Training Center was the only
organization that could push competitors that hard and take care of them within
a stressful environment, he said.
“After all, they conducted Pre-Ranger,
Air Assault and several other high-stress courses for the Army,” Gipe said.
The cadre at the center worked up Gipe’s
initial ideas.
“The command sergeant major of the center
at the time drew up a draft of the [new] competition based on the Army’s Best
Ranger competition … and my vision for what I wanted our competition to be
like,” he said. “I told him I wanted it to be non-stop and … what things had to
be there to mirror the Army competition, but the rest was left to whatever he
saw fit.”
Gipe said his goal was to take what the
Army did in five days, and fit it into two days.
“That’s changed over time,” he said.
“It’s no longer the 42-hour Ranger Challenge-like competition.”
Today, the Army Guard’s Best Warrior
Competition is conducted over a five-to-six day period, a major change from its
fledgling beginnings in 2007, but the results brought out by the revamped
competition were seen not long after its introduction.
In 2008, during the second year of the
Army Guard’s reinvented Best Warrior Competition , the Army Guard’s NCO of the
Year—Army Staff Sgt. Michael Noyce-Merino from the Montana Army National
Guard—went on to win the Department of the Army level competition and was named
the Army’s NCO of the Year.
“We came a long way in a short period of
time,” Gipe said, referring to 2008. “I really don’t think that the active component
thought Guard and Reserve Soldiers were capable of [winning].
“That same year, the Army Reserve won
the Soldier of the Year competition,” he exclaimed. “So here in the year of the
NCO, both reserve components held the titles – it was pretty phenomenal and
rattled a few cages on the active side.”
That represented a pretty significant
moment for the Army, said Gipe.
“I thought it was a big step for us, but
also a big step for the Army because it showed that they were not afraid to let
their reserve components shine when they deserved to shine,” he said. “It was a
pretty significant moment for the Army.”
In 2011 another Guard member, Army Sgt.
Guy Mellor from the Utah Army National Guard, won the Army competition to
become the second NCO of the Year from the Guard in four years.
With such great success in such a short
amount of time, Gipe said the face of the Army-wide competition has been
changed for the better.
“I guarantee it has elevated the level
of competition at the DA level,” he said. “It’s extremely tough out there now,
and even tougher to win in the states now with what this competition has come
to be, but that’s the good news.
Gipe said the program has been a huge
success overall and gives much credit to the Soldiers who compete, but also to
the state command sergeants major and the staff at the Warrior Training Center.
“Throughout the last 10-plus years, our
Soldiers have built a reputation for being quality Soldiers and NCOs through
their outstanding performance of duty while deployed – both at home and
abroad,” he said.
“What Staff Sgt. Noyce-Merino and Sgt.
Mellor have done is to elevate that awareness of the quality of our enlisted
corps to the American public.”
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