06/04/2026
🎖️ MEDIC RODEO 2026: THE CRUCIBLE WHERE READINESS IS FORGED AND THE STANDARD IS SET
Almost twenty years ago, this competition began as a small regional contest among emergency medical technicians. Over time, it grew—expanding to teams from around the globe, across multiple medical specialties and services—each year answering the call to train harder, to get better, and to be ready. This year, the Medic Rodeo modernized once again. Not for the sake of change, but because the nature of warfare demanded it.
🔥 The Focus: Large-scale combat operations. Role 1 medics embedded with line forces. The professionals who are right there with our warfighters—in the dirt, under fire, providing integrated operational support when evacuation is not guaranteed and the margin for error is zero.
💪 The Test: Nine Total Force teams—Active Duty, Guard, and Reserve—faced day and night tactical and operational scenarios at Melrose Air Force Range. They were assessed on Tactical Combat Casualty Care, Prolonged Casualty Care, CBRN response, Damage Control Resuscitation, Triage, and Command & Control. In short, they were tested on the very tasks that decide whether our warfighters live or die—whether units maintain combat power—and whether we can continue the fight.
🩺 The Trust: That absolute, unshakeable trust a warfighter places in their medic when they scream "MEDIC!" on the battlefield is not built in a single moment. It is built over thousands of hours of preparation, thousands of repetitions, and thousands of quiet acts of discipline that no one ever sees. As Audie Murphy—the most decorated American combat soldier of World War II—once said: "I'll tell you what bravery really is. Bravery is just determination to do a job that you know has to be done." Not glory. Not recognition. Just the quiet, iron-willed determination to do the job that has to be done.
🛡️ The Standard: Medical expertise was the price of admission—the absolute minimum. What made these competitors true force multipliers was understanding the bigger picture: Mission Command. The logistics, the comms, the operational plan. The ability to lead under pressure, make sound decisions when information was incomplete, and keep their teams focused when the environment did everything it could to break them. They were not just medics. They were mission-ready Airmen.
📣 The Charge: We must prepare for the moments when the noise is deafening, the ground is shaking, and a teammate is looking at you with the absolute expectation that you will save them. In those moments, you will not rise to the level of your hopes—you will sink to the level of your training.
Every repetition mattered. Every heavy pack carried mattered. Every late night, every skill rehearsed until their hands ached, every scenario pushed through when their bodies wanted to quit—those were deposits into a bank of readiness that our teammates and this nation count on.
As General Colin Powell wisely said:
"There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work, and learning from failure."
Our competitors excelled in some scenarios and stumbled in others. That was by design. Perseverance was the key. Learning under stress was the objective. Growth was the requirement.
✨ The Result: This was not theater. This was readiness in action. The living proof of our collective commitment to one another, to our warfighters, and to this nation.
To all our competitors: You showed us your determination. You showed us that when everything was on the line, you had what it took to do the job that had to be done. You pushed yourselves, supported each other, led under pressure, and left this arena more prepared, more capable, and more confident than when you walked in.
#1 Air National Guard
#2 Barksdale
#3 Kadena
Commando Challenge: Whiteman
Top Performer: 1st Lt Joshua Stumpf (former SOF IDMT, now a PA-C)
To ALL our medics: Continue to train with purpose and iron-willed determination to do the job that has to be done. The mission ahead is worthy of your very best—give it everything you have.
May you always have blue skies, tailwinds, and steady hands.
Fights On.
-Chief Valerie Lee
