Local firefighters remember fallen comrade at annual games

Wednesday, Nov. 1, 2000 | 8:37 a.m.

Brent Cooper's spirit will lead the cheering for his teammates at the ninth annual Firefighter Combat Challenge International Championship at Texas Station this week.

The 42-year-old division chief of the North Las Vegas Fire Department died of cancer Aug. 13, nearly three months before he could defend the two titles he won at last year's competition.

"We are going to have a special salute for Brent during the opening ceremony Saturday," said Paul O. Davis, who created the challenge in 1991. "He personified the ethos of this event, a very competitive guy who was by every definition an athlete. He was a great sportsman who loved the event."

Firefighters will march in his honor. Many of the competitors will have stickers on their helmets to pay tribute to Cooper.

A video will be shown of last year's competition in which Cooper, who first entered the challenge in 1995, took first place in the over-40 and chief's categories. "He was an important part of the challenge," Davis said.

More than 1,000 firefighters from across the United States and Canada will compete this week on an obstacle course in a parking lot at Texas Station. This morning was the start of three days of qualifying events. On Saturday the top 12 teams will compete in championship matches.

Among the competitors will be teams from the North Las Vegas, Las Vegas and Clark County fire departments.

ESPN (Cox cable channel 19), which has taped the past seven challenges, will be there again this year for a show that will air on Dec. 10.

Donovan Hansen, 31, of North Las Vegas, worked and trained with Cooper. "Coop was a great competitor, a real athlete," he said. "He's missed."

Hansen said Cooper's illness was sudden. The chief was going to attend an elimination contest in Irvine, Calif., in July. But a week before the team was to leave, Cooper complained of stomach problems.

"Six weeks later, he died of cancer," Hansen said.

Cooper took a lot of pride in setting a world record in the chief's category last year, completing the course in one minute and 38 seconds -- which also was fast enough to win him the title in the over-40 category.

Hansen said Cooper wanted to be around to win the over-50 and over-60 categories as well. He was planning to be help his North Las Vegas team topple the current three-time champion -- the Brampton, Ontario, Canada Fire Department, which holds the record of 4 minutes, 43 seconds and six-tenths of a second.

Last year the North Las Vegas finished second -- only seven seconds behind the Canadian team.

"We're going to be hurting without Coop," Hansen, a firefighter engineer, said.

The obstacle course the firefighters will run has been billed by its creators as "the Toughest Two Minutes in Sports" and those in the competition as "the Best of the Bravest."

Firefighters, wearing 50 pounds of protective gear, race a clock as they carry out five tasks that simulate real-life rescues, including climbing a five-story tower while carrying a 42-pound hose and ending by dragging a 175-pound mannequin 100 feet to the finish line. Categories in the competition include open; over 40, 50 and 60; chief; and women.

The Firefighter Combat Challenge grew out of a grant awarded by the U.S. Fire Administration in 1975 to the University of Maryland, for the purpose of developing a physical performance exam for firefighters.

Davis helped develop most of the physical test. "It took 15 years before it dawned on me that this could be a great sporting event," he said.

The first Challenge was held in 1991. In 1996 Davis incorporated as On-Target Challenge Inc. and began accepting sponsorships of the contests.

This year more than 10,000 firefighters competed in 25 regional qualifying events to narrow the field down to the 1,000 semi-finalists vying for the top honors this week.

Davis is developing a similar competition for law enforcement officers, and next year expects to have a 13-part series on ESPN called "The Guardians," with each show airing a different profession.

The Firefighter Combat Challenge will play a prominent role in the series.

The physical test Davis developed in 1975 is similar to the obstacle course used in the Challenge. He said when the test first was used, "A substantial percentage of fire fighters were not up to performance standards. That has changed."

He said today's firefighters are in much better shape, in part because of the test. "Firefighters are by nature a competitive group. They enjoy a challenge," he said.

The test became a competition among the members of departments long before it evolved into a contest between departments.

Friends of Cooper said the Challenge was an important part of his life and he influenced others to join in the fun.

"He got me involved," Hansen, said.

At the 1999 competition Hansen set the world individual record at 1 minute and 29 seconds. But he only held the title for two hours, when Overland Park, Kan., firefighter Bobby Russell completed the course in 1 minute and 25 seconds.

Most of the competitors train year round. "There are different types of training at different times of the year. Right now it's real specific to the course," Hansen said.

Frank Taylor, 41, a captain with the North Las Vegas department, said the competition motivates him to stay in shape.

"Before the Challenge competition started, if you could do the course in under five minutes you were considered to be in good shape," he said. "Now, it's under three minutes."

North Las Vegas has two teams, and may field a third before Saturday's finals, when the playing field is narrowed to 12 teams (five people on each team). Others on Taylor's team include Hansen, Ryan Aughenbaugh, Jeff Hurley and Larry Larson.

Taylor said firefighters sometimes compete against professional football players on the obstacle course to see who is the toughest.

"Football players and weight lifters have a hard time keeping up with us," he said. "It's all in the legs and lungs."

And, for Cooper, it was in the heart.