They love competition

Marisa O’Neil

They train every week for crises and dangers most hope they’ll never

face.

But on Monday, members of the Costa Mesa Police Department SWAT

team will put their skills to use in some friendly competition at the

10th annual Ventura Police SWAT Competition.

This is the first time Costa Mesa will take part in the tough

contest, which challenges teams in endurance races and throws them

into the kinds of scenarios they could face in real-life emergencies.

“The chances of a call out [to an incident] are pretty slim,”

Costa Mesa SWAT Commander Lt. Karl Schuler said. “But they’re ready

if they are.”

In addition to their regular training, they have undergone

grueling exercises in oppressive heat in Costa Mesa, Camp Pendleton

and El Toro for the last month, preparing for what is dubbed “The

Toughest One-Day Competition on the West Coast.”

“We really push them through it,” Ventura Police Sgt. David Dickey

said of the competition. “The whole goal is to push [competitors] to

the physical limit and make them perform under that stress. Teams

that are the most physically fit perform the best, not just in

real-world situations, but in the training environment we put them

through.”

The competition will include nine events in eight hours, Dickey

said. Those include two obstacle courses, distance running and

sprinting in full SWAT gear, followed by shooting competition and

hostage-rescue reaction.

“It’s testing ourselves physically and then throwing a mental

challenge on top of it,” SWAT Officer Jon Doezie, 37, said.

Even in 100-degree heat, the seven officers going to the

competition have been running and shooting for four hours straight

during training sessions this month, Officer Brent McKinley, 34,

said. And they’ve been doing it wearing 35 pounds of gear.

That’s on top of the regular training they undergo to keep them in

top shape, Officer Rob Dimel, 37, said. Because they never know what

kind of situation they will face on the job, he said, SWAT officers

need to stay physically fit.

“Your life depends on it,” Doezie said.

This is the 10th year for the competition, which brings together

SWAT teams from all over Central and Southern California. Costa Mesa

will compete against teams representing police and sheriff’s

departments and even a Los Angeles FBI team, Dickey said.

“Competition breeds camaraderie and instills trust in one

another,” Schuler said. “These guys love competition.”

Costa Mesa’s SWAT team has 16 members. The top seven officers, in

terms of physical condition, were selected for the competition,

McKinley said.

Along with Dimel, McKinley and Doezie, the team includes

39-year-old Eric Wisener, 35-year-old Doug Johnson, 35-year-old Pat

Wessel and 35-year-old Todd Williams. All have between five and 11

years of SWAT experience.

Their training, conditioning and experience should serve them well

in the competition, Schuler said.

“They are a team who knows how each other thinks and how they

respond in any situation,” he said

* MARISA O’NEIL covers public safety and courts. She may be

reached at (949) 574-4268 or by e-mail at [email protected].