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Corporal Dan Lebel: I kind of love or thrive on that misery when you’re doing something, and it’s awful—but then you get to the end and you’re like: “That was amazing!” and you just get that sense of accomplishment. It’s, like, euphoric.

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Lieutenant Adam Orton: Hi! I’m Lieutenant Adam Orton, and today on the Canadian Army Podcast, we’re going to talk about one soldiers’ quest to improve his ability to ruck march, and how it kinda turned into a community movement. For those that don’t know, ruck marching is when you take a big backpack, fill it up with stuff, and go a set walking distance with it—kind of like hiking. For soldiers, that’s where you take all of your fighting and living gear, throw it on your back, and take it where you need to go to do the business. Today, we have Corporal Dan Lebel from 33 Service Battalion in Ottawa here to tell us a little bit about what he’s done for this. How’s it going, Dan?

Cpl Lebel: I’m excellent. How are you, sir?

Lt Orton: I’m doing great.

Cpl Lebel: Great.

Lt Orton: So, tell us a little bit about yourself.

Cpl Lebel: Well, Corporal Lebel, Dan, from 33 Service Battalion. Like you said, here in Ottawa. I’ve been with the services for about three or four years now. I was a bit of a late bloomer; I’ll be 47 this year. I started when I was 43. Felt like I needed to do my service, my time. I felt like I needed some camaraderie, to meet some people, new challenges, experiences. I’ve been—civvy side, I work with Canada Post, and I’ve been with them for about 14 years. It’s a good place to work—a lot of good people there too, but it can be a little bit monotonous after a while. So, the Forces give you a little bit of, you know, just something different. So, yeah, I’ve been with 33 Service for, like I said, about four years. Corporal now, hoping to get to PLQ eventually soon. And that’s probably it in a nutshell, yeah.

Lt Orton: Were you a letter carrier?

Cpl Lebel: I started as a letter carrier, and then I moved into middle management you could say. I’m a supervisor at one of the letter carrier depots there.

Lt Orton: So, you already had practice rucking then basically then?

Cpl Lebel: Yeah, I mean as a letter carrier, you’re doing, you know, eight to nine to ten kilometers a day, with weights already. So it was a completely natural progression when we put a rucksack on and started doing some rucking with the platoon.

Lt Orton: The reason why we’re is that, because you actually started a Facebook group—the CAF Get Out and Ruck Facebook group. And I’m a part of that group also, which is what got me interested in, you know, you, but also how this came to be. And, a little background information on the Facebook group, for those who may not have checked it out yet. It’s an interesting group because it’s a little bit more of a positive atmosphere then what you would normally see in the military. And a lot of people are posting—Regular Force, Reserve, all sorts of people, even civilians—are on there posting about, you know, going for their ruck march, or doing PT, or doing WODs. How did that come to be?

Cpl Lebel: I, myself, need people to help me stay motivated to do things as well. With 33 Service, I’m on the Iron Warrior Team. I finished Iron Warrior three times so far in my short tenure. I also went to Nijmegen two years ago with the 33 Service team as well. So, there is actually a pretty rich history for just general fitness for a service battalion. It’s pretty good. And also a rich history in Iron Warrior and doing that kind of competition. And, I forgot what the question was. I kind of went into another, yeah.

Lt Orton: No, no, it’s good, it’s good. How did you come about making this Facebook page?

Cpl Lebel: Right, so the Facebook page came about because, in the springtime, we start training for Iron Warrior. And, typically, we parade on Thursday nights—so, when we stop parading, we continue with rucking. So, we start rucking Thursday nights, and we usually expand that to one long ruck on a Saturday or Sunday morning. And we do that as a group. And it’s that group that I crave. I guess it’s the same thing, just joining the Forces, it’s just being with a bunch of people, common goals, and doing those things. So, with COVID, everybody was stuck at home. I wasn’t seeing my team. I wasn’t motivated to go out. We weren’t sure if there was going to be an Iron Warrior—but at the time, we were pretty confident that we were going to be doing it. So, I needed to start hitting the pavement and start getting some kilometers under my feet. But, who wants to get up at four or five in the morning by themselves, to do anything, really? So, the idea came to host an event on, in fact, the originally 33 Battalion Service Facebook page just to try to get people motivated to get out. So, we hosted our first one I think on March 28 and we had about 30 troops come out. On that day, the idea that you go out at 7 a.m. and the weight that you carry is between you and God. Basically no one really cares. You just put a backpack on, you started walking, the minimum distance was 5K. And so, that actual virtual march has continued on since—it’s the only one that we kind of post weekly. And then, I had other friends though from courses, and different things, that I knew were probably craving the same thing I was—just connecting with other people and having some type of commonality.

So, I started another page which I think was called a 33 Service Get Out and Ruck page. And, I started inviting people, but it was hard to get people on board because, again, who really wants to go out at 5 a.m., right? So, I knew I needed some influencers—and probably, I should change the name to incorporate, be more inclusive, if you will, than just 33 Service. So we changed it to CAF Get Out and Ruck. And, a buddy of mine from a course, Dave Jones—he’s known as John Shephard—if you’re on the page, you’ll see his crazy workouts. He’s a beast, and he’s a super enthusiastic, super positive guy. So, I contacted him and said: “Hey, I’m doing these weekly rucks. Can you get more people?” And, I think within the first week, he had like 60 guys. He’s from 33 CER, so he had a bunch of guys with him and that’s kind of how it started. What I didn’t know, in the background, is my Chain of Command is actually—I can’t say enough about them. They’re amazing, super supportive. And MWO Carter, Chris Carter, and also Major Baker; they were contacting people in the background as well, higher ranking people than I have access to, and they got Gord Scharf.

Let me just back up for a second here. When I started training for Iron Warrior, MWO Carter said to me: “When we are rucking, we’re just dudes. There are no ranks, we are all the same, we are all suffering, we are all the same.” So, on the page, it’s the same philosophy. So there’s a ton of people. I know there’s colonels, lieutenant colonels, all ranks. Right? I don’t know, like I don’t know all the ranks because we are just all dudes rucking together. So, I don’t mean any disrespect at all to people that are on the page. That’s not the point, but the point is that we are just all dudes on the page. So, Gord Scharf jumped on board with the Camerons and the next thing you know, within a couple of weeks, we had 600 people. A couple weeks later, 900. Then we hit 1000. Now, we’re close to, well we are over 3000—close to 4000 members, with I’d say about 10-15% posting regularly. You know, you just get to know some of the guys—you feel like you got a whole new group of friends. I kind of just lost my train of thought there.

Lt Orton: No, that was pretty good actually. You made a comment at the beginning, and I thought that was interesting, you said: “It doesn’t matter what weight you bring out, and it doesn't matter which distance you go. We’re shooting for a minimum of 5K.” And, you know, if I think of Battalion PT and things like that where everything is very prescribed, for good reasons—but to have some other mechanism to kind of maybe train up or do something that you are comfortable with, I think that decreases the threshold in terms of people wanting to participate. Because you know, for whatever reason, maybe you had a bad day or long day and you’re like fifty pounds and ten kilometers, you’re like: “Uh, I don’t feel like that”. But when you're kind of like: “You know, what do you feel like doing today?” At least you did something and that’s something, right?

Cpl Lebel: Yeah, there’s Sergeant Carter. She was my Platoon IC when I was in PAT Platoon. She’s also an Iron Warrior. The first day is always Reserves and stuff—she won a couple of years back. She had posted something—I wish I had memorized it because it was pretty good. It’s basically, if you get out of bed and you go for a walk with your kids, you’re crushing it. You know, like, whatever you do, just get moving. There’s absolutely no judgement. I never post what weight, but I typically do forty pounds because that’s what an Iron Warrior is. Some people are doing 50, 60 pounds. Good for them. I don’t want anybody to get injured, for sure. But it doesn’t really matter; just get moving. I know it’s a Get Out and Ruck page; we’ve had a few people comment—because, on Facebook, they can warn you if someone posted something that is inappropriate and stuff. They are like: “Oh, I don’t understand, some guy posted that they posted a swim and you guys are allowing that, it’s a ruck page.” I know it’s called Get Out and Ruck, but in order to be a good rucker you have to be well rounded; you have to do a whole bunch of things, and it doesn’t really matter—just move. Because COVID has created such a kind of fearful environment, whatever you happened to do, it’s a win. So, let’s celebrate that, and you know, you were mentioning our Army before, and how it can sometimes be a bit daunting and negative. Let’s not do that. Let’s just do something different. And I think what’s happened is we’ve had a lot of young people, I guess new troops kind of came in, and they feel a lot more comfortable posting. Whereas, like I was saying before, sometimes rank can kind of put a damper on your spirits a little bit. You don’t want to be too out there if you want to be the grey man and kind of fly under the radar. I’ve definitely seen a lot more women post, which I think is fantastic. Like statistically, we have about, members wise, we have about 75% men and 25% women. Well, when we first started, we had maybe 10%. So, there has been a huge growth. Women are posting more which I think is fantastic. And it’s just a positive thing. I think maybe the whole time that I’ve been an admin on the page, there’s maybe been one guy that’s called the whole thing lame. And, I just sent them a message, I’m like: “If you don’t like it’s okay, man, you don’t have to be on it.” It doesn’t have to be G.I. Jane, Navy Seals Training all the time. Like if somebody is coming back from an injury and they can just muster like a 2K walk, well they did that. At least it’s something.

Lt Orton: Yeah, you don’t know their story.

Cpl Lebel: You don’t know, like, right? Some people are going through really tough times. And, you know, I’ve had a lot of people message me personally. A lot of them are super thankful; they think it’s a great outlet to reach and connect with people. And sometimes they post workouts and sometimes they don’t—it doesn’t really matter. It’s just about getting to know people, just connecting, being positive, and moving, and getting some fitness in.

Lt Orton: It’s worth mentioning that this is one of the most positive military community things that I’ve seen myself. And, generally everybody is like: “Yeah! You can do it!” And it doesn’t really matter, like you said. And you can tell people are more comfortable kind of talking about their things in a controlled environment to an extent. You know, it’s focused on that one thing, which is fitness, and it’s something that we all want to see grow. It’s an important part of what we do, you know, being physically fit. And, whatever increases that level of physical fitness, regardless of where you’re at, that’s something.

Cpl Lebel: Yeah, exactly. And, you’ll have guys like John Shepherd.

Lt Orton: He’s always there just like: “Yeah you can do it! Good work!”

Cpl Lebel: We both try to put comments on everybody. I mean it’s really hard at some point— because it’s often the same people posting. And so, like: “You’re killing it! You’re crushing it!” Like, how many times can I say the same thing. And it’s not because I think it’s any less valuable or any less great. It’s just, you know, sometimes some of the things that come out are a little bit repetitive. But the main thing is somebody is looking, and somebody is paying attention. And that’s part of the accountability. I mean if you’re on your own and if somebody posts a workout, I feel anyways, I don’t comment on it or don’t see it, then, you feel like you’re by yourself again. You know, it was really that feeling that I was trying to fight at the beginning and that led to the whole creation of the page. So, I think that’s important. I’d love to see more people comment. Like, we have the same regular guys that comment all the time. I mean I’d be great if more people posted. But, the comments are really what encourage people to keep going. So, if I could improve that kind of engagement and get more people just to say: “Yeah! You’re killing it! It’s awesome!” That would be my kind of ideal situation.

Lt Orton: So, why does any of this matter to you? I guess for non-military people, you know, being able to carry your gear around is pretty important and that may seem fairly self-evident. But, why do you think that fitness and particularly rucking—and if you’ve done Iron Warrior, that’s several dozens of kilometers; Nijmegen is hundreds of kilometers throughout the training period—why is that important to you, to put that many kilometers on?

Cpl Lebel: Sergeant Woeldike, so Adrian Woeldike, a good friend of mine. Also a teammate. When I first joined, he was our PAT Platoon 2IC, he said to me: “The ability to carry everything you need separates you from the average civilian. Like, you are there to help people out, and if you don’t have everything you need, and you can’t carry that, then you’re not going to be able to help those people out.” And, that’s really stuck with me. And this idea of just being able to carry a whole bunch of stuff for a long distance, that’s what makes it Army. And whatever element you’re in Airforce, Navy, Army—you’ve had the opportunity to go on some really crappy ruck march where you’re carrying stuff, and you’re getting yelled at. But everybody’s done it. So everybody understands. You have to understand. You have to go through that to understand. I don’t really know if I’m answering the exact question that you were asking.

Lt Orton: No, no, that’s good.

Cpl Lebel: If you haven’t done it, you don’t get it. And that’s why this page is for active members or veterans. I have somebody from the British navy on the page. So it’s from all over the place. But everybody understands that feeling of, you know, you just finished a course and you have to ruck out. If you train for that, then it obviously becomes a lot easier. And, if you’re physically fit to begin with, again, it becomes that much easier. But it’s really what brings us together as a group. Like I was mentioning a little bit earlier, I kind of love or thrive on that misery when you’re doing something and it’s awful—but then you get to the end and you’re just like: “That was amazing!” You just get that sense of accomplishment. It’s, like, euphoric.

You know, I remember the first finish line of my first Iron Warrior, and just walking through, it has been a slog. Like, it had been really tough. When you’re portaging that canoe, it’s a sole crusher. There are so many times where you’re just like: “I just give up.” But then you keep going, but then you get to the finish line and you’re like: “That was amazing!” And, you just feel this sense of accomplishment. Every time you put on a ruck and go out for 5, 10k, you come back, yeah it might not have been great while you’re doing it—but when you come back, you always feel good.

Same thing, I do a lot of CrossFit or functional fitness; it’s miserable. You question your existence every time you do some type of a WOD. Like, it sucks. Some of the stuff that you do, like, I was at a class at six this morning before coming here, and we were doing like 150 wall balls. Like, who the hell wants to do that? But, I’m there with a class and everyone else is doing it, so I’m like, then you feel like you’re a part of that group and you just want to beat the guy next to you. So, you just try to go harder. And then you finish and you’re like: “That was amazing, you know—like I feel great, now I have accomplished something in my day.”

Lt Orton: And then the whole bonding through shared hardships as well. That goes a long way. And, I think that’s one of those things that brings us, as military people, together, is those shared difficult experiences that, even if you didn’t share in that particular experience with that person, you’ve both, at some point, carried a one hundred pound backpack over ten kilometers or at some point was outside in the rain for 24 hours without sleep. And, then you come back and you’re stronger as a team as a result of having gone through that. And I know that you can do it, and you know I can do it. And that’s how we get to where we are as an organization.

Cpl Lebel: Exactly. That’s what I love about the whole thing: the page, the rucking, just going on course; you just get to meet people. And, everybody has that. They just understand you. Like you just said, it just separates you from other groups.

Lt Orton: Yeah, and the other thing is, particularly with rucking, is at the end of the day for the Army, and with other organizations, as well, it is soldier first. You know, fundamentally, every soldier has basic core competencies, and being able to carry your gear, your living gear, and your fighting gear, is one of the most basic things that we have to deal with. So, that’s a great common point for everybody to work on together like in maybe a more positive environment as well.

Cpl Lebel: Exactly, because there are so many hardships when you’re either on Ex, or on course, or at work. I think it’s more important to keep a positive light feeling on the page. Because, you just don’t need to get crapped on again. Everybody is just happy and supports each other, like I know this family can, right? We can really be there for each other.

Lt Orton: Yeah, it’s interesting because, we talk about maybe a little bit of negativity in the military—but, it’s not so much negativity as mission focus, right?

Cpl Lebel: Right.

Lt Orton: A lot of us deal with situations where, you know, it’s a difficult situation, or we are going ten kilometers with a 100 pound ruck, and the focus is more on getting it done than having a good time, because we are mission oriented. But, to be able to kind of take away that mission piece and just focus on growing, sometimes it’s not easy at work. Just like any other job really, and so, sometimes when you take the work piece out of the stuff, that’s interesting. And just do it on the side, it becomes a little more interesting and easier to have fun with. Like how many times have people done things at work that on paper may seem, like, it’s super fun on paper, like flying an airplane—but as a job, it sucks. But then for fun, it’s super fun.

Cpl Lebel: Yeah, exactly.

Lt Orton: Was there anything else you wanted to add?

Cpl Lebel: I mentioned before that my Chain of Command is super supportive. Also, I should mention the admin group that I have for the page: Aaron Carter, Chris Carter, Gord Sharf, Dave Jones. And actually, we have another one too, I should mention, Matt Matsimus. I don’t know if you know him, he’s a big YouTuber.

Lt Orton: Yeah.

Cpl Lebel: Actually, in fact, a week or so into starting the Facebook page, somebody sent me a - I had never heard of him before - Matt had done a rucking video that stemmed from the ruck page. And he’s in Calgary or Edmonton. I think he’s in Calgary. And, I’m like, how this guy in Calgary hear of the page and then decide to do a rucking video mentioning the page. That’s when I started seeing that this could be a lot bigger than I originally thought it was. Just the support I’ve had has been pretty great in terms of other stuff. I guess that’s about it.

Lt Orton: Sounds good. That was Corporal Dan Lebel. Thank you so much for talking to us today.

Cpl Lebel: Thank you very much for having me, I appreciate it.

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Lt Orton: And, as usual, I’m Lieutenant Adam Orton with the Canadian Army Podcast. Don’t forget to check us out on Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter. And, throw on a ruck, get out there, put some kilometers on those boots.

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