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Martial arts training draws praise from sailors

Leathernecks have spent several years learning hand-to-hand combat skills with the Marine Corps Martial Arts Program. Now, small groups of sailors gradually are spreading the franchise to the blue side.

“This is probably the best program I’ve been in during my Navy career,” said Builder 3rd Class (SCW) Ryan Sparks. “It teaches you physical, mental and character discipline. It betters you as a whole.”

On May 21, Sparks and six other Seabees in Gulfport, Miss., graduated to green belt with an instructor tab, enabling them to turn around and welcome others to the dojo.

“I will be implementing a gray and tan belt program in my battalion,” said Sparks, who is assigned to Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 133.

“I am starting brown belt training in a couple of weeks. I’d recommend it to anybody.”

Officials at Navy Personnel Command said there are no plans underway to formally adopt MCMAP, but some sailors, including corpsmen and security force sailors serving with Marine units, have started training.

A mobile training team from the Martial Arts Center of Excellence at Marine Corps Base Quantico, Va., was sent to Gulfport to spread the program to Seabees, who often operate with Marines.

“If they are attached [to a Marine unit], it just makes sense they’re doing whatever the parent command is going to do,” said Capt. Sean Patton, the program’s deputy director. “You don’t want to feel different. You want to roll around if they’re rolling around. ”

Other services also have looked into MCMAP, according to retired Lt. Col. Joseph Shusko, program director of MCMAP.

“The Coast Guard has shown interest. We seem to be training some of their organizations every year. The Navy is currently conducting training, mostly with the corpsmen on the East and West Coasts,” he said in an e-mail.

He also cited some Army units and Eglin Air Force Base, Fla., as trying out the program.

Builder 2nd Class (SCW) Christopher Jones from NMCB 1 graduated May 21 with Sparks and the others. He thinks MCMAP would help any sailor, as well as the fleet.

“The biggest misconception of MCMAP is concentrating on the fighting. But it’s the whole philosophy of discipline and how everything is based on our core values. They’ve tied that into honor, courage and commitment,” he said.

Thanks to the structure of MCMAP, Jones can teach those under him in his fire team. As a qualified instructor, he said he can apply the leadership methods throughout his Seabee career.

“The Navy has very good ways of teaching but they’re textbook about it. Sometimes it’s hard to grasp things when it’s textbook,” he said. “In MCMAP everything is textbook, but the instructors are able to relate it to our lives.”

Another graduate, Engineering Aide 2nd Class-select (SCW) Erik Kennerson will likewise take MCMAP back to his unit, NMCB 74.

He said word traveled fast around Gulfport as other Seabees saw him and others being run through their paces on base by the Marine instructors.

“The best way to get ahead in the Navy, and the Seabees being part of the Navy, is taking challenges and finding ways to help your battalion and your unit,” he said.

DISCUSS: The training