By Alban Murtishi
MassLive.com
WORCESTER, Mass. — Imagine having to pull a 15,000-pound ambulance with just you and five other friends more than 100 feet.
Now imagine doing that after 30 minutes of continuous physical activity in humid heat.
That’s what a group of Worcester EMS workers were up against during a physical fitness rally on the WPI sports track Friday morning.
Over the past four years, Worcester EMS has challenged its employees to do weekly physical challenges over a 12-week period. Previously, all the challenges were individual, but for the first time this year, physical fitness teams were created.
By putting people into teams, a lot more of the challenges were completed.
“When it was individual, people were falling off quickly, but now you have a team you to get your steps and push-ups in every week,” Josh Bennet, a Worcester EMS paramedic, said.
Seven EMS teams have been challenged to log in thousands of steps, push-ups, sit-ups per week, with the number of repetitions being based on something EMS-related.
For example, one week teams were tasked with logging in 25,000 steps for the 25,000 calls made to Worcester EMS in 2015.
So far, four teams have competed in the relay race. The team with the fastest time will receive a trophy and $500.
Challenges in the relay race included a tire flip, half-mile run, and a sled push. The final event is the ambulance pull.
The Monday Night team clocked in the fastest time so far at 27 minutes.
By the time the racers got their hands around the rope, their faces looked weary and sweaty. The sun had just broken through the clouds and was beating down hard on the crowd.
But as soon as the team starting pulling, they seemed to easily glide on the pavement. In just about a minute, the ambulance had already reached its destination.
While they didn’t beat the Monday Night team, Bennet said that’s not what’s important.
“This is a way to tie in the fitness and teamwork to the work that we do every day,” Bennet said. “This is the biggest way to do that.”
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