Field Gun 1988

Ginge Fullen

I joined the Plymouth clearance diving team towards the end of 1987. It was a hard working team with a good bunch of lads. There were a number of ex-Devonport Field Gunners there, so the gym was kitted out with masses of weights. I now had loads of training partners and was soon over training more than ever. One of the older more experienced lads kept telling me I was over doing it and no one can keep at 100 % fitness all the time. I ignored him and carried on, after six or eight-week periods I would need one or two weeks off, I was so fatigued and drained.

There were some big guys there at the time and big characters in the diving branch, Dave Bateman and Nellie Nielson both ex-Field Gunners several times over, John Waller and psycho Lou Lewis not Field Gunners, but at well over six feet and just as big, they were well into their weights. I remember doing a back session with Dave, Nellie and John. They were all around 16 stone in weight and I was hoping to keep up with them. I knew I was going to hurt the next day, I was wrong, I hurt for the next week, not that I told any of them that.

I was aiming to try for Field Gun in 1989, leaving me all of 1988 to prepare for it, but Dave Bateman dragged me up for the pre 1988 training and aptitude. Dave's known as the '3rd trainer' down in Devonport. The years that he's not been running he's been down at the track helping out in any way. He's run more or less every time that he's been able to since 1980. Up until recently you were only allowed to run every third year, having run six times he's won a near record of five silver medals. The aptitude consisted of a strength, sprinting and weights session. The strength test was with a bar with 40kg on it. We had to do 10 millpress with it and then 10 clean and jerks. I passed the aptitude and put my name forward for the 1988 Field Gun season.

The diving team has a good relationship with the Field Gun and tries always to spare at least one person to run for them each year. I got on well with the Chief Diver Scouse Rowlands. He was as tough as they come and if you worked hard for him, he would be on your side. Since I joined the Plymouth team I had done the most diving on the team, so it was no trouble for him to let me go. CPO Scouse Rowlands is one of the original old school joining up near the very start of the Clearance Diving Branch back in 1966. Likeable, knowledgeable and as hard as they come. He's done it all, including several months behind bars for gun running in the Far East in his younger days. He joined up after he saw an RN Diver's Bomb Disposal team's Landrover go careering off the jetty in his home town of Liverpool. That was the kind of lifestyle he got. Of a branch of many characters and hard bastards, Scouse Rowlands would be mentioned in the first sentence.

The Field Gun is billed as the toughest and hardest team sport in the world by the Guinness Book of Records. I would say that it is one of the most all encompassing sports ever devised, combining strength, fitness and speed, with no little amount of danger. There is the fiercest competition between the different teams than anywhere on earth. It's the only sport where you regularly spill blood as well as sweat and tears. People have died, but more often fingers are lost, legs and arms are broken, and faces and hands are torn.

The crews go on the track at the beginning of May, when they actually begin training with the gun and putting runs together. The work begins long before that though, nearly as soon as the final competition at Earls Court is over, people are starting to think about the next season. The first trainer will have an idea of the ex-Field Gunners that are available to run and letters will be sent off to ask for them to be spared. The first and second trainers and the PTI will also go around to all of the fleet at home and abroad running aptitude sessions and scouting for new lads to run.

Back at each crew's home base circuit training begins in October for two sessions a week. The aim being to get the crew to a good standard of fitness before they step onto the track in May. With the track season being only ten weeks long before going to Earls Court for the competition, all the time is needed to learn your new job and achieve the best timings. Years ago the track season was much longer, but in today's leaner Navy crews are on a very short and strict timetable. When training begins on the track the only day off is Sunday.

The crews start assembling as early as January, getting ready for May and training two or three times a day. For lads new to the Field Gun it is better to get to extra training as soon as possible and get their faces known to the trainers. I joined the crew at the end of March and from then on I lived and breathed Field Gun. It was a way of life for the next few months, from when I woke to when I went to bed. We had our own PTI and the best of food, as much as we could eat. Generally the sessions were strength exercises. Heavy sessions started at 20kg either side of the bar for 10 repetitions going up to 35kg either side for 3 repetitions for the stronger lads. Other sessions were sprint work and running around the hills of Plymouth. Anyone who knows that area will know how hilly it is, one circuit was the seven sisters. These are seven hills, all very steep, all done at once, a particularly 'killer' session. Friday sessions involved all of us being driven out of Plymouth for 12 miles and having to run back.

On some of the earlier circuits everybody was completely physically tired out, but after six weeks of pre-track training, the circuits, although just as hard, seem to get a lot easier. We got to a stage where nothing the PTI could do to us bothered us. We just said, 'come on make the weights heavier, let's do one more circuit', we got so fit and hyped up.

At the Devonport gym we had a bar with big welded weights on either side, it weighed over 200lbs. At the beginning of the season only two or three of the bigger, stronger guys could lift it over their heads. Although I was one of the smallest and lightest, at the end of the season, even though I'd lost weight, I could get myself so aggressive and hyped up I could easily lift the bar over my head.

The Field Gun is moving with the times as regard to training, from 'beasting' men until they drop to the more scientific approach. Gone are the days where the warm up before a session was ' pick up the fucking weights', in are the stretching exercises, cooling down periods, and dieticians, physiotherapists and specialist trainers. Gone are the long runs. Power and sprinting is the way ahead. Alan Wells and his wife have been involved with training methods for Devonport for a number of years. Don't get me wrong, there are still some monumental 'beasting' sessions, they are just more scientific about it.

As May approaches there will be around 50 to 80 lads vying for a place on the crews. The 'exs' walk straight into the A crew, as their experience saves time in training. With only 36 places available on both crews and around 10 men kept as spare numbers, the competition is fierce. The jobs on the crew do vary considerably with the gun numbers needing to be extra strong, the swing numbers extra fast and some numbers extra tall. Already at this stage the trainers are placing men in the jobs for which they are most suitable.

The week before going on the track the men are told of their job in either A or B crew. B crew are mostly all new lads, so the pace is obviously slower. It's vital to have a B crew, as should anyone get injured in the A crew their opposite number will step in. The one and only goal is to keep the A crew running and to bring the timings down.

I got a place in the B crew as a gun number. My number was axle number, a job that meant staying with the gun all the time. When track day arrives the work begins in earnest. First are the bit part runs, each person having to learn where to be, where to put his hands and where not to put his hands. Get this wrong and he may lose a hand or at least a finger or two.

There's a lot to do as all 18 men have to learn different jobs. The gun numbers include two heavy ends, two axle numbers and two trail numbers, plus another number when it comes to lifting it over the wall. On the first day we were learning how to get the gun over the wall. The axle numbers' jobs are to pull the pin out that holds the wheel on, squeeze between the carriage and the wheel and bang the wheel off with his shoulder. Then all the gun numbers lift together and slide and push the gun over the wall. On the second time of doing this the trail number didn't go in hard enough and hold the trail on the wall, both wheels had been knocked off and the gun slid down on top of him and me. The full weight of the barrel and carriage, 1250lbs, went on top of him, luckily stopped by the trestle that holds the wall up, so just pinning him there and not crushing him. Meanwhile, as I had had my arms under the axle to lift it, the carriage had come down and pinned me to the ground. Luckily the tan (the gravel the track is made up of) was soft as it was the beginning of the season, and my forearm sank into it under the weight. We all got a scare, the trail number more so, as he got a big bollocking from the second trainer for messing up. Metal normally wins against flesh and bone, we knew we were lucky to get away with no injuries.

After the first day we were all battered and bruised and would know for the next day where to wear pads. Depending on which job we had depended on how much and where we had padding and tape. The numbers that carry the 120lb wheel will have their shoulders padded. The axle numbers who probably take the most battering have padding on each arm and elbow for when they bang the wheel off. One of the axle numbers has to scratch the shells out of the breach after each firing. Mistiming or a mistake by the other axle number who slams the breach shut can mean sore fingers or no fingers, either way it's pretty painful. So almost all the axle numbers' hands are taped up with surgical tape. I was that lucky person who scratches the shells out.

At the beginning of the season I had shin pads covering my upper arm, padding on my elbows and forearm, knee pads and tape all over my hands. As we went through the season we got used to the knocks and took some of the padding off, although my hands were always cut and bleeding throughout the season. I did manage to keep all of my fingers, though the same cannot be said for one of our heavy ends. When we were putting a gun over he left his hand on the wall too long and the barrel came down and crushed his finger taking the end off it and smearing it on the wall. We finished the run then all went looking for it.

As the weeks went on we gradually started putting runs together. Finishing in under three minutes for the first time is a big goal. Through repetition and slight adjustments here and there seconds are knocked off and then tenths of seconds. A crew needs to be running consistently in under two minutes fifty seconds before they get to Earls Court, for them to stand a chance of winning. A good time for a B crew is to break three minutes.

Once the crews are doing full runs they'll do 5 or 6 runs a day, 2 or 3 on Saturday and have Sunday off. That leaves only Saturday night to go out. The year I ran we didn't have many big injuries just one lad who fell and the gun ran over his leg finishing his Field Gun season for that year. The crew's doctor was still kept busy with sprains and pulled muscles and having to give over 200 stitches in the season.

Going over the chasm is where a lot of injuries occur. The traveller weighs 70lbs itself and with lots of sharp edges you don't want your head in its way. The carriage ride across can also be dangerous, with 350lbs worth of angles to contend with you've got to get everything right. With 18 people and 18 different jobs a thousand things can go wrong, there's only one right way, get it wrong and not only yourself could get hurt but you could wipe out 4 or 5 people.

Going out I steered the carriage across with 3 other people on, 4 people making it evenly balanced. During one crossing one lad on the back did not get on, this sent the carriage on a seesawing spin across the chasm. One other lad got flung off making the situation even worse. The second trainer shouted to the swing numbers, who were heaving us, to stop but they didn't hear him. I stayed on the carriage to try and steer it across and step off on the ramp as normal on the other side. It didn't work. The carriage came in sideways and as I jumped off my left leg was left trailing and got caught between the 10 foot and the carriage as it slammed into the 10 foot. I collapsed in a heap on the far ramp thinking I'd smashed my leg up as it was completely numb. The doctor came and had a look and although it was not broken it was badly bruised. From then on I joined most of the crew on painkillers to keep on running. I understand now why the ride on the carriage is sometimes called the coffin ride or the suicide carriage.

The only other major incident I had was when we were doing a run back. The gun numbers have a straight run at the wall, the trail numbers are supposed to lift the trail end up on the wall so the axle numbers can knock the wheels off and we all carry on with the lift. On this particular run the trail wasn't lifted high enough and the whole gun slammed into the wall. The axle numbers are fully committed a split second earlier and get down to knock the wheels off and begin the lift. As I was going in the whole gun bounced back and the axle hub hit me in the ribs, fracturing a rib or two and knocking the wind out of me. I fell to the ground as if I'd been shot. It was another place to put padding and more painkillers followed.

As the time comes to go to Earls Court there's a series of public runs done for all the many supporters of the Field Gun. This is a good time to beat the records and reduce the timings. After months of living and training together there is a great feeling of teamwork. The A crew got their time down to two minutes forty seven seconds and we at B crew just managed to break three minutes.

At Earls Court for the Royal Tournament is where the crews get down to business. This gives them the first sight of the other two crews. The first week is spent settling in and getting everything ready. There's more practise runs for the A crew and the B crew have their competition for the fastest B crew for the Copenhagen Cup. We had a good B crew for 1988 and easily won the competition. The first run for the A crews was due on Saturday afternoon, during the morning practise session one of our A crew left his hand loafing for a second too long and had the full weight of a wheel land on it. It was squashed like a tomato and needed 20 stitches. This is one of the first trainer's worst nightmares. His well honed team of 18 is now disrupted but that's what the B crew is for, although it is not an easy job for them to step in and run up to 15 seconds quicker. Luckily for me it was my opposite number that had been injured. I'd got my chance to run at Earls Court after all, every Field Gunners dream.

After just one practise run with A crew I'd have to step out to a packed Earls Court audience and try not to mess it up. To say I wasn't nervous would be wrong. At 20 years old I was the youngest crew member for that year, but I had plenty of support from A crew and the other 'exs' who were there watching. The second trainer seemed more nervous than me though, this is what he had trained me for, to step in and replace my opposite number, although maybe not so late in the day.

Stepping out to do battle with the other crews is as near as you come to going to war without killing anyone, such is the passion and history behind the Field Gun. We stepped out into the arena to the music of Hearts of Oak feeling ten feet tall. This was what we'd spent the last four months training for, and even longer thinking about.

The pace for me was incredibly fast and I just managed to keep my footing in places. We lost the run but came home in a fast time of two minutes fifty seconds and that's with rolling the gun over on the run back and so losing several seconds. The A crew went on to win two of the four cups, but not the silver medal for the best aggregate time for which every Field Gunner looks for.

For me it's still the hardest sport in the world and remains one of the best and most difficult sports that I've ever done. Sadly due to manpower cuts Field Gun may cease to exist within the next few years.