Minnesota National Guard Soldiers of the Headquarters and Headquarters Battalion, 34th Infantry Division, competed in its Best Warrior Competition at the General John W. Vessey Readiness Center at the Arden Hills Army Training Site, March 7, 2026.<\/p>\n
The purpose of the preliminary event is to determine who will advance to represent the Battalion at the Minnesota National Guard\u2019s state Best Warrior Competition at Camp Ripley on April 15-19, 2026. Competitors participated in a variety of events that tested their skills and knowledge in basic Soldier tasks, including weapons training and proficiency, land navigation skills, first aid and casualty care, communications, physical fitness, ruck marching, and professional knowledge.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Best Warrior Competition is a significant event for the Soldiers and NCO\u2019s who compete, as well as for the Army as a whole,\u201d said Command Sgt. Maj. Megan Allen, the Battalion command sergeant major. \u201cIt is designed to test their physical and mental limits, demonstrate resilience, recognize excellence, and promote readiness. Competitors often have a higher promotion rate than their peers, and the competition provides a way for them to stand out and be recognized.\u201d<\/p>\n
The skills and knowledge gained during the competition are then brought back to the competitors\u2019 unit, furthering the development of other Soldiers and improving training quality and unit readiness, Allen said.
\n\u201cThese Soldiers and NCOs are able to raise the bar within their formations, so to speak,\u201d she said.
\nAllen\u2019s role is to coordinate and oversee the Battalion\u2019s BWC. Working closely with staff, the event was managed to ensure it was fair to all competitors and met Army doctrinal standards for executing Army warrior tasks.<\/p>\n
At the end of the day, one junior enlisted Soldier and one noncommissioned officer must take the lead to represent the Battalion as the top Soldier and NCO at the state competition, Allen said.<\/p>\n
This year, Spc. Ema Crone will champion the fight in the top Soldier category.<\/p>\n
A Human Resources Specialist with Battalions Alpha Company, Crone enlisted in 2023 during the summer before her senior year in high school. A Buffalo native, she currently lives in Maple Grove and is in her second year at Anoka Ramsey Community College, where she is completing an Associate of Business degree. She is a part of the Business Transfer Pathway program between her college and Mankato State University, which will lead her to complete a Bachelor of Science in marketing. A full-time student, she also works full-time at a printing shop in her hometown of Buffalo, where she supports the business\u2019s outsourcing efforts and works in the bindery department.<\/p>\n
Balancing her studies and work while preparing for the Battalion-level competition wasn\u2019t easy, Crone said. However, with the help of her boyfriend, who studied and even ruck marched alongside her, and the support she received from her parents and employer, it was made possible.<\/p>\n
Crone put a lot of effort into preparing for the competition, particularly the board, even creating a collection of study notes and tips that she plans to pass on to next year\u2019s competitors.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m hoping I can hand it off to someone else if they do this competition,\u201d she said. \u201cI bet they\u2019ll need it. It took me so long to create, and it\u2019s just worth giving it to someone else.\u201d<\/p>\n
The preparation is not complete, and Crone continues to strategically plan the use of her physical and mental strengths, assess her weaknesses, and carefully calculate what other contenders may bring to the table.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m feeling pretty good about the knowledge portion,\u201d she said. \u201cIn the competition, I think it is mostly guys, and some do have more upper body strength, and I know this competition requires a lot of upper body strength. But I have a lot of lower-body strength, and if I can incorporate that, I can do it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Looking forward to the state event, Crone is already displaying good sportsmanship in her attitude.
\n\u201cI think it will be really cool,\u201d she said. \u201cI mean, if I don\u2019t win, I\u2019m still there, and I still showed up.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sgt. Wyndsor Goodenough will drive forward to represent the NCO\u2019s of the Battalion.<\/p>\n
An infantryman assigned to Battalion\u2019s Headquarters Support Company, Goodenough enlisted in 2020 shortly after graduating high school. He earned a Bachelor of Science in Finance from the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire in 2024 and lives in West Salem, Wisconsin, where he works as an independent insurance agent.<\/p>\n
When he was asked if he would compete to represent the Battalion, Goodenough said that he, well, thought perhaps he wasn\u2019t \u201cgood enough\u201d to represent the Battalion.<\/p>\n
\u201cI said \u2018you know, I don\u2019t think it\u2019s something that I could particularly excel in compared to some of the other Soldiers here at the G3 (operations, planning, and training)\u2019,\u201d he said. \u201cThe next month, they said, \u2018No ifs, ands, or buts, you\u2019re the one, you\u2019re doing it.\u2019 To which I responded \u2018All right, you know what? I\u2019ll take the challenge. I\u2019ll do my best.\u201d<\/p>\n
Working full-time and planning a wedding in October did not keep Goodenough from putting in the time and effort to give it his all. Knowing that he can indeed represent the Battalion is a great and humbling feeling, he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a fantastic feeling,\u201d he said. \u201cI went in confident in my physical ability. The big thing was the studying habits and the mental game. I feel blessed to be able to represent our battalion as the NCO at the state level. I know that there were a couple of other solid NCO candidates that could have definitely taken the cake on that one, but I guess that day was my day.\u201d<\/p>\n
Witnessing the caliber of Soldiers and NCOs competing at the Battalion\u2019s competition makes her proud, Allen said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey stand out from their peers because they make a deliberate choice to step out of their comfort zone,\u201d she said. \u201cThey\u2019re tough, mentally and physically, and ultimately these are the Soldiers and NCOs I look to, to become the next generation of stand-out leaders within the Battalion.\u201d<\/p>\n
Up for the challenge, the Battalions’ best will go on to display their grit and compete against the cream of the crop from other Minnesota National Guard major commands during the state competition later this week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Minnesota National Guard Soldiers of the Headquarters and Headquarters Battalion, 34th Infantry Division, competed in its Best Warrior…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":584318,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-584317","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/584317","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=584317"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/584317\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/584318"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=584317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=584317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=584317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}