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Police go for gold
Officers from around Florida will converge on Tampa to test themselves against one another in competition beginning Saturday.
By MICHAEL CANNING
© St. Petersburg Times,
published June 14, 2001
Most of us don't get to see police leap into action like they do in the movies. But if you take in one of the many events of the Florida Law Enforcement Games, running Saturday through June 24 throughout the bay area, you'll have your fill.
It won't exactly be like movie action. More like track and field, basketball, soccer, golf, tennis, swimming and 33 other events that nonetheless will make our local officers do more spectator-worthy things than directing traffic, pointing radar guns or writing tickets.
Patterned after the Olympics, these games will officially start with an opening ceremony at 6 p.m. Monday at the Marriott Westshore, 1001 N West Shore Blvd. As at the real Olympics, events will precede the opening ceremony. They are the bass tournament on Saturday and Sunday, and the tug-of-war on Sunday.
But unlike that at the Olympics, the opening ceremony "is not real high on pageantry," said organizer Norm DeMers by phone from the games' Jacksonville office. Local political and law enforcement dignitaries will give speeches, and trophies will retroactively be awarded to the departments whose athletes won the most points in competition the previous year (only this time 1999's Florida Law Enforcement trophies will be awarded since the 2000 Florida Law Enforcement Games coincided with the International Law Enforcement Games).
Gold, silver and bronze medals are awarded to athletes after individual competitions.
More than 5,000 competitors from 130 law enforcement agencies from around the state are expected to participate. Every event is free to spectators.
A recent rash of reminders about the health risks that face police give this year's games, and the fitness culture it tries to foster, a sobering subtext. At least 13 Tampa police officers have suffered heart attacks in the past two years, five of them in the past four months.
The Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office has recorded one known heart attack in its ranks in the past year.
In the past 11 years, the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office, where DeMers worked before retiring, lost four of nine officers who died in the line of duty to heart attacks.
A 1998 published study conducted at the State University of New York at Buffalo School of Medicine found that Buffalo Police Department officers face a 20 percent higher risk arteriosclerotic heart disease than the general population. The study also indicated that officers faced increased rates of kidney, colon, liver and esophagus cancer, cirrhosis of the liver and suicide.
The Tampa Police Department and Hillsborough Sheriff's Office are considering the services of private health companies that would offer health screenings. Among the companies considered is Life Scan in Tampa, whose services have already been retained by the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office. Tampa Deputy Police Chief John Bushell said his department hopes to have some program implemented by September. The Jacksonville Sheriff's Office will have its program operating by the end of July. "We're going to go up and view it then," Bushell said. "Obviously we need to look at something, because of the number of heart attacks. I'm sure that's going to be the way of the future."
Bushell is a medal-winning veteran of these games -- he won eight medals with the mounted patrol team in 1998 -- and among those who believe they can instill healthier lifestyles. "Obviously I do, because those that compete in the health games are usually your more healthy officers that take a lot of pride in their physical fitness."
"Most of the guys that compete are pretty physically fit," said DeMers. "When we started this thing many years ago, the police officers came for a good time. But as the years have progressed, they take it more seriously, and they train a lot more. "
Tampa police Officer David Duncan, who is entered in singles and doubles tennis, believes in the games' benefits. "It shows good camaraderie and competitiveness," Duncan said. "But of course, there's also the health benefits when you play sports. Especially if you play not just once a year in tournaments like this, but if you play every day or once a week, it definitely helps out in the long run."
Though Duncan, 23, says he's always led a healthy lifestyle, he feels it's harder for most officers to do the same. Good diets are constantly threatened by the temptation of fast food. "The temptation is very great, definitely," Duncan said. "Get a quick meal in between calls, between writing reports. Of course, we're in our car a great number of hours during the shift. We don't get a lot of chances to walk. A lot of times our job's fast paced, so whenever we do find time to eat, we try to go in somewhere really quick."
Moreover, the 12-hour shifts prevalent among officers make it harder to maintain personal fitness routines. "We generally lose time that we would normally have to do things that would keep us up on our physical well being," Duncan said. "I definitely would like to stay in shape over my career, but I can't say that I'm going to."
"Just wearing a gun belt is a disadvantage," said Rick Cervis, 47, a school resource deputy at Walker Middle School. "There's not a lot of physical activity in the day. Eating habits are thrown off because you don't always have the time or the ability to eat as well you might want to. Fast food is truly all you have time for."
To say that Cervis is a booster of these games would be an understatement. He's competed in them since 1978, is undefeated in the triathlon and holds more than 400 medals. He feels that his agency, the Hillsborough Sheriff's Office, doesn't do enough to encourage its employees to participate in the games. "You'd think somebody in this profession would want to be in shape just for their own safety. In this kind of job, you might not ever need it," said Cervis. "But, heaven forbid, the one time you have to have it, you don't have the air to hang in there."
Cervis was once a fitness instructor for the Sheriff's Office, and he says if the office signs on with health evaluators, "They're going to find out how out of shape the average deputy is. Since I started, the physical requirements to get this job have fluctuated. Years ago, you had to be able to run a mile and a half in a certain time, do a maximum amount in a bench press and a leg press, so many sit-ups in a minute; they'd do your body fat and a flexibility test. Well, that's all gone. And now we have an obstacle course. You can walk and finish it, which means pretty much anyone can do it."
Though Cervis says he tends to medal in every event he enters, he still appreciates these games for the atmosphere they create. In a small way, they enable some to feel like they're at real Olympics. "It gives you that sense," said Cervis. "You leave after a week, and it's a high. You get all pumped up thinking how great it is. It's just a great time."
Michael Canning can be reached at (813) 226-3408.
2001 Florida Law Enforcement Games
Thirty-eight events will be held at venues throughout the bay area. Call 1-800-354-3536, or log on to www.lawgames.org for locations and times.
The events include arm wrestling, basketball, three-point shot contest, bass tournament, bench press, billiards, bowling, bulls-eye and combat pistol, chess, darts, track and field, flag football, golf, golf scramble, half marathon, horseshoes, kata and karate, mounted police, mountain bike, police motorcycle, power lifting, practical shooting, racquetball, shotgun, skeet and trap, soccer, softball, sporting clays, swimming, table tennis, 10K road race, tennis, Toughest Cop Alive, triathlon, tug-of-war, volleyball and wrestling.
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