I said, “No, I want to be a SEAL. That’s my one and only goal.”
So before I got to BUD/S, Ray—who went on to become a very successful orthopedic surgeon—called his friend at BUD/S in Coronado, a guy named Steve Simmit, to let him know that I was coming.
The first week of BUD/S I ran into Steve as we were assembling before our weekly four-mile timed run on the beach. Steve was another amazing physical specimen—a pentathlete with a body so fit that it looked like it had been turned inside out, leaving all of his muscles on the outside.
I said, “Instructor Simmit, a friend of mine says hello.”
“Who is your friend?”
“Ray Fritz.”
He grunted. “Drop down and give me fifty.”
No problem. It was a beautiful California summer day with a fresh breeze blowing in from the ocean. I enjoyed doing push-ups and I loved that I was finally at BUD/S.
As I was lifting myself up for the fiftieth time, he said, “Now get in the water and make a sugar cookie.” Sugar cookies meant getting wet and rolling in the sand.
So I’m in my shorts covered with sand when he barks, “All right, Mann, give me another fifty.”
“Yes, sir.” I did another set.
“Fifty more!”
The inside of my thighs were starting to bleed because of the chafing from the sand.
Then he beckoned me closer and said in confidence, “What you gotta do now is win the run. I know what you can do, and I expect you to win every time.”
My swim buddy Jeff Hobblit and I always ran at the front of the pack. Steve Simmit said, “Don, you gotta beat him today.”
“Yes, sir.”
I did, and I beat him the next time too.
Instructor Simmit started acting real friendly and I was honored. When somebody told me that the instructors were taking bets on whether Jeff or I was going to come in first, I understood why.
So a couple days later, I ran down the beach as hard as possible to catch up with Jeff. When I finally pulled alongside him, I said, “Jeff, instead of us killing each other each time we run, why don’t we tie?”
“Good idea.”
For the next four months we ran at 99 percent instead of 100 and crossed the finish line side by side. I’m sure it threw the oddsmakers for a loop.
Jeff was on my boat team too, along with four other trainees, during small-boat-tactics training. We were the power guys up front—I was on the port side, Jeff was starboard. We paddled every day, some days for as long as eight hours.
One night the IBS (inflatable boat, small) we were in was lurching all over the place and we were losing speed so that the team behind us was closing.
I yelled at Jeff, “Come on, Jeff. Paddle harder!”
He turned to me and shouted, “I am paddling hard. You paddle harder!”
I looked behind me and saw that the officer, the coxswain, who only had to steer the boat, had fallen asleep. No wonder we were zigzagging all over the place. It took all my self-control not to smack him with a paddle.
Training was always highly competitive, and often highly dangerous. Rock portage was hairy as hell. The goal was to get your IBS through the surf and onto a forty-foot-high rock formation near Coronado Cays. Guys broke arms and legs all the time. The less fortunate broke backs and cracked their skulls.
When the waves reached their violent peak, a BUD/S instructor standing on top of the jetty would signal with his flashlight. If the moon wasn’t out, you couldn’t see squat.
Most times you’d get smeared and flip over. Sometimes you’d end up sailing over the bow. The boat would go flying. You’re getting tossed around, flailing through huge waves, doing your very best not to drown or hit the rocks. Then you had to regain control of your boat, paddle out, and try again.
I never hit the rocks hard enough to get hurt. But I saw plenty of guys from previous classes walking around the BUD/S compound with broken arms or hobbling around with broken legs or ankles from rock portage.
Hydrographic surveys and drawing beach charts were a snap in comparison. The instructor would give you a lead line and a slate board, and drop you into the water. The idea was to measure depths and check for obstacles.
The part I was the least proficient at was swimming. The BUD/S instructors had a fast way of testing our fight-or-flight response. They’d tie our hands behind our backs, bind our feet, then toss us in the pool.
Some trainees quickly figured out that the only way to avoid drowning was to relax, sink to the bottom of the pool, kick off powerfully toward the surface, get your mug above the waterline, gasp for a bit of air, then drop to the bottom again.
Many panicked, swallowed water, then coughed, choked, and eventually passed out. Divers retrieved them from the bottom of the pool, and the unconscious trainees were rolled on their sides and revived. Then instructors screamed in their faces, “Are you gonna quit? Did you get uncomfortable? What are you wasting our time for, quitter? You want to quit now?”