Michael Roberts
For Time: Finished in 14:20
20 Shoulder-to-Overhead (185/135 lb from the ground)
40 Burpees
This was the perfect workout for me to work on my split jerks. I started with 135# but after 6 I stripped some weight and did the rest at 125#. They just weren't feeling strong and I didn't like my form. Even my first ones at 125# weren't great. My last 5 were definitely my best. I was just happy to be working them though!
Grateful to honor this hero...
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This Firefighter Hero WOD is dedicated to Michael Roberts, FDNY, Ladder 35, who was killed on September 11, 2001.
Every year as the calendar heads toward Sept. 11 is the same, Paulette Roberts said. As the day approaches, she lives through it again, asking the same questions, wondering if anything could have saved her son, FDNY Firefighter Mike Roberts. And then it passes after Sept. 11 passes. "Each year is very difficult," she said. "That really doesn't change. But I can't believe it's been 10 years."
Mike Roberts was 31, a three-year veteran of the FDNY when he died. He loved being a firefighter, she said, following in the footsteps of his father, Thomas, a member of the FDNY for 30 years.
Her husband feels the loss perhaps even more than she and Mike's younger siblings, Lisa and Kenny, do, she said. Father and son had formed a tight bond as Mike Roberts entered the fire department in 1998. Paulette Roberts said she has gotten to know the woman who would have been her daughter-in-law by now, Teresa Ivey, even better since Mike's death.
Ivey got engaged earlier this year, an event that made the Roberts family happy, Paulette Roberts said. She and her husband will go down to Mike's firehouse in mid-town Manhattan, Engine 40/Ladder 35, like they did for the first several anniversaries. Then they'll go on to Ground Zero. The last three years they have stayed near home on Sept. 11, taking part in memorials in Rockland County.
"What's changed is that we've learned to move forward in our lives without him," she said. "But that doesn't mean we don't miss him every single day."
