Former Lourdes resident wins firefighter challenge in Las Vegas LOURDES FRANK GALE The Western Star

Dwayne Drover, who grew up in Lourdes, is the individual category world champion of the Scott Firefighter Combat Challenge held in Las Vegas last week. — Photo courtesy of the Waterloo Region Record

Dwayne Drover, a former resident of Lourdes, became a world champion at the Scott Firefighter Combat Challenge held in Las Vegas last week.

Tagged as the “Toughest Two Minutes in Sports” Drover, 34, finished the grueling course with a time of 1:26:52 in his final competition Nov. 19.

To make sure he had a spot in the final, the firefighter from Waterloo Fire Rescue in Ontario raced every qualifier that week on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, and he won them all.

“While some thought I shouldn’t do all the races, this gave me more familiarity with the course, and I just love running and pushing myself,” he said.

In Canada the event is known as Scott Firefit Challenge. Drover said there is a little bit of a difference in the course here and the one in the United States in that the Canadian one is all speed and the American one is more like a strongman course.

In Canada, the forcible entry machine is hydraulic, while the American one is a solid steel beam that you have to continually keep hitting hard with your large rubber mallet and it doesn’t move as easily.

This is Drover’s fifth year competing in the challenge and he feels he’s just tapping into his strength now. He hired a personal trainer last year and was completely dedicated to the challenge, putting in 30 hours of training each week at it.

In gaining his world championship title he was just five seconds off the world record, and set a new goal set beating that record next year.

“Getting there is hard enough, but staying there is even harder,” he said.

His success in Las Vegas wasn’t limited to the individual competition as he did the tandem relay with his buddy from Oakville, Shawn Henderson, winning that competition with a time of 1:14.70 — just a second and a half short of the world record.

Drover has competed in Firefit competitions in Stephenville on several occasions and Henderson competed in Stephenville several years ago.

Previous victories
In addition to the world title, Drover won the U.S. Nationals Firefighter Combat Challenge held at Arlington, Texas on Halloween.

“It was awesome,” he said. “All the Canadians who were there were just screaming and cheering. They broke down the barrier and came running,” he said.

“They guy I raced (Brandon Cunningham from Fort Gordon, a military army installation near Augusta, Georgia) was world champ for the past three years. He had one mispull on the donut pull and I didn’t have any, which made the difference,” he said.

While he grew up in Lourdes, he left after graduating from high school in 1994 and first went into landscaping in Ontario, then to Alberta working on oil rigs, and later as a welder for three years. While working fulltime, he went to firefighting school, set his goal and found his niche with Waterloo Fire Rescue.

His 15-year-old son Kaden Drake lives in Lourdes with his grandparents Monte and Mavis Drake. He is married for four years to Mireille Drover, formerly Martin, of Montreal and they have a daughter, Demi, who is three years of age.