The Falcon baseball team began its annual five-week “Iron Falcon Challenge” as part of the pre-season conditioning schedule. 

Five years ago, Head Coach Matt Ittner implemented this “challenge” as a way to get the players ready for the competitive baseball season.

In order to compete, four teams are drafted and led by senior players Michael Irby, Joe Munitz, Aidan Ensogna, and Tyler Frostad. Over the course of five weeks, each team of players compete in various activities such as individual, team, school engagement, and academic challenges to rack up points.  

At the end of the challenge, the team with the most points is the winner and is rewarded with a champion’s dinner provided by Coach Ittner.

In each of the team challenges, first place gets 25 points, second place gets ten points, and third place gets five points. In the individual challenges, first place is rewarded with 15 points, second with ten, and third with five. In the academic challenge portion, the coaches look at each team’s average GPA to determine points first place gets 25 points, second gets ten, and third gets five.

“The Iron Falcon Challenge is a great way to spark competitiveness before the season and to instill trust in our teammates,” junior pitcher Jake Colucci said.

This year Ittner implemented a new aspect to the challenge. If one of the four teams goes to a Falcon sporting event together and snaps a picture with everyone included and tweets the picture to the Falcon baseball account, ten points will be awarded to that team. But, teams are only able to include this one time each week. 

“My favorite part of the “Iron Falcon Challenge” is the environment it creates every Friday where anybody and everybody will do whatever it takes to win,” senior infielder Joe Munitz said.