Superbowl XLIX
A week of warrior wishes coming true at Superbowl XLIX in Phoenix Arizona
Honoring multiple warrior including Army Ranger Cory Remsburg at the big game!
In week 1 of the 2014 NFL season we had the pleasure of meeting & hosting Army Ranger Cory Remsburg to the Cardinals game. We were so inspired by Cory that we invited him to be our guest at Superbowl XLIX!
Cory Remsburg joined the Army at the young age of 18 years old. He went through the rigorous, specialized training to become an elite Army Ranger, deploying to Iraq and Afghanistan a total of 10 times! Cory spent a total of 39 months in combat, and was eventually made leader of his company’s heavy weapons squad.
In June 2009, he participated in ceremony for the 65th anniversary of D-Day, parachuting in on the shores of Omaha Beach in Normandy, France, as part of a ceremony President Obama attended. Afterward, the two met briefly.
What Remsburg didn’t know then was that he would meet the President again just a year later, under very different circumstances.
On October 1, 2009, Remsburg and his platoon hit a roadside bomb in Kandahar, Afghanistan, and the immediate explosion nearly killed him. He was found face down in a pool of water, shrapnel lodged in his brain. Remsburg was in a coma for more than three months. He’s undergone dozens of surgeries, is still blind in his right eye and is partially paralyzed on his left side.
Remsburg met President Obama for the second time in 2010, shortly after coming out of his coma. The President happened to be visiting Walter Reed Medical Center outside Washington, and realized he knew the young man once he saw the photo of their first meeting hanging on the wall near his bed.
Remsburg is the only known wounded veteran to have met the President both before and after his injury.
President Obama met Cory a third time when he made a stop in Phoenix and requested to see how Remsburg was doing. When Obama arrived, Remsburg did something that shocked everyone.
“Cory got up, saluted him, then got up with a walker and walked across the floor,” said his father. For Cory, the gesture was to prove a point: “To show the President that this is what happens when you don’t quit.”
President Obama was so inspired by Cory’s determination that he shared Cory’s story during the State of the Union Address in January 2014.
“Cory Remsburg never gives up, and he does not quit,” President Barack Obama declared to the nation during his speech.
Cory received a standing ovation and inspired the nation after the president shared his story. The recognition turned Remsburg one if the most recognizable veterans in the country, a position he’s not entirely comfortable with. But he says he’s okay with the attention as long as it brings attention to all wounded veterans.
Cory lives by the motto “FIGHT LIKE HELL.” Cory Said “There are other people who would have quit a long time ago and would have been happy in their wheelchair. Me? Oh, no.”
After years of rehabilitation centers and hospitals, Remsburg now lives at home (built by Chicago Bears DE Jared Allen’s foundation) with a full-time caregiver in Phoenix, Arizona.
Cory says his heroes are his Army Ranger buddies who gave their lives serving their country. He wears a bracelet engraved with their names as a reminder of their ultimate sacrifice.
His long-term goals are to go to college, get married and have children, to live a full life, just like anyone else.
We truly are thankful for Cory’s service & “Fight Like Hell” determination. Cory Remsburg is in fact someone who never gives up. He is an inspiration to everyone & we were honored to have him & his father as our guests to Superbowl XLIX!
