Nissan – Titan’s Expedition Heroes Once Again Features The FEW and our Exceptional Warriors
The project between Wakeboarding Magazine, Nissan Titan, the Foundation for Exceptional Warriors, and Mastercraft, shot in Lake Powell near Page, Arizona.
What’s better than a week spent wakeboarding in a spectacular location? A week spent wakeboarding in a spectacular location with veterans who have served their country and deserve to enjoy the trip of a lifetime. To give back to these brave young people, we at Bonnier and Nissan Trucks are providing them with fantasy trips. Our sister magazines have taken vets hunting, fishing and motorcycling all over the globe. Along with pros, Steel Lafferty and Josh Palma, and our own Ben Greenwood, Wakeboarding took veterans wakeboarding on the waters of Lake Powell, Utah.
“I have trouble being around kids, even my own nieces and nephews,” stated 23-year-old Watanabe, trying not to choke up — and doing a better job at it than I did — while relating his experiences to us over a post- session steak dinner. “In–country (in the war zone), little kids are slapping IEDs on vehicles.”
As newshounds know, IED stands for “ improvised explosive device,” and they bring death and injury to many U.S. service members.
Watanabe spent 270 days “outside the wire” in Afghanistan, meaning beyond the perimeter of a base camp. A combat medic, he had many young people die in his arms, and he placed even more in body bags. His knees suffered injury when he shouldered a downed soldier, and when a firefight broke out; he fell to his already- injured knees several times. He also suffers from post- traumatic stress disorder and tinnitus. Still, he was stoked about the experience at Lake Powell.
“Who gets to do this?” he asked, beaming with a smile brighter than the desert sun as he slid past the photo boat at the beginning of a run behind the MasterCraft X-Star.
Watanabe is a surfer and skater from SoCal, and now an entrepreneur whose company, One Actual, sells battle belts and holsters. He also works with the charity Labs for Liberty. At the lake, he was psyched and focused on one thing: learning a tantrum.
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