My Mizzou Story
Ken Segelhorst
As captain of the MU Ranger Challenge Team, Cadet Ken Segelhorst leads his nine fellow cadets in competitions against battalions across the Midwest.
The teams engage in grueling tests of physical ability and military skills — weapons and grenade assaults, land navigation, crossing streams with rope bridges, and 10-kilometer road marches in full gear.
Segelhorst rises before dawn to prepare his team for the 24-hour nonstop competition. Each morning, he directs them through two hours of physical training that includes push-ups, sit-ups, pull-ups, chin-ups and running with rucksacks. Then they practice again in the evenings.
A senior majoring in history with minors in military science and sociology, Segelhorst also scores well in academic challenges. He's ranked in the top one percent of all ROTC cadets nationwide, and he's the winner of the 2003 Ridgway Military History Research Fellowship, making him the nation's top cadet majoring in history.
The fellowship supported Segelhorst's summer research at the U.S. Military History Institute in Carlisle Barracks, Pa., where he compared the results of mechanized and infantry operations in the Vietnam conflict.
In his crisp dress uniform, this young man from St. Peters, Mo., looks every bit the military scholar. Outside of class, he devotes 20 hours a week to planning and conducting training for MU's Tiger Battalion.
As operations officer, Segelhorst leads the cadets in soldiering skills: moving under fire, weapons care and marksmanship, marching drills, and field conduct. Such leadership earned him the Curators Award for Excellence in Military Science and the Department of Army Superior Cadet Award.
"Ken is an outstanding cadet, student and individual," says Lt. Col. Mark Ayers, director of the Military Science Program. "He is the epitome of the whole-person concept and possesses the attributes we look for in future Army officers as a scholar, athlete and leader."
Beyond the laurels, Segelhorst may be most proud of a set of wings he earned after finishing airborne school and mastering the art of jumping out of airplanes. After graduation, he'll take officers' training in tanks and operations before receiving his first assignment. Eventually, he wants to command an armored battalion.
"I really like the military," Segelhorst says. "I know I'm not going through life on easy street. I like having it harder than others. It's the challenge."