Pit Bull – Soldiers at the Limits of Performance

The objective of the selection training (also known as Pit Bull) is to find the future soldiers of
the Bercsényi unit among the applicants, who are really ready to go down the long road at the
end of which they will receive their deserved “prize", that is, the badge of the Special Forces
Battalion and the proud awareness of belonging to the unit. During the ten days of Pitbull, the
venturesome soldiers are being tested both physically and mentally, so “they are approaching
the limits of their performance and endurance", as their trainers say.

“The first day is about testing their physical condition, when their physical fitness and its
limits are measured", one of the trainers told us (we cannot reveal his personal identity
because he is an SF soldier). “We are examining the applicants’ mental, physical and personal
characteristics, and then, based on these, we are going to decide whether a given soldier is fit
to participate in the Special Forces Qualification Course, and to conduct special operations in
the designated area of operations after the successful completion of the course."

All the applicants serve with the units of the Hungarian Defence Forces as career and enlisted
soldiers. Although for many of them, physical load is part of everyday service, here the
required performance and the characteristics of the tasks pose a challenge even to the fittest
soldiers. It follows that only the truly determined ones can become SF troops, those who are
both physically and mentally prepared, since they would not often have another chance of
correction in the area of operations. For these reasons, the strict but just assessment is quite
understandable, thanks to which usually only 30 per cent of the applicants is able to finish the
selection training successfully.

The execution of the tasks assigned during the ten days of the selection is a honor to
the selected ones – this is just their first step on the way to become “SF" soldiers, as the
successful completion of the Pit Bull gives the applicants only an opportunity to participate in
the nearly year-long Special Forces Qualification Course.

Photos: Veronika Dévényi