Veterans honored at JetBlue Park

FORT MYERS, Fla. – A group of local Southwest Florida veterans were honored at JetBlue Park before the Red Sox v. Pirates game Saturday.

The veterans were honored for their hard work participating in the Southwest Florida Warrior Heath and Fitness Challenge, which was offered by the Red Sox Foundation and Massachusetts General Hospital Home Base Program. The program helps post-9/11 veterans and their families get fit and manage post-traumatic stress disorder. It provides supervised exercise, nutrition counseling, stress management and various other health-related services.

“What we’ve realized in the last couple of years, a lot of veterans are coming home and getting sedentary. What we’ve done with the Warrior Health and Fitness program is really focus on getting veterans back into living a healthier lifestyle, and we started that right here in SWFL with our first pilot program, ” said Roger Knight, the senior director of the program.

U.S. Army Four-Star General (Ret.) Fredrick M. Franks helped setup the program.

“This post 911 generation. To see them enter into our H&F program, to see them progress, to see what it’s done for them. That they’ve earned that for their courageous service to us all,” General Franks said.

The program is a collaboration of FGCU, Naples Vet Center, Fort Myers Vet Center, the Red Sox Foundation and The Massachusetts General Hospital Home Base Program. Participants are from all over Southwest Florida.

For more information on the Home Base Program, click here.