Slammin’ Sam Smith, the co-host of CompetitionPlus.com’s Power Hour with the Monday Morning Racer for the past year, truly understands and appreciates Veterans Day, Nov. 11.

Smith served in the U.S. Army from 2009-20014. He went in with a Private E1 ranking and left with a Specialist E4 ranking

“For me, I have friends who still serve, and I have friends who gave the ultimate sacrifice of losing their lives,” said Smith, 30, who spent time serving in Iraq. “To me Veterans Day is to remember those who have served before and those who are serving now. A lot of people don’t understand the freedoms that we have and that those freedoms aren’t free. Someone paid the ultimate prize for that freedom.

“Looking at it as a kid, you got a day off school, and you didn’t realize (why). It’s knowing what people have gone through day in and day out, the sacrifices that have been made by many others to gives us this day.”

Growing up in San Diego, Smith was surrounded by military as his grandfather and father served in the Navy. Smith now lives in Minot, N.D.

“As a kid we played with G.I. Joe action figures and I like water being a kid from California, but I didn’t want to be on a boat all day,” Smith said. “I like to be on the ground and be able to move around and different things like that.

“I actually wasn’t going to join the military it was my secondary plan. My first plan was to play sports and I had a track scholarship, and my first objective was to continue my sports career and other things happened.”

After serving in the Army, Smith did have a simple take.

“It’s a cliché thing, you miss your sports team or your friends who you do stuff with day-in-day-out,” Smith said. 

“There are some things I saw most people will not see, but I miss the brother and sisterhood of it. You wake up every morning and put a uniform on just like the person next to you and you go to do a job. Somedays it feels like a job and somedays it feels like stress, but at the end you are doing what you need to do.”