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Two big Hollywood stars dared each other -- and their fans -- to take The Murph Challenge for a good cause on Memorial Day.
Chris Pratt challenged John Krasinski -- who challenged Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson -- to the yearly Memorial Day tradition honoring a fallen warrior. “It is a tradition that helps push us, humble us, and allows us the opportunity to dedicate a bit of pain and sweat to honor, LT. Michael P. Murphy, a man who sacrificed everything he had for our freedom,” the Instagram caption read.
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The Murph Challenge is a CrossFit workout consisting of a mile-long run, 100 pull-ups, 200 push-ups, 300 air squats and a final mile run — all while wearing a 20-pound vest or body armor.
The challenge’s namesake is Lt. Michael Murphy. He was a native of Patchogue, N.Y., and a dedicated New York Rangers fan. He also was an athlete and star student from Penn State who turned down offers to attend law school to join the Navy SEALs instead, as Fox News previously reported.
He died in a 2005 firefight in Afghanistan that left three SEALs dead in all. He posthumously received the Medal of Honor — “for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life,” as the official citation read — and was spotlighted in the 2013 movie, “Lone Survivor.” He also was the first SEAL to have a ship named after him — the guided-missile destroyer Michael P Murphy was commissioned in summer 2011.
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His father, attorney Daniel Murphy, told Fox News: “Michael did this CrossFit regimen, which he called Body Armor during his five years as a Navy SEAL as a training program, and he would do it with a 20-pound armor vest. His normal time would run about 32 to 33 minutes, but his best overall time was 28 minutes and change.”
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Murphy told Fox News that the regimen was renamed by the CrossFit community in 2007, as a workout challenge by Dr. Josh Appel, an emergency room physician in Tucson and para-rescue soldier who recovered Murphy’s body in Afghanistan.
Appel told Fox News, “‘Murph’... is a workout performed on Memorial Day to remember all who have given the ultimate sacrifice in service to our country. It’s a way of honoring lives lost with effort, sweat and pain. If it makes you feel miserable and exhausted — you’re doing it right.”