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Alex Findura cuts an imposing figure. He has the stature of a man who uses his body for work. His 250-some pounds are suspended from his 6-foot-5 frame in the type of inverted triangle that makes strangers wonder exactly what it is he does for a living.He used to love that question.Findura spent a little more than a year playing on the defensive line under Bill Curry at Georgia State before enlisting in the Marines in 2012. During boot camp, he was selected to be a part of the Body Bearers -- an elite unit responsible for carrying caskets to graves in Arlington National Cemetery.For the last four years his days had started at 4 a.m. on the bottom floor of a parking garage at the corner of Eighth and I streets in Washington D.C. Thats where he and a dozen other bulked-up Marines trained to carry coffins that typically weighed between 700 and 1,500 pounds. The branchs tradition is to carry the fallen at shoulder height, above the heart, as a sign of respect. The men selected for this honor are screened for upper body strength and a stoic temperament.Findura estimates he put more than 200 active-duty Marines in the ground over the course of four years in the service, almost one a week. He buried a four-star general, a Medal of Honor recipient, bronze star recipients and the young daughter of his sergeant major. Had a U.S. president died during Finduras time in the Marines, his hand would have been on the casket.Leaving was not easy. In August, Findura walked the halls of his Marine barracks not entirely certain where he would go from here. He had decided not to renew his contract and was in the midst of a three-day course provided by the Marines to help prepare their departing members for a transition back to civilian life.He bumped into his old platoon commander who asked if Findura had considered returning to school to play football again. He shook his head. That didnt go so well the last time. When he joined the Marines to extricate himself from the usual demons of a young athlete set loose on his own for the first time -- poor grades, parties, chasing girls -- he made peace with the idea that he was closing that chapter of his life for good.Well, the commander said. If you change your mind, I know some guys in Boston who might be able to help.Alex Stone knows that uncertainty well. He set adrift from the Marines amid a recession in 2008, and the first job he could find was hawking wheelchairs and walkers for a hospital supply company. He spent long hours crisscrossing New England in a Nissan Pathfinder and wondering what had happened to the high school hockey star who left for boot camp the week after graduation, just the way he had always planned.The solitude was eating me alive, Stone says. Thats when it really hit home. Man, this is everything I didnt want to be. It was only six months to a year after separating, but I lost that feeling. I used to be proud to tell people what I did.Many of the approximately quarter of a million men and women who separate from the U.S. military each year have felt that rough patch. The Department of Veterans Affairs says 60 percent of them will try to go back to school via the GI Bill, but only half of those who enroll will finish their degree. The highest concentration of that group is between the ages of 25 and 30, and many of them will have to battle to figure out whats next.Findura was looking into careers in law enforcement. His wife was on him to get a degree, and he thought maybe he would try a night class or two while he worked. He took a temporary job as a security guard for large events at D.C.s Verizon Center. It was fine, he convinced himself -- decent money, a free pass to a fancy gym and the occasional opportunity to brush shoulders with NBA players or famous musicians.A week later Findura and his wife went to dinner with a couple of her friends. The man across the table asked him what he was doing for work. The response to that question used to come so easily: Im a Marine. That night he stared down at the beer in his glass for a moment before explaining his new security gig.The look he gave me, Findura says before trailing off. So, youre like a mall cop? Thats what people are thinking. Its ... its kind of heartbreaking.Stone, and his new Boston-based company Athletes of Valor, think they have a plan to help men and women like Findura. And it starts with college sports.Its the perfect way to transition out of the militaryNate Boyer sees the heartbroken every week. The former Green Beret who famously walked on to the Texas football team and earned a job as a long snapper is living in Los Angeles now. Most Thursday afternoons he hosts a workout session at Jay Glazers gym for a couple dozen veterans who have struggled since leaving the military. All of them spent time in combat and all of them have been or are currently homeless.They rip through a workout together then pick a spot in the gym to sit and talk. The discussions, Boyer says, are about regaining a sense of service, a purpose -- that thing you lose when you turn in your uniform. The workouts are about filling the void.Boyer saw the void coming before he finished his time overseas. He spent his last year in the service taking online courses to get himself eligible for a school like Texas. He knew he needed a challenge waiting for him when get got home, and he figured walking on to a Longhorns team that had played for a national championship the previous January was a good place to start.Its the perfect way to transition out of the military, Boyer says. Guys miss that camaraderie. You definitely feel a lot older than some of the other students on campus. I remember walking around and thinking about how small and young everybody looks, but in the locker room I felt more at home.A college campus can be a foreign and daunting place for new veterans, according to Auburn professor David DiRamio, a former member of the Navy who has spent much of the last decade studying the issues military members face when they return to school. He has found that one of the biggest factors that determines which veterans finish their degree and which ones dont is whether or not they get involved in extracurricular activities on campus.Those who dont get involved feel out of place and have an easier time quitting, DiRamio says. They lose their sense of mission, and that can lead to the problems that plague the nations veteran population like substance abuse and depression.Then-Texas head coach Mack Brown was skeptical when he first met Boyer. But it didnt take Brown very long to see the first layer of his value. On the 100-degree days of an August training camp, players have a tendency to complain. Brown remembers stopping practices several times and gathering his team to have Boyer tell them a story. Tell us about boot camp, Nate, he would say. Or, Nate, tell us what it feels like when explosions shake the ground while youre lying in the Iraqi desert on a day that makes Austin summers feel breezy.That would shut them up pretty quickly, says Brown, who can only remember two veterans on his roster in 30 years as a head coach. They both found him. He wouldnt have known where to begin if he was trying to seek them out.Stone, who left the wheelchair sales business and parlayed a sports apparel internship into a middle-management job at Under Armour, heard from plenty of coaches who felt the same way. He visited all-star combines and 7-on-7 tournaments and sized up the talent, thinking of men and women he served with who could compete with high school prospects. The demand was present, and so was the supply. Someone just needed to connect the two.Were probably a little bit different than most of the people around hereThe 166-year-old Davenport Building in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is an unlikely setting for the collision of military veterans and college athletics. On a cool day in October, software engineers with ruffled hair and ruffled cargo shorts scamper past the Japanese floral-printed banners that stretch to the ceiling of the four-story lobby without bothering to look up from their laptops. MBA-types stride past exposed brick walls, thumbing through iPhones in their chino pants and quarter-zip sweatshirts.The buildings main occupant, a marketing company called HubSpot, has its own in-house barista and kegs of local IPAs in the office for its employees. Athletes of Valor found a venture capitalist firm on the third floor that was willing to give them some office space and some start-up money.Their wing of the building consists of a long corridor lined by glass-framed offices occupied by a variety of burgeoning companies toting slogans about making the world a better place and living life to the fullest. Some will make it. Others wont.Stone and his teams of six have their headquarters there, too, a 10-by-10 glass room with four desks wedged up against the walls. On one wall is a dry-erase board with pricing matrices, call lists and networking ideas. On the opposite is the offices only real decorative sign. It reads, in part:?Be a f---ing lion. Set goals, smash them. Take no s---. Eat peoples faces off.Were probably a little bit different than most of the people around here, Stone says.The investors he approached early in the process largely felt the same way. This is a nice nonprofit idea, most investors told them, just like the many other organizations that honor and help veterans through sporting events or some other vehicle. Stone vehemently disagreed.For starters, his mind is groomed for business. He had spent the last six years parlaying an athletic apparel internship into a full-time job at Under Armour and working his way up the ladder to a promising career in charge of all of the companys baseball products. He didnt want to spend his days writing grant applications and passing the hat for charity donations.DiRamios research shows that newly minted veterans are fiercely reluctant to ask for help from someone outside of their immediate unit. Theyve been trained to adapt and overcome. Needing outside assistance is seen as a sign of weakness, DiRamio says, to young men and women who just spent the early part of their professional lives proving their strength. Veterans dont need a coachs help. Coaches need them.This isnt supposed to be a feel good thing, Stone says. We have a valuable, pinnacle demographic of athletes. Were not looking for you to pat us on the back and say heres your fee, maybe well recruit someone, maybe not. Were saying we can make your team better. If you dont agree, then dont pay for our service.Stone and his team have set a goal to attract 1,000 athletes and 1,000 college coaches in 2017. They currently have 25 coaches signed up for the service as beta testers and roughly the same number of veterans filling out profiles as their first round of prospects. The start-up world can be unpredictable and harrowing, but Athletes of Valor believes it can be profitable by this time next year.This week the company announced a partnership with Front Rush, a recruiting service used by more than 20,000 coaches at schools such as Clemson, Texas A&M, Washington, Florida State and many others to help find and track high school recruits. The deal will inform coaches about Athletes of Valor and allow them to integrate the veterans profiles into the same interface they use to find high school athletes.Next to the high school standouts, coaches will now be able to find players such as Chris Ahmed, a field goal kicker who has put one through the uprights from 55 yards and will be leaving the Navy next year. Austin Canfield is on the same list -- a 6-foot South Carolina native who would like to play quarterback again after he finishes his time in the Marines. Findura is on the list, too -- a 6-5, 250-pound defensive end with a year of college football experience and an interest in studying exercise science.He added his profile to the mix in September a couple of days after a painful dinner discussion with his wife and her friends. It was the first thing he did the next time he sat down at a computer.Findura signed up for an Arena League tryout this fall to see how rusty he was. Like a riding a bike, he thought. He let his parents know that he was thinking about giving football, and college, another shot. They were elated.Finduras grandfather was a talented baseball player who missed his shot when he was drafted into the Navy. It stuck with him for a long time. When Findura was at Georgia State, friends in their small town south of Atlanta would ask what he was up to, and his grandfather would cut him off before he had a chance to answer. He told them how Alex was up in Atlanta playing for Coach Curry and before long hed be off to the NFL. His dad wasnt much more subdued.?It wasnt fun for Findura to tell them he was leaving football because his grades and his priorities were headed in the wrong direction. That was a confrontation and a half, Findura says about telling his grandfather. He wanted me to go on. He was living what he wanted through me, and I kind of blew it for him.Next month, when college football season draws to a close and the recruiting cycle picks up the pace, Findura gets a second chance. Hell meet Stone and a few other members of Athletes of Valor in Baltimore for a training session at the gym Under Armour uses for many of its athletes. Theyll bring along a camera crew and a handful of fellow Body Bearers to help put together a tape showcasing his athleticism and strength.The night before Finduras Arena League workout he was pacing his place in the D.C. metro area when the phone rang. For the first time?in five years, it was his grandfather on the other end of the line. Good luck, he said. Let me know how it goes.Findura smiled. He cant wait for the next call.Wholesale Air Max . 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Neymar curled home a free kick from just outside the area to put the 2014 World Cup host ahead in the 44th minute. Three minutes after the break, a simple through pass from Paulinho freed Oscar and the Chelsea star rounded goalkeeper Jung Sung-ryong to extend Brazils lead.In the first installment of ESPNs top ten drivers of 2016, we name numbers 10-610. Pascal Wehrlein Pascal Wehrleins first season in Formula One showed glimpses of the talent Mercedes saw in him when signing him to its junior programme. The undoubted highlight was a Q2 appearance and 10th-place finish in Austria, which very nearly helped Manor beat Sauber to tenth in the championship this year. It was a year with impressive performances scattered throughout, in a car which received limited development.Several blots on his record linger: he failed to convincingly out-perform Rio Haryanto in qualifying (winning their head-to-head 7-5) and then was overlooked for the Force India seat in favour of Haryantos replacement, fellow Mercedes junior Esteban Ocon. Wehrleins snub hinted at concerns over his temperament but there is no doubting his ability on a race track. He is still rated highly by Mercedes and was drafted in to test in place of Lewis Hamilton in Abu Dhabi after Toto Wolff discovered Nico Rosbergs decision to retire. 2016 was a good start for Wehrlein but he will need to build on that next season -- wherever he may be.9. Kimi RaikkonenAfter the first 10 races of the season Kimi Raikkonen was third in the championship, with only Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton ahead. After two years of underwhelming performances at Ferrari in 2014 and 2015 there were signs he was returning to form and at the Spanish Grand Prix he came within 0.6s of winning his first race since 2013. In the second half of the year his results started to slide as Ferrari became less competitive, but, if anything, his raw performances improved. Once he had signed a contract extension to remain at Ferrari in 2017, Raikkonen started to up his game and at the last ten races of the season he outqualified teammate Sebastian Vettel 8-2.Vettel scored more points over the course of the year but his performances were more erratic and he committed the cardinal sin of colliding with his teammate on the opening lap in both China and Belgium. Vettels peaks were higher but his troughs were lower, while Raikkonen offered consistency throughout the season. It wasnt Raikkonen at his very best, but it was the closest he has come since rejoining Ferrari in 2014.8. Sebastian VettelA second winless season in three years was not what Sebastian Vettel or Ferrari anticipated coming into 2016. Vettel led into Turn 1 of the opening race, which he lost due to a strategy blunder, and the season unravelled from that point on. The honeymoon period at Ferrari is well and truly over and by seasons end it was clear cracks were appearing in a relationship which had looked so good during 2015.Despite Ferraris failings he was a source of hope in the opening half of the season, finishing on the podium five times in the first nine races. Peerhaps due to the frustrations of a season spent slipping further and further from the leaders, Vettel became increasingly fraught as the year went on -- both on and off the track.dddddddddddd Sweary radio messages became the norm -- including his infamous Mexico rant at Max Verstappen and Charlie Whiting -- and he faced accusations of trying to do too much behind the scenes at Ferrari. He at least finished the season in good form and once again out-scored teammate Kimi Raikkonen. But, with his contract up at the end of 2017, Ferrari will need a big improvement next year to keep the German on board.7. Sergio PerezAlthough his teammate beat him in qualifying over the course of the year, Sergio Perez had the measure of Nico Hulkenberg in races. His ability to manage car and tyres through a race distance remains his strength and he exploited it on several occasions this year. What he may lack in one-lap pace, he makes up for in tenths of a second saved per lap over a race distance -- and that eventually results in points scored at the end of the season.He finished on the podium at the Monaco Grand Prix thanks to a well-timed switch to slick tyres, but his best performance came in Baku. Had it not been for a gearbox penalty he would have started the race second on the grid, but even from seventh he was able to work his way back through the field (and ahead of Hulkenberg) to finish third. At the final ten rounds he showed consistency, finishing each race in the points and bringing his total for the year to 101 -- enough to finish seventh overall, only behind the six drivers of the top three teams.6. Fernando AlonsoIt is no coincidence that the Alonso of 2016 seemed more motivated than the Alonso of 2015, with McLaren and Honda making clear steps forward from their dismal reunion campaign. The increased motivation was easy to see. Alonso rolled back the years to finish fifth with a remarkable drive in Monaco, while he also charged from the back row of the grid for top-seven finishes in Malaysia and Belgium -- the latter an especially impressive effort.The in-house battle at McLaren was a no-contest this year: Alonso winning 15-5 against Jenson Button in qualifying and outscoring his teammate by 34 points. Frustration still bubbled over on occasions -- most notably about the current generation of F1 cars -- but there is no denying that Alonsos immense talent is being wasted at present. McLarens season and the imminent rule changes next year spring hopes of a rejuvenation for Alonso but a more competitive McLaren and more enjoyable F1 car might be the only hopes of keeping the two-time world champion on the grid beyond 2017.Positions 5-1 to follow... ' ' '