A marathon is one thing. Climbing a mountain is another.
But try the equivalent of 38 marathons. And three mountains. Oh, and add a 35-pound pack to your back and some combat boots.
Who the hell would do that?
Paul Cretella, a Serene Lake firefighter and former British paratrooper, is embarking on a yearlong effort to log 1,000 miles under just those conditions to raise awareness of the pain endured by wounded combat veterans.
Cretella recalled an elderly man he met on one of his aid calls, a veteran who was wounded three times in the Korean War and who still deals with chronic pain.
“Those guys coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan now are, 50 years from now, going to still be feeling the effects. … We need to do better for them,” Cretella said.
He calls his odyssey Brothers in Arms 1,000 Mile Challenge and is taking donations for two nonprofits, the Florida-based Wounded Warrior Project and its UK counterpart Help for Heroes.
The kickoff for the effort was the Seattle Marathon on Nov. 29. Cretella plans to finish the 1,000 miles with next year’s marathon.
In between, he’ll run other organized events or on a whim. In the spring, he plans to take part in the Three Peaks Challenge, scaling the United Kingdom’s three tallest peaks in 24 hours. Some friends back across the pond invited him to join, and it was from that event that the idea for his 1,000-mile effort came.
Cretella is quickly gathering followers to his cause, including among his coworkers at Snohomish County Fire District 1.
“He’s a stand-up guy, a fantastic person, always working to improve himself and the department — and doing shocking things like this,” said Matt Stiefel of Everett who also works with the fire district.
During the Seattle Marathon, having just learned of four Lakewood police officers being gunned down, Cretella was handed a special challenge coin from a Seattle police officer who commended him for his cause.
“It was a big boost. It was quite emotional,” he recalled.
On Dec. 1, Cretella logged a short run of 6 miles to a Lakewood memorial honoring the slain officers.
It’s been a long time since Cretella, 38, has put on those boots and that weighty pack.
Cretella joined the British army at age 17 and served as a paratrooper for the next decade, including three years in Northern Ireland. “It was ‘work hard, play hard’ basically for 10 years,” he said.
He came to Tacoma in 1997 to attend paramedic school at the community college there and ended up marrying. He has a 15-year-old stepdaughter and a 12-year-old son — who may or may not think their dad is a bit crazy.
Always one to stay in shape, Cretella also isn’t one to sit still if he sees something that needs to be done — this time, for “wounded guys who do come home (but) don’t come back complete.”
“We should get up and do something about it,” he said.
How to help
To donate to Paul Cretella’s Brothers in Arms 1,000 Mile Challenge, go to http://tinyurl.com/paulcretella, a portal of the Wounded Warrior Project that tracks his fundraising efforts in the United States.
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