Health

Veteran Completes First Workout Since Losing Leg

Meagan McGinnes

By Meagan McGinnes

September 12, 2014

3 minutes to read

September 6 was not an ideal day for a workout. A sweltering 90 degrees with even thicker air, it really wasn’t a great day for any physical activity. But that Saturday, Ruben Gomez took his next steps towards recovery. Towards normalcy. He completed his first CrossFit workout since he lost his leg and two fingers in a bombing in Afghanistan.

Gomez, 34, spent 17 years in the army. He was first deployed in 2003 in Iraq.

In February of 2011, Gomez had less than a month left on his deployment in Afghanistan. He was coming back from patrol duty when his outfit was hit by a rocket.

Gomez shattered over two inches of his femur and lost two fingers on his left hand. He kept the lower part of his leg for almost three years before having a voluntary amputation below the knee because of extensive nerve damage in December of 2013.

“Believe it or not I am actually a lot more functional without it than I was even with it. I am able to run which I would have never been able to run ever again had I kept the leg,’’ Gomez said.

With a desire to see how much he could physically push himself, Gomez said he could not refuse when his friend and unit member, Kristin Domboski, asked him to participate in the 31Heroes workout at CrossFit Florian in Norwood.

“Seeing him back in action was fantastic,’’ Domboski said.

Florian coowner Bill Malcomb said he was hesitant at first because Florian is not trained in adaptive workouts for amputees, but after speaking with Gomez he allowed him to join the event.

“I am glad he came because it was good for everyone that he was there. It was good for Ruben…and it was good for the members to see him do it,’’ Malcomb said.

Gomez scaled the workout, using flat plate weights for box jumps and ring rows as a replacement for rope climbs.

“It was a bit of an eye opener of how out of shape I am, but it was awesome to just grab a bar and throw weight up over my head, to get out and run a little bit,’’ he said. “It was great just to be in a gym again.’’

The nonprofit 31 Heroes was created to honor 31 servicemen (including one service dog) that were killed on August 6, 2011 when helicopter Extortion 17 crashed in Afghanistan. A rocket propelled grenade fired by Taliban insurgents brought down the helicopter. Seventeen of the men killed were elite Navy Seals.

The fallen are remembered through a CrossFit workout that raises money for the families of fallen or deployed servicemen. According to the 31Heroes website, they’ve raised a total of $1.5 million since the initiation of the workout. That money was split between Extortion 17 Families, the Navy Seal Foundation, the Travis Manion Foundation and the Snowball Express.

Malcomb said the gym has been particpating in the workout for three years. In 2012 the CrossFit Florian affiliate was the top gym in the world with money raised.

The workout itself is very symbolic, using a a pattern of repetition that matches the date that the servicemen were killed. It is a partner workout where one person is always running with a sand bag, taking the burden back and forth from each other. Gomez said that participating in the workout meant a lot to him.

“Not everybody goes to the gym goes to work out, goes to the box and does CrossFit and everything. This is a great way to get a group of people together who all have similar likes, but have it be for something other than ourselves,’’ Gomez said. “To have that money be donated to an organization that represents families of the loved ones that are no longer there.’’