Jacob De La Garza has always had a competitive spirit.
It is what got him through high school at Edinburg High. It’s what inspired him to join the United States Marine Corps in 2003. And it’s what has pushed him to keep going and complete multiple marathons after suffering traumatic injuries while deployed in Afghanistan.
De La Garza, 40, said that he’d always wanted to be a Marine since he was a young boy.
“It’s just one of those things that I always wanted to do. At the time in my life in 2003, I was like, ‘This is not what I want to be,’” he said, recalling a job he held at Pizza Hut after graduating from high school in 2000.
“I always wanted to be a Marine, so I joined,” he said. “I played sports all my life, so I was always in good shape and used to coaches yelling at me. So my experience through boot camp wasn’t too bad at all.”
De La Garza’s enlistment would see him deployed to Iraq three times. During his first deployment, he fought in the Battle of Fallujah, described as the bloodiest battle of the Iraq War.
“That one was a pretty rough one,” De La Garza recalled. “We lost a couple of guys out there.”
He said that his plan was to retire from the Marine Corps and get a job working in law enforcement. Those plans took a turn on May 21, 2011, during a tour of Afghanistan, his first to the country and his fourth deployment overall.
“Seeing how they live changes a person,” De La Garza recalled. “We take for granted how we live here compared to other countries. You see how poverty is over there, and it makes you think differently.”
At the time Sgt. De La Garza was a squad leader, leading a group of 15 Marines through the town of Sangin. His squad was approaching a group of buildings surrounded by a large wall with only one entryway and exit. It was at this time that he said he began to feel like something wasn’t right.
“I just felt something was wrong,” he recalled. “We had one entry. We had one guy in a second house just watching us, and there was no kids outside — all signs that something’s going to happen.”
Two of his men had already gone through the entryway. De La Garza went in to retrieve them. As he was making his way back out, there was an explosion by the door.
“I got thrown. I got up and saw that my leg was dangling,” De La Garza said. “I made sure nobody else was injured, and thank God nobody else was hurt. Then the doctors started working on me.”
While medics were attending to De La Garza’s wounds, the enemy tossed a grenade near the area where he was receiving treatment.
“I grabbed (the medic), threw him to the floor and covered him so he won’t get hit by any shrapnel from the grenade,” he recalled. “It exploded, and we started taking fire. My weapon was already blown-up, so it couldn’t fire. I grabbed his weapon, and it took a couple rounds just to lay down fire while my men started maneuvering.”
“At this time, my lieutenant was with us, so he was calling the birds (helicopters) so they could take me out of there,” De La Garza continued. “My men closed in on the enemy and they surrendered. When this happened the bird landed, so I hopped in the helicopter. Once I layed down, I ended up falling asleep.”
De La Garza suffered a deep laceration to his right leg, but most of the damage was done to his left leg. He was transported to a hospital in Germany before being flown back to the United States. He would eventually end up at Balboa Naval Medical Center in San Diego, California.
“My foot wasn’t totally gone,” De La Garza said. “When I got to the hospital, they asked me if I wanted to salvage it. I told them no. I wanted them to just go ahead and amputate it. Once that happened, it took me a few months to actually start walking again. I started running within seven months.”
The Marine said that during his recovery process, his competitive spirit stuck up competition with other service members who were also amputees.
“We were always trying to be competitive,” De La Garza.
He said that he also found strength through the support from programs such as Semper Fi & America’s Fund.
Also known as “The Fund”, Semper Fi & America’s Fund is a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization founded in 2004 by a group of military spouses to provide assistance to service members, veterans and family members from all branches of the U.S. armed forces.
“After my injury, obviously I couldn’t really walk yet,” De La Garza said. “Semper Fi & America’s Fund introduced me to hand cycling. They got me a hand cycle and made it customized for me to fit in perfectly. I started doing marathons with that since I couldn’t run or walk at the time. Any little equipment I could use, they would help me out with that.”
“To this day, they still help,” he continued. “My case manager, she’s always checking in on me every couple of months. If I need anything, she’s always there for me.”
De La Garza’s first marathon took place in San Diego in 2012, less than a year after his injury in Afghanistan.
“The good thing is it wasn’t just me,” he said. “It was my other friends that I met through my recovery. We all just push each other. It was fun to be out there and be competitive again. We just push each other.”
Since then, De La Garza has competed in three hand-cycling marathons and about a dozen 10-Ks, as well as a marathon relay two years ago. He said that he would like to compete in another 5K by the end of this year, a goal that he has been running and training for recently.
“It’s more just pushing myself,” De La Garza said. “I think most amputees, we try to push ourselves more. It’s weird. We do more stuff now than we did when we had both legs. For some reason, we like to push ourselves. There’s no limit.”
Semper Fi & America’s Fund will be partnering with The Bob & Renee Parsons Foundation and Parsons Xtreme Golf (PXG) for the 11th consecutive year to host the Double Down for Veterans Match Campaign. The Bob & Renee Parsons Foundation and PXG will be matching every donation made to “The Fund” up to $10 million through the end of the year.
More information about Semper Fi & America’s Fund can be found at www.thefund.org.
