Denver boot camp for the homeless aims to help mental illness, drug use

Under the yellow glow of a streetlamp, about 20 homeless men in shorts and sweatpants rush into a huddle, hands in the air, and shout, “Knuckleheads!” The rallying cry on this chilly December night follows 45 minutes of punishing squats, push-ups, burpees, sit-ups and jogging around a housing project just off Interstate 70 where they have found temporary places to sleep.

The men are sweating when they finish, some gasping for breath — in a good way — as they stand on dried-up winter grass alongside an old motel that has been converted into housing by the Denver Rescue Mission.

“You guys got through Lawrence Street. You can get through this,” says their leader, former TV sportscaster Mark McIntosh, now a motivational speaker and volunteer at the mission who set up weekly boot-camp classes for homeless guys because “a sweat a day keeps the doctor away — and the surgeon and the shrink.”

These men lived at the rescue mission’s no-nonsense Lawrence Street Shelter, just north of downtown, before earning private rooms at the former motel, now called The Crossing. The next steps, if they keep on track, are real-world jobs and their own apartments. Almost all of them are trying to stay clean, to kick the drugs and alcohol that got them here, and regain stability after, in some cases, years of mental health problems.

Among them is Darwin Ben, a 47-year-old veteran of the Gulf War who has post-traumatic stress disorder because the ship he was on in the Persian Gulf was attacked in 1991. “My life has been an up-and-down roller coaster ever since,” said Ben, who tends toward isolation, to “go away from people and do my own thing.”

He feels better when he goes to boot camp, not just because of the workout, but because he feels part of a team.

Throughout boot camp, they are pushing one another to work harder. In pairs, they count their partners’ push-ups. After a 6-foot man with tattoos on his sculpted biceps does a ridiculous 85 push-ups without stopping, shouts of “Eighty-five!” ring out among the circle of men. They all yell their numbers: 65, 50, 32. There are pats on the back and high-fives. They’ve got something called the “Adam Award,” named for the first guy who puked in the middle of a workout.

Kevin Jeffrey, 23, says working out has cut down on the number of days he is depressed, and it helps reduce the temptation to drink alcohol. “It builds my endorphins,” he said.

About two-thirds of Denver’s chronically homeless have mental illnesses, and among those, only about one-third are getting treatment.

It seems simple: exercising to fight off mental health problems. It’s so simple that McIntosh, an exercise fanatic who for months came straight from the gym to lead chapel services at the rescue mission, never considered it would help the homeless men until one of them asked.

David Danielson, a 24-year-old with a history of methamphetamine use that led to homelessness, asked McIntosh one day when he was going to help them work out.

Danielson has lived at The Crossing about five months and is enrolled in a rehabilitation program called New Life, which requires that he stay clean and work the front desk. He first realized exercise helped him stay away from drugs before he become homeless, when he was living with his brother and biking 20 miles each day to his construction job.

But a bike accident injured his shoulder. He lost his job and soon fell back into drugs. He ended up living on the street and spent a bleak 35 days at the Lawrence Street Shelter before earning a room at The Crossing.

Chase Lontin, 29, played lacrosse in high school and makes 60 push-ups look easy. His job assignment at The Crossing is building maintenance, and boot camp three times a week is part of his regimen to turn things around, a way to steer clear of methamphetamine, alcohol and depression. “It gives me something to do, and it feels good,” he said.

McIntosh hopes to expand the boot-camp program, called A Stronger Cord, and is seeking volunteer coaches to lead workouts downtown and at The Crossing. He hopes that eventually the group gets city funding and business donations and can rent the Twentieth Street Recreation Center’s basketball court for an hour or two each day, beginning at 6:30 a.m., so that homeless people could work out after leaving shelters.

The boot camp already has drawn interest from several downtown workers, all men, who volunteer their time to mentor, mostly by holding plank and doing burpees alongside the homeless guys.

“The physical piece is important — you get the endorphins going, but it’s also the teamwork,” McIntosh said. “All men, when we are bummed out about life, we tend to go into our caves. This brings us all together.”

Jennifer Brown: 303-954-1593, jenbrown@denverpost.com or twitter.com/jbrowndpost