Arapahoe County Deputies Train For World Police And Fire Games

(CBS4) - Two Arapahoe County Sheriff's deputies will represent Colorado and the United States in the World Police and Fire Games next month in China. One will look for gold in track events and the other will compete in what's called "toughest competitor alive."

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Those two men are deputies Mateo Montoya-Collis and Bill Litweiler, seen on the right and left of the photo above. Montoya-Collis allowed CBS4 to join him for a training session Monday morning.

Although it was his day off of work, Mateo Montoya-Collis arrived at the track at Regis Jesuit High School at 9 a.m. sharp. The veteran sheriff's deputy typically trains five days a week for two to three hours at a time. That's in addition to his full-time job at the Arapahoe County Sheriff's Office.

(credit: CBS)

"This is the stuff that nobody sees -- waking up the old muscles," Montoya-Collis said while stretching.

The training sessions start with a warmup and quickly progress to a grueling workout. Then it's time for countless sprints alongside much younger Olympic hopefuls.

"Those dudes, you know, they're going to be running some of them close to 10.9," he said.

This is all preparation for two and a half weeks from now. That's when Montoya-Collis and his colleague, Deputy Litweiler, will head to Chengdu China for what's essentially the first responder Olympics.

"Spain is out there, Germany, Taiwan," He said. "Any country you can think of that has a police force."

Litweiler will test his speed and strength in an event called "The Toughest Competitor Alive." The event involves a wide range of physical tests.

Montoya-Collis will look for yet another gold medal in several track events. His specialty is short-distance sprinting.

"It's a beautiful thing knowing that you represented and did your best to represent your country so I definitely feel blessed," Montoya-Collis said.

When Montoya-Collis reflects on past trips to the biennial event, it's not the medals that stick out in his mind.

"I also want to reach out and have an ally and a friend in a different country knowing that we're trying to make the world a better place because there's a lot of dedicated people who don't get a lot of credit," he said.

The two deputies will leave for China on Aug. 8. Until then you'll likely see them at the gym or track. If not, they're likely on patrol in your neighborhood.