Pete Rettler and His 28-year Daily Commitment
Pete Rettler, Dean of Moraine Park’s West Bend Campus, made a decision in 1993 to focus on his health. On New Year’s Eve, he made a bet with a friend to run every day for an entire year. Needless to say, he surpassed that goal and hasn’t missed a single day of running for 28 years. He averages 2.5 miles each run.
A few years back, he started using this daily running streak to generate community involvement and giving by hosting a New Year’s Eve 5k run event. The money raised was donated a local non-profit.
At year 25, Pete held a 25 day event, selecting a different non-profit each day- and gathering over $25,000 in donations.
This year, his donations will be given to the Wisconsin Remembers 9-11 Memorial in Kewaskum to assist their efforts to bring awareness, and honor and remember local victims. https://www.wisconsin911memorial.com/about.html
You can register for the run at: Rettlerrun.com.
Here’s a message from Pete:
“Another year has passed by and I am very grateful that my streak is still alive. This year the Streak Run will once again be held at the Kewaskum Annex located right next to the Memorial. The date is December 31st the event starts at noon. This year we will return back to normal but you still don’t have to be present to win any of the 28 door prizes. We will be LiveStreaming the door prize drawings. The door prizes this year are phenomenal, 28 hand selected Bourbons worth over $2200. Each run entry equals an entry into the door prize drawing. Enter as many times as you wish. This year we will have subs provided by Cousins Subs and also coffee cider and hot chocolate from Dunn Brothers. We are very fortunate that Fr. Pat Heppe has recovered from the horrible Waukesha parade tragedy and will once again join us to do a New Year’s blessing. Following the blessing will be a very non-competitive, fun 5k that you can walk, run, walk your dog, skip, or just skip the entire run. After the race we will give away the 28 door prizes plus a 200 piece Craftsman tool set.”
