I wanted to share, please be sure to watch the video at the end and have tissues handy Lyn
Strongest Dad in the World
[From Sports Illustrated, By Rick Reilly]
I try to be a good father. Give my kids mulligans. Work nights to pay for
their text messaging. Take them to swimsuit shoots. But compared with Dick
Hoyt, I suck.
Eighty-five times he's pushed his disabled son, Rick, 26.2 miles in
marathons. Eight times he's not only pushed him 26.2 miles in a wheelchair
but also towed him 2.4 miles in a dinghy while swimming and pedaled him 112
miles in a seat on the handlebars--all in the same day.
Dick's also pulled him cross-country skiing, taken him on his back mountain
climbing and once hauled him across the country on a bike. Makes taking your
son bowling look a little lame, right?
And what has Rick done for his father? Not much--except save his life.
This love story began in :City Winchester 43 years ago, when Rick was
strangled by the umbilical cord during birth, leaving him brain-damaged and
unable to control his limbs. ``He'll be a vegetable the rest of his life;''
Dick says doctors told him and his wife, Judy, when Rick was nine months
old. ``Put him in an institution.''
But the Hoyts weren't buying it. They noticed the way Rick's eyes followed
them around the room. When Rick was 11 they took him to the engineering
department at Tufts and asked if there was anything to help the
boy communicate. ``No way,'' Dick says he was told. ``There's nothing going
on in his brain.''
"Tell him a joke,'' Dick countered. They did. Rick laughed. Turns out a lot
was going on in his brain.
Rigged up with a computer that allowed him to control the cursor by touching
a switch with the side of his head, Rick was finally able to communicate.
First words? ``Go Bruins!'' And after a high school classmate was paralyzed
in an accident and the school organized a charity run for him, Rick pecked
out, ``Dad, I want to do that.''
Yeah, right. How was Dick, a self-described ``porker'' who never ran more
than a mile at a time, going to push his son five miles? Still, he tried.
``Then it was me who was handicapped,'' Dick says. ``I was sore for two
weeks.''
That day changed Rick's life. ``Dad,'' he typed, ``when we were running, it
felt like I wasn't disabled anymore!''
And that sentence changed Dick's life. He became obsessed with giving Rick
that feeling as often as he could. He got into such hard-belly shape that he
and Rick were ready to try the 1979 Boston Marathon.
``No way,'' Dick was told by a race official. The Hoyts weren't quite a
single runner, and they weren't quite a wheelchair competitor. For a few
years Dick and Rick just joined the massive field and ran anyway, then they
found a way to get into the race officially: In 1983 they ran another
marathon so fast they made the qualifying time forthe following
year.
Then somebody said, ``Hey, Dick, why not a triathlon?''
How's a guy who never learned to swim and hadn't ridden a bike since he was
six going to haul his 110-pound kid through a triathlon? Still, Dick tried.
Now they've done 212 triathlons, including four grueling 15-hour Ironmans in
Hawaii It must be a buzzkill to be a 25-year-old stud getting passed by an
old guy towing a grown man in a dinghy, don't you think?
Hey, Dick, why not see how you'd do on your own? ``No way,'' he says. Dick
does it purely for ``the awesome feeling'' he gets seeing Rick with a
cantaloupe smile as they run, swim and ride together.
This year, at ages 65 and 43, Dick and Rick finished their 24th Boston:
Marathon in 5,083rd place out of more than 20,000 starters. Their best
time'? Two hours, 40 minutes in 1992--only 35 minutes off the world record,
which, in case you don't keep track of these things, happens to be held by
a guy who was not pushing another man in a wheelchair at the time.
``No question about it,'' Rick types. ``My dad is the Father of the
Century.''
And Dick got something else out of all this too. Two years ago he had a mild
heart attack during a race. Doctors found that one of his arteries was
95% clogged. ``If you hadn't been in such great shape,'' one doctor told
him, ``you probably would've died 15 years ago.''
So, in a way, Dick and Rick saved each other's life.
Rick, who has his own apartment (he gets home care) and works in City on" Boston place and
Dick, retired from the military and living in place :City Holland Mass. always find
ways to be together. They give speeches around the country and compete in
some backbreaking race every > weekend, including this Father's Day.
That night, Rick will buy his dad dinner, but the thing he really wants to
give him is a gift he can never buy.
``The thing I'd most like,'' Rick types, ``is that my dad would sit in the
chair and I would push him once.''
Here's the video.... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjPrL3n63yg
Strongest Dad in the World
[From Sports Illustrated, By Rick Reilly]
I try to be a good father. Give my kids mulligans. Work nights to pay for
their text messaging. Take them to swimsuit shoots. But compared with Dick
Hoyt, I suck.
Eighty-five times he's pushed his disabled son, Rick, 26.2 miles in
marathons. Eight times he's not only pushed him 26.2 miles in a wheelchair
but also towed him 2.4 miles in a dinghy while swimming and pedaled him 112
miles in a seat on the handlebars--all in the same day.
Dick's also pulled him cross-country skiing, taken him on his back mountain
climbing and once hauled him across the country on a bike. Makes taking your
son bowling look a little lame, right?
And what has Rick done for his father? Not much--except save his life.
This love story began in :City Winchester 43 years ago, when Rick was
strangled by the umbilical cord during birth, leaving him brain-damaged and
unable to control his limbs. ``He'll be a vegetable the rest of his life;''
Dick says doctors told him and his wife, Judy, when Rick was nine months
old. ``Put him in an institution.''
But the Hoyts weren't buying it. They noticed the way Rick's eyes followed
them around the room. When Rick was 11 they took him to the engineering
department at Tufts and asked if there was anything to help the
boy communicate. ``No way,'' Dick says he was told. ``There's nothing going
on in his brain.''
"Tell him a joke,'' Dick countered. They did. Rick laughed. Turns out a lot
was going on in his brain.
Rigged up with a computer that allowed him to control the cursor by touching
a switch with the side of his head, Rick was finally able to communicate.
First words? ``Go Bruins!'' And after a high school classmate was paralyzed
in an accident and the school organized a charity run for him, Rick pecked
out, ``Dad, I want to do that.''
Yeah, right. How was Dick, a self-described ``porker'' who never ran more
than a mile at a time, going to push his son five miles? Still, he tried.
``Then it was me who was handicapped,'' Dick says. ``I was sore for two
weeks.''
That day changed Rick's life. ``Dad,'' he typed, ``when we were running, it
felt like I wasn't disabled anymore!''
And that sentence changed Dick's life. He became obsessed with giving Rick
that feeling as often as he could. He got into such hard-belly shape that he
and Rick were ready to try the 1979 Boston Marathon.
``No way,'' Dick was told by a race official. The Hoyts weren't quite a
single runner, and they weren't quite a wheelchair competitor. For a few
years Dick and Rick just joined the massive field and ran anyway, then they
found a way to get into the race officially: In 1983 they ran another
marathon so fast they made the qualifying time forthe following
year.
Then somebody said, ``Hey, Dick, why not a triathlon?''
How's a guy who never learned to swim and hadn't ridden a bike since he was
six going to haul his 110-pound kid through a triathlon? Still, Dick tried.
Now they've done 212 triathlons, including four grueling 15-hour Ironmans in
Hawaii It must be a buzzkill to be a 25-year-old stud getting passed by an
old guy towing a grown man in a dinghy, don't you think?
Hey, Dick, why not see how you'd do on your own? ``No way,'' he says. Dick
does it purely for ``the awesome feeling'' he gets seeing Rick with a
cantaloupe smile as they run, swim and ride together.
This year, at ages 65 and 43, Dick and Rick finished their 24th Boston:
Marathon in 5,083rd place out of more than 20,000 starters. Their best
time'? Two hours, 40 minutes in 1992--only 35 minutes off the world record,
which, in case you don't keep track of these things, happens to be held by
a guy who was not pushing another man in a wheelchair at the time.
``No question about it,'' Rick types. ``My dad is the Father of the
Century.''
And Dick got something else out of all this too. Two years ago he had a mild
heart attack during a race. Doctors found that one of his arteries was
95% clogged. ``If you hadn't been in such great shape,'' one doctor told
him, ``you probably would've died 15 years ago.''
So, in a way, Dick and Rick saved each other's life.
Rick, who has his own apartment (he gets home care) and works in City on" Boston place and
Dick, retired from the military and living in place :City Holland Mass. always find
ways to be together. They give speeches around the country and compete in
some backbreaking race every > weekend, including this Father's Day.
That night, Rick will buy his dad dinner, but the thing he really wants to
give him is a gift he can never buy.
``The thing I'd most like,'' Rick types, ``is that my dad would sit in the
chair and I would push him once.''
Here's the video.... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjPrL3n63yg
Thanks for the post! Brian
