Anthony Robles, a true inspiration.

[Cooper]

His disability didn't get in the way of becoming a champion...

 

http://espn.go.com/video/clip?id=6238024

[jgoo]

Very inspirational. Thanks cooper for posting this as I am sure I would never have known about this wonderful young man. Goes to show how some can overcome some seemingly insurmountable obstacles to achieve their dreams. Things like this make me stop and appreciate how relatively easy my life has been and reminds me not to let the small things get me down. A wonderful way to start Sunday.

[ChiTown]

Thanks for sharing, Coop! Great inspiration . . . a reminder to all of us how fortunate we are and how relatively minor our own obstacles and issues are.

[+ sam.fitzpatrick]

Thanks for posting Cooper. I heard about this wrestler on the radio yesterday afternoon while running errands - before his finals match. I had hoped to get back in time to see the match live, but missed it and was wondering how he fared.

 

What a great story.

[happyguy2]

Thanks so much Cooper, I would never have heard about him. What a wonderful thing to watch while having my Sunday morning coffee. Makes me wonder, with all we have been given, what are we really doing with our lives? Thanks again

[BaronArtz]

What a wonderfully inspirational story! Thanks for posting, Coop. It shows that there are no limits other than the self-imposed ones in our own minds ...

 

Thanks!

[instudiocity]

A reminder to all of us that we too are disabled. His is external for the world to see, and he overcame his disability to win. Now will we overcome ours?

[MsGuy]

Thanks for posting Cooper. I heard about this wrestler on the radio yesterday afternoon while running errands - before his finals match. I had hoped to get back in time to see the match live, but missed it and was wondering how he fared.

 

By sheer chance I happened to catch the match live.

 

As the kid himself said, every wrestler has his individual strengths and weaknesses. Robles indicated that that was one of the things that first drew him to the sport. My own thought watching the match was that Robles was very good at using technique to compensate for his missing leg. In its own way, being missing a leg gave him at least two significant advantages to work with: 1) an opponent's techique would be thrown off a bit by not being able to grab the missing leg, and 2) wrestling is done by weight class, so the mass of the missing leg shows up in greatly increased arm and upper body strength.

 

Neither observation takes anything away from Robles achievment. I admire the way he took what most folks would have regarded as as a crippling limitation and successfully integrated it into his sport.