[ad_1]
He's not the fastest and he's not a full-time professional athlete, but he's training as a player, as he's had something to lose. he missed a day.
"Nobody died for working hard," Gwala told CNN after his morning monster workout.
At 7 am Gwala prepares breakfast for her two children in the kitchen before going to work. Then he will swim in a 3 km race.
At 27, Gwala should be at its peak in his favorite sport: triathlon.
Except that he was not after being attacked by three men who, according to Gwala, then took out a chainsaw and started to see each other in the legs.
Modest beginnings
Gwala grew up at the foot of the rural village of Ndwedwe, South Africa, in a family of shepherds. On these vast expanses of barren land, he learned to run – to chase cows and clbadmates. Declaring himself rebellious, he often swam in the forbidden river of the valley.
"If I want to get strong, I'm coming here to train," Gwala told CNN, looking up at the huge mountains of her home town. Today, he is here to visit his family. But first, a race.
Running along the steep paths, he pointed to his elementary school, a stone's throw from his childhood home. From there, he said that he would run races without knowing the total distance on the course and with no other prize than the satisfaction of participating.
Today, his training is much more disciplined. Each kilometer calculated; each timed rhythm.
Gwala moved to nearby Chesterville for the university. He quickly fell into a bad crowd and started to use drugs and drugs.
"I told my mother:" I want to stop [going to school] because I'm wasting your money, "he said. I had developed a problem with drugs and alcohol. "
Gwala, then 22, failed at university and began looking towards liver failure. She then said that he had to radically change his lifestyle if he wanted to see 30 of them.
Uncertain of the direction to take, a friend suggested he try a life-saving career, knowing that he knew how to swim and that it would be a healthy lifestyle choice.
After two weeks of grueling tests in the pool, he landed the job.
"I fell in love with the rescue and decided to start doing [this]"Gwala said.
This profession did not completely cover the bills at the beginning, so he worked in the dark in a factory – a task he worked on every day. He attributes this journey to its speed.
He joined the Marine Rescue Club in Durban and began competing in swimming events at the beach. After winning two races, including the South Africa Rescue Championships, he realized that he knew how to swim and run very well, so why not add a bike and try a triathlon? ?
A triathlete is born
In 2015, Gwala began to rank in her age group in local triathlons. Later that year, he was invited to the United States to represent South Africa at the ITU World Triathlon Grand Final in Chicago.
Two weeks before the big race, he was in a bike accident. Despite everything, he competed and came in 57th place in his age group.
Making great strides for his country, once again participating in the ITU World Finals in 2017 and over longer distances – like the Ironman 70.3 events, Gwala was starting to take a serious interest in triathlon. .
The accident that changes the life
Except "people have tried to stop my career," said Gwala, though he could not say more about the heinous accident that changed everything.
In March 2018, during his usual morning walk near the University of KwaZulu-Natal, Gwala was attacked by an armed gun by three men and dragged into a nearby bush.
According to Gwala, they started screaming at him in a foreign language, then took out the chainsaw.
According to Dr. O. Sharran Singh, the men managed to cut 90% of his tibia and 80% of the surrounding tissues located on his right leg.
This did some lacerations in the left leg, but miraculously, the chainsaw apparently stopped working and the men fled, according to Gwala.
He was rushed to the hospital, where his doctors were able to save his leg. But they told him that it would take him two years before he could run again.
Six months after the operation, Gwala was running again. Today, it runs up to 6 km. It may not be fast or pretty; he compares this to the way a crab would work, but the aesthetic is not what he's looking for.
Get back on your feet
"The first time we drove it on a treadmill, it was very moving," said Jarrod Rudolph, his physical therapist at the Prime Human Performance Institute in Durban.
"For us, convincing him to achieve this goal in a post-operative period of five to six months was a remarkable thing and it really boils down to his attitude," commented Rudolph.
There is still a long way to go to recover. According to the South African team's Olympic physician, Kevin Shubban, nerve damage could take up to two years to heal.
But, remarkably, Gwala did everything he did before, just limping.
Road to the Paralympic Games
Gwala is qualified for coding as a parathlete. His goal now is to compete at the 2020 Paralympic Games in Para-cycling or Paratriathlon.
"It's my great motivation, which makes me wake up every morning because I have to be strong if I go out there and make South Africa proud of me," he said. "I'm thirsty for success, ha ha."
Olympian Josia Thugwane, the first black athlete to win an Olympic gold medal for South Africa, is another great motivator for Gwala.
Thugwane was shot and wounded five months before his participation in the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. The ball touched his chin and back. Defying all odds, he made an incredible recovery and won the marathon.
"Every time I go running, I have to watch his documentary, it makes me feel strong."
To this day, Gwala is struggling to talk about the chainsaw incident. He still does not understand why he was attacked, any more than police who claim to be no closer to catching his badailants.
"I forgive them, I can not forget, I will always remember them, every day, every hour," he says, "but I will not remember it as a bad thing."
Alcohol took his life. The triathlon has made it. This attack may have slowed Gwala, but he is more determined than ever to reach the summit.
That is why he trains himself day after day, not only for himself or his family, but also for his country and for a more ambitious goal than him: Tokyo in 2020.
Source link
