Vision Problems Don’t Keep Athletes Down
Visual impairment can affect anyone, at any age, at any time. For some people, a congenital condition can appear at birth, for others a reduction in eyesight can happen gradually over time, due to illness, a disease such as macular degeneration or glaucoma, or a traumatizing accident.
Fortunately, vision loss need not be debilitating due to new assistive technology for the vision impaired. In fact, those deemed legally blind can do nearly anything a sighted person can, including participation in sports and even reading text.
Legally Blind Athletes
Take James Magana, for instance. A wrestler on Monrovia High School’s varsity team, he has managed to rise to the top of his sport even though he is plagued by a congenital disease that affected his eyesight from birth. Although Magana can see vague shapes and colors, he is considered legally blind. But he hasn’t allowed that handicap to dictate what he can and cannot do. As his father reminded him, it does not take perfect vision to wrestle.
Magana is not alone in his quest to overcome the obstacles visual impairment erects. Asya Miller also deals with low vision due to Stargardt’s disease, yet she doesn’t allow that fact to keep her from competing in goalball as a U.S. Paralympics. Although her competitors often try to fool her with a soft, low noise throw, Miller uses her sense of hearing to determine who is throwing the ball and where it is headed. In fact, she is so good at sports Miller has managed to amass more than 79 medals in the past decade.
There are numerous blind and visually impaired athletes who excel in nearly any sport, including downhill skiing, judo, wrestling, track and field, cycling, power lifting, and much more.