Alex Roca made history this past Sunday when he completed the Barcelona marathon. He did it with a time of 5 hours, 50 minutes and 51 seconds, but the Catalan became the first athlete with 76 percent physical disability to cover 42,195 meters. A feat that he had previously achieved: 5 triathlons, 5 half marathons, a Titan Desert or a Pilguim Race. Roca (Barcelona, 1991) communicates through sign language and has reduced mobility on the left side of his body due to cerebral palsy that he suffered when he was six months old. Then he suffered a herpetic viral encephalitis that led to this disability that has not prevented him from fulfilling his dreams. At the appointment with ABC he goes with Mari Carmen Maza, his wife, his friend, his confidante. She is the one who interprets Alex’s signs and the one who gives voice to his thoughts.
-What value do you give to having finished the marathon?
-I can’t qualify it yet but it is one of the most wonderful things I have ever achieved in my life.
-What has been the hardest?
-The preparation. On a physical level because I find myself with many difficulties: a 76 percent physical disability, a very crooked foot with a great curvature and above all with many problems nourishing myself during the race. I can’t eat solids running and that has been a big obstacle. Just to tell him that in key training, after five kilometers I tried to eat solid food, I choked and luckily my personal trainer, my mother-in-law and my wife were there to save me because I thought I would stay there. At the last minute, three weeks before, he had to change the entire nutrition plan, taking into account that at each stop he had to eat 288 milligrams of carbohydrates with 300 milliliters of water… In short, crazy.
-And what was going through your head during those 42 kilometers?
-I was really going through situations of all kinds. At some point I felt that I couldn’t but I also had others in which I looked around me and felt gratification for everything I was achieving. I really looked at the whole team and thought: I’m lucky to have a lot of people who support me and love me.
-Is it possible to forget about limitations at times?
-I often forget about my limitations because I think I am a very ambitious and highly motivated person, and when I have a goal in mind I feel so eager that sometimes I eliminate all obstacles even if they exist.
-You are the living example of wanting is being able…
-I do not consider myself the example of wanting is power, but I consider myself a person who fights to fulfill my dreams. Willing is power when willpower, work, motivation and teamwork come together. If you want, you can’t directly, but you must fight it, surround yourself with very powerful people and look for the strategy by which you can achieve the objective.
-But you must feel like a reference…
-I do not feel like an example but I do notice that there are people for whom I am a reference and for me it is a source of pride. I always like to remember an experience that happened to me one day: I was running in Barcelona and a boy came up to me and said: “I tried to commit suicide and I couldn’t but I found out about your story in your videos and now I want to live life and I do sports for overcome my moments of difficulty. There I thought: «Alex, you are doing something right in life».
– Does that backpack, that responsibility, weigh?
-Of course it’s heavy. I’m not fake, I’m very sincere and it weighs a lot. I had a lot of pressure but I like that because it motivates me and pushes me to achieve my dreams but many times I am afraid of disappointing the world. But I think that if I have given everything to the maximum all along the way, no one can tell me anything because I have given all my heart, body, soul and mind to achieve the goal. If I have not achieved it, it is not because I have not offered everything, but the first thing is health, that always.
-Where has been the key to your fight?
-Because of what the marathon does in the word resilience because when I am in a moment when I see that I cannot, I remember the moments of difficulty from when I was little and I think that if I could with that, how could I not be able to with this? Even so, there are times when I would stop, I would not continue… but I look around at the people who love me and support me…
-How is this carried when one is a child?
-I remember a lot that when I was little I had an outside world that scared me and it was the world of the street because I had received a lot of disrespect, looks and negative comments. And I had another part of my life that was when I was at home or when I went to school. That world made me feed myself positively and evolve as a person and right now, in moments of difficulty I always turn to those people who have always been with me and who give me strength and power to continue. This is brutal stuff. I eat a lot from the people around me, they are my strength and my vitamin, but I also believe that I am a person with a lot of mental strength.
What role have your parents played in your life?
-Throughout my childhood and adolescence my parents have been very important to me. They have always been with me and have accompanied me through everything, like any other child. They have helped me grow and evolve.
-When did you opt for sports?
-Since I was little I loved soccer. At school I started playing with Ronaldo Nazario’s shirt and as I grew up I tried many sports, like skiing, tennis… I liked them but I didn’t fully practice them until about nine years ago I did my first race, five kilometres, and I really liked it. But I did one or two a year. In 2016 I did my first triathlon and there I felt that I loved doing sports and in 2017, with my uncle, I did a tandem bike. In 2018 I tried the Titan Desert and since then I have not stopped fighting. That race generated a change in my life.
-What change? What does sport bring you?
-It gives me communication and right now it is part of my job and I give conferences with my wife Mari Carmen to make people aware of the importance of inclusion and the benefits of sport, but above all of the values that we must have in our life. Our goal is that when the conference ends, attendees say: “Now I have goals to strive for, dreams to fulfill, minds to change, and people to say I love you to.”
-Does sport eliminate barriers or are they still there?
-Me, while I run, I forget that I have a disability. I believe that it is the person himself who must remove his barriers. Society has to fight a lot but we have to send a message to each other and that is that the one who arrives last sometimes arrives happier than the first. The record holder in the Barcelona race was very happy but I don’t think he was happier than me… That’s removing barriers. Winning or achieving a great brand is not achieving success, but what you do makes you happy.
What is the next challenge now?
-Be happy every day and assimilate the marathon, because it will cost me. Now we have to see everything that the marathon process has generated to apply it in conferences and show it to the world so that everyone can savor what the path before, during and after a marathon can really offer.
The Barça and Rafael Nadal
What athletes do you admire?
-My idol is my grandfather but at a sporting level I always had Ronaldinho as a reference because he always went out onto the field with a beautiful smile and I am like that, I always go out smiling. But right now I love it and I would like to meet Rafa Nadal because I think he is a person with incalculable mental strength and indescribable willpower. In addition, I have had several idols throughout my life, also from Barcelona, because I am very culé. I respect that everyone is from a different club but I adore Barça and on Sunday, after the marathon, I went to the Camp Nou without being able to walk, lame, my lame, to cheer on my team. It was a round day. When I was little I went to the field because everyone was looking at the game and not me and that gave me peace of mind and football has helped me to be happy. I managed to finish a marathon and also, the club of my heart won. A round day
-He will be happy, half the league in his pocket…
-We’ll see. I think so, hopefully so. I love Barça very much and, furthermore, I have been an ambassador for their Foundation for a year and a half and transmitting these values that they have to society makes me so happy…
-He also told me that his idol was his grandfather…
It’s hard for me to talk about this. He went to heaven two months ago and now I cry when I talk about him. When I was little, when the doctors said that I would never walk, my grandfather said that I would, and when I was three years old I started to walk because he put a towel under my arms every afternoon, every day, so that I could try and give it a try. new step. I started walking at the age of three, but it doesn’t matter when you do things, but rather the value you give it when doing it. And he also taught me to drive and gave me his car. How could my grandfather not be my idol if he has been a vital reference for me. He died two months ago and he was still driving. And he was 92 years old.
-His life is a good tribute to him…
-On Sunday, when I reached the finish line, I remembered him so much… And I ran the entire race with the necklace I gave him eight years ago. And when I crossed the finish line I asked the organization if someone could get me a medal because I had to bring it to the cemetery for my grandfather and grandmother, who were two great references for me and two people who loved me with their hearts. I always gave him all the medals and told him all the stories because he was a person who always had an ear to listen to me and the more I explained to him, the more he wanted to know. The love he felt for me was incredible.
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– A few years ago he got married. She has also shown that there are no barriers in love…
-Success I don’t know but I have caught the best girl in the whole world. When I was little I thought I would never have a partner. I saw myself differently and I would see my friends talking to girls and I would think, “Are they going to notice me?” She had known her for more than six years and since then we have spent almost 24 hours together and for me she is the luck of my life. We fight together in challenges and in life and it is something indescribable.
-And how did you get it?
-In the first place, to say that she was the one who wrote to me but the trick was not to make things easy from the beginning. That’s how I hooked her…
-And when you see them together, do you think people judge unjustifiably?
-A lot. But we don’t care because we know what we have and what we have always had.