Blindness No Barrier To Malek Chamoun’s Bid For A Medal At Glasgow Commonwealth Games

 MALEK Chamoun was seven when he was diagnosed with a condition that would eventually blind him.

His father George didn’t tell him for several years.
“He wanted to be play footy with his mates and all that,” George says. “And for a while, he could and he did.”
When retinitis pigmentosa began to severely diminish Malek’s sight as he entered his teens, George raised the idea of his boy taking up the sport in which he once represented Australia: weightlifting.
To gauge how rough the road ahead would be, George closed his eyes and lifted.
“I tried it myself and it is definitely difficult. You need a lot of balance, you need to see what you’re doing,” he said.
“But you know, football was not going to be easy. So I started thinking, what else can he do?
“Let’s try weightlifting and see how he goes.”
A dozen years on and Malek Chamoun has, by any measure, gone well. Inspirationally well.
The 24-year-old has become the first legally blind athlete to ever be nominated for Australia’s Commonwealth Games team, and will compete against able-bodied athletes in Glasgow in the 85kg weightlifting division.
With his dad and coach George next to him literally every step, as always, Malek qualified by smashing his personal best at the recent trials, where he finished as pound-for-pound the best Australian lifter.
“I am here, I made it and it’s a great accomplishment,” Malek said.
“There have been a lot of hard years of training. There have been some disappointing times. I didn’t make the last Commonwealth Games because I was injured.
“Then the year after I made the world championships in 2011 but this Commonwealth Games, it amazing for me.”
Malek was back training in the garage of his dad’s home in Summer Hill this week, banging down weights on the 2000 Olympics weightlifting platform that George bought him for $500 at auction. The bond of father and son is clearly a strong one.
“I have been training for many years and I’ve had my Dad with me, I can’t thank him enough,” Malek says.
“He has put more effort into me than any other coach would. Pretty much everywhere I go he is there holding me and guiding me, whether it is training venues, or competitions.
“He is my personal coach and my carer. I honestly couldn’t do any of this without him.”
Now totally blind, Malek relies on George to accompany him on the stage during competitions and though now practised at setting his grip by feeling notches on the bar, his dad will occasionally help him “if a bar is old and worn, or twisted or something.”
The Paralympics were never an option for Malek, who regards himself as the equal of any sighted lifter.
“I don’t even think about it (blindness) as any big thing,” he explains.
“All I know I am competing in a normal sport, that’s it. Obviously there will be a bit of disadvantage, with balance and technique and stuff like that. But I don’t think about it. I don’t put it in my mind.
“If anything, it actually helps me. It motivates me more, that I am blind and competing against able athletes. There is nothing holding me back, I am just as good as everyone.”
Malek won’t need to see the green and gold uniform to feel immensely proud, and he hopes his presence in Glasgow will inspire others who need hope in dark times, as he once did.
“Not just kids with no sight, any kid with disability,” he says. “And not even just that. Even normal people who have problems. I hope I can show them they can overcome obstacles and break through any barrier.”
Australian Weighlifting Federation head coach Michael Keeler said Malek will even inspire his teammates.
“It’s a big thing for any person to do it, let alone someone who’s had the challenges to face that Malek has faced. It’s remarkable,” Keelan said.
-CULLED FROM THE DAILY TELEGRAPH