Juan Bautista Pérez (Cistierna, León, 1969) is one of the oldest athletes of the Spanish Paralympic team. He debuts in his first games with 47 years and Olympic diploma after touching bronze in table tennis category for players with physical disabilities.
The Spanish Palist fell into the fight for the Bronze Medal with the Italian Mohamed Amine Kalem by 7-11, 8-11 and 6-11. “You can't defeat who never surrenders,” he says. His sports career dates back to more than three decades. He had not taken his first steps when his family moved to Vigo. With 16 years he was already a ping Pong genius and with 18 he proclaimed himself champion of Spain in all the lower categories. Triumphs that lifted the third place in the national ranking.
His skill with the blade led him to play the table of table tennis world held in New Delhi (India) in 1987. No one expected the reverse that shook his life and that he would mark the rest of his days. During a game, and without apparent reason, his legs faltered, he ran out of force in an instant and had to leave the competition.
He was not yet aware of the tortuous road ahead. Repatriation was delayed three days with hardly any medical attention, according to their testimony. A month of evidence and medical pilgrimage until reaching an accurate diagnosis: acute polyrradiculoneuritis or Landry Guillain-Barré syndrome, a rare and degenerative disease that blocks peripheral nerves and muscle connections.
The rehabilitation was carried out at the Guttmann Institute in Barcelona, specializing in spinal injuries and other neurological pathologies. The media echoed their situation. The young promise of table tennis Juan Bautista Pérez could be “invalid for life.” After several disagreements, the Superior Sports Council took over the bill of its rehabilitation for an amount of 4 million pesetas. At two years, he competed again. He changed his way of playing, but did not lose the hunger of titles. He signed for the Almendralejo Extremadura Obrero Club, with which he was runner -up of Cup and third in the maximum division.
In 2013, competitions for athletes with disabilities were hooked and, since then, it has not gotten out of the great national and international podiums. In Rio, the Leonese faces his ghosts from the past. The zika virus carrier mosquito can also transmit Landry Guillain-Barré syndrome. “Passing the disease does not make you immune and it is possible to contract it again, although it is not easy. In India we do not adopt the necessary precautions and caught me very low of defenses,” says the athlete.
Almost thirty years after the nightmare of New Delhi, Juan Bautista is in Rio defending the colors of Spain again.
