The Jim Cerveny Invitational Track Meet VIII at Mission Bay High Sat., March 21, was an annual chance to check in with blind para student-athlete Chris Abramson. It has always seemed like "home" to go the meet, because my wife and I were personal friends of Jim--and the growing relationship with Abramson has been a treat in the last four years.
"I'm going to San Diego State next year," he said enthusiastically, having just run one of his sprint races on the Mission Bay surface at 2:45 p.m. or so in the afternoon, the activity and the crowd dwindling as the meet was winding down.
But the crowds at the meets I have attended have always been encouraging and supportive of Chris, who was born able to see to some degree, but then through the progress of a disease lost the ability to detect light completely, as I remember it.
Abramson and other pioneers of para sports are spawning a movement that is growing, including Kamden Houshan, a wheelchair racer from Mount Carmel High School. There have been attempts in the last two or three years to create and build "unified" sports and athletes who would train and compete as partners or groups for support, under their respective staff at their high schools.
I mentioned Gabby Bigler, who I interviewed last June, to Chris. She is a rower for the San Diego Rowing Club, and she has a partner who guides the two-person vessel and keeps the pace so that Gabby can just focus on rowing. That's plenty for her to do, with her impaired sight, which she overcomes by sitting in the front row in math at Canyon Crest Academy, taking photos of the work on the whiteboard in front of the room, and enlarging those photos so that she can continue working math problems. Very ingenious, very courageous, very successful.
A common factor in Chris's case, Gabby's, and others', is considerable family support. You don't make it alone with such conditions. Chris has skied downhill with his father.
Chris commented on Gabby's rowing, "You just need somebody to steer, and look around" (for conditions). He was talking about tandem bike-riding, which he does on a bicycle-built-for-two--the other person rides in front and guides the handlebars. All Chris has to do is trust and pedal.
He is pretty excited about enrolling at SDSU in the fall, because he and his guide runner and one-on-one teacher's aide for many years, David Cervantes, said that the Aztecs have had many handicapped student-athletes, and "they are number one in ambulatory sports", including anything that affects running track: sight, hearing, mobility, cerebral palsy, "and all that", in Chris's words.
Even more exciting, lurking in the background, but not too far off, is the 2028 Paralympics with the Olympics in Los Angeles. "The coach of the U.S. (Parlympic track) team was just talking to Chris," said David after I approached them. A man fitting that description had just touched base with the athlete and moved elsewhere on the track infield.
"Of course," or something to that effect, Abramson replied when I asked him if the Paralympics were in his future plans. He wants to qualify and go. Same with Gabby. Big stuff. The international stage. Why not do something if it's the way upward, the biggest, best competition available?
In general conversation, which Chris is always amenable to, he said, "I eat sugar-free by preference: healthy veggies, avocadoes. Healthy stuff including broccoli and sweet potatoes. I have blueberries everyday. They're my best source of vitamin C."
Somebody's doing shopping in his household, because, "I have cereal. Homemade, with oats and nuts."
I had forgotten his dad is Canadian. "He grew up just outside Toronto. He grew up ice-skating," which Chris has done with him.
The intersection at Law and Ingraham in Pacific Beach is always a bear, I remember him saying. "It's really bad crossing Ingraham. Cars don't stop." Also, electric cars are difficult to hear, with their low-noise engines. "When traffic one way stops, then you know to go," Abramson said.
To put a cherry on top of the whole day, Chris had set a new field record at Mission Bay for his time in the 200 meters (2:59). Basically, every time he has raced the last couple of years, he has set records, because he is the pioneer of this genre of track. Pretty heady stuff.
Talking about what he has run into over the years, Chris good-naturedly listed, "Fences, poles, trees, cement blocks. The cane (I use) doesn't (detect) solid surfaces, like a car. I've run into the side of a car."
