Sharp lessons from a man with no legs

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Ernst van Dyk in conversation with David O’Sullivan at the SAB Sports Media awards in Johannesburg.

Almost 20 years ago, I heard Andy Irvine talk at the Wanderers. The former British Lions fullback was mesmerising.

Through the years I’ve heard many other outstanding sportsmen. Among them was Ashwin Willemse, who two years ago wowed the crowd at the SA Rugby awards with a magnificent speech.

Last night, Ernst van Dyk, in conversation with David O’Sullivan, joined the club while regaling the audience at the SAB Media Awards. Appropriately enough, it was also at the Wanderers.

Van Dyk, a champion wheelchair racer, has competed professionally for 23 years and if he is showing no signs of slowing down, in either sense, he ought to give thought to taking his talk show on the road. He’s that good.

He’s a beast in the world of wheelchair racing and has won the Boston Marathon 10 times, and also New York, Paris and London. Van Dyk has competed at six Paralympics and will be gunning for a seventh in Rio when he will be aiming for gold in the road race, time trial and marathon events. He’s a real gem and a supreme example of sporting excellence.

Mixing in homespun philosophy with self-deprecating humour, he had the audience so spellbound he received three job offers afterwards.

The irony is that he was able to tell his story at all. When Van Dyk was born in Ceres 42 years ago, the doctor told his parents he had never delivered a baby as deformed as he. He suggested they send him to an institution and forget about him. Thankfully, they thought differently.

His views on technology, rivals and his many races were fascinating and inevitably talk shifted to another high-profile disabled sportsman: Oscar Pistorius.

Van Dyk is bemused by the public’s fascination with the disgraced athlete, not least their habit of making role models of sportsmen. “I’m not sure why people do that. A guy might be good kicking a ball, but don’t say to my daughter to be like him. Role models are engineers, nurses, surgeons . . . don’t make me a role model because I can push a wheelchair fast.”

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Night out with Ernst van Dyk, David O’Sullivan and Paula Fray.

Given the overwhelming evidence that many sportsmen have feet of clay, it was a salutary lesson from a man who deserves to be lauded at every turn.