This time I’m so happy to present to you the Hoyt Team, an impressive demonstration of what people motivated by love can be capable to achieve. This is a beautiful story about a child that was saved by his parents from the doctors diagnose. They never listened when doctors said that his son was going to live in a vegetative state for the rest of his life, they always knew that with love and dedication his son had a chance to live a live just like anybody and time proved they were right.
We need to go back to 1962 the year Rick was born quadriplegic with cerebral palsy, caused by loss of oxygen to his brain at birth because his umbilical cord was wrapped around his neck. The doctors told Rick’s parents to put him away, in an institution because recovery was impossible and he would never be a normal child.
Dick and Judy thought about the idea but they decided that they were not going to put Rick away and instead they were going to try everything to give him a normal live just like any other child. Since the beginning they noticed that Rick was smart, by the look in his eyes they knew he was paying attention to everything they said to him and that let them to believe that if they can get a computer to help Rick to communicate with them he would be able to do so.
Rick’s parents fought to have him attend a public school just like any normal kid, but the authorities refused arguing that he wasn’t capable to communicate but shortly after Dick & Judy proved them wrong when they asked a group of engineers at Tufts University if they could build an interactive computer so Rick could use it to talk through it. Their initial answer was a “No way!”, so in an effort to convince the scientist Rick’s parents asked them to tell him a joke, so they did and the kid laughed, so then it became obvious to them that Rick had a lot inside of him trying to came out and that he was capable to learn.
The scientist said that it would cost about $5,000.00 dollars to build the computer and back then that was a lot of money but the Hoyts raised the money in short time and finally Rick’s computer was built in 1972 costing about $5,000 dollars, they called it Tuft Interactive Communicator (TIC) but Dick and Judy called “The Hope Machine”. His mom worked hard teaching him the alphabet, Judy would stick letters to everything around the house so Rick could learn by association and repetition and he did learn very fast. When he was 11 years old he got accepted into school.
So they got the computer and invited close friends to witness Rick saying his first word, and everyone was speculating what was he going to say first, some were saying it’s going to be “hi mom!” and others said no he’s going to say “hi dad! “ but it was so funny when to the surprise of everyone present at that moment he said “Go Bruins!” his favorite hockey team that was heading to the Stanley Cup finals on that year.
Rick did well at school and most of the students accepted him without a problem and it was at school that he saw a sign about a charity event to help raise money for a paralyzed school’s athlete. He asked his Dad if he could help him to participate in a way to contribute to the charity and his dad said yes!
It was a nice Spring day in 1977 when Rick and his dad showed up for the race, an uphill 5 mile race. The organizers and many of the people around thought that they were not going to make it past the corner but the Father & Son team made it to the finish line. Dick was 40 years old at that time.
Back home they were talking how awesome it was to participate and contribute in the race when a phrase came out of Rick’s mouth, he said “Dad while we were running I felt like all my disabilities disappeared” and that’s when the Hoyt Team was born. Dick had realized that finally they have found a sport that they can do together and even although that Dick was hurting from the race he experience the greatest feeling in the world when he saw how happy his son was.
To Dick, Rick has been the greatest blessing in his life, he says Rick is his motivator and inspiration, to him Rick is the real athlete competing and he is just loaning his legs and arms so he can compete, it is just an incredible source of energy that he is not able to explain with words that make him keep running and swimming, when he is with Rick that allows him to go faster, it is just an unbelievable feeling, he said.
Since that first charity race they have been competing in many triathlons becoming a symbol to the Ironman competition. They said they feel thankful for being allowed to participate and at the same time honored by competing with the best tri-athletes in the world. The excitement of coming down the road near the finish line is an incredible feeling that energizes them listening to the cheering crowd.
Rick not only attended high school but also graduated from Boston University with a major in Special Education, and also works at the university. Rick once said “I may be disabled but I have lived a very fulfilling live and if someone gets the time to know me they will realize that I’m no different than anyone else.”
As of August 31, 2008, Team Hoyt had participated in a total of 984 events, including 229 Triathlons (6 of which were Ironman competitions), 20 Durathlons, and 66 Marathons, including 26 Boston Marathons. They have also biked and run across the USA, in 1992 — a 3,735 mile journey that took them 45 days.
We can only imagine what the doctors that recommended having Rick turned into an institution to live as a vegetable would say now about Rick’s achievements. There message has always been “Yes you can!”, you can do anything you want to as long as you make up your mind you can do it. They have definitely mastered the meaning of life, that when you combine love and motivation everything is possible.
The Team Hoyt is such an amazing example and a lesson of life… a motivation life.
By Rolando Ponce de León
This video has captions for our hispanic audience
