“No Need For Sight If You Have a Vision.”

The new Trackside magazine is out, and I think this will be the one to put us on the map. The whole experience has been an eye opener, and having the opportunity to "meet" and interview some of the biggest names from track's past and present has been so much fun.

My first interview for this issue was with Lex Gillette. Lex is a fascinating person, a man, who despite not being able to see, sprints and jumps as a Paralympian. In fact, he has long jumped over 22 feet, and there is visual evidence of this (see right). There is a rumor that he was also a waiter at a high-end restaurant in the past, but I didn't quite have the nerve to ask if this was true.

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Lex Gillette lives by this motto. Blind since the age of eight, he grew to discover the one bit of information that the doctors failed to relay in their prognosis twenty years ago.

“They never told me that I could see my potential through Paralympic sport,” wrote the long jump world record holder in his category.

Gillette discovered jumping innocently enough.

“I was in high school, and we were taking the Presidential Fitness test for gym class. One of the categories was the standing broad jump. And I was one of the best (in the class).

Brian Whitmer took Gillette to the next level. Whitmer, a visual impairment specialist at Athens Drive HS in Gillette’s hometown of Raleigh, NC, was the first to hone Gillette’s jumping talents. The youngster had been athletic, playing basketball and riding his bicycle with mother Verdina Gillette-Simms, herself legally blind because of complications from glaucoma.

But there was something different about sprinting down a runway at full speed and hurtling through the air into an abyss of the unknown.

“He (Whitmer) was the first person to say we could take it (jumping) from standing to running. We went to a sports camp in Michigan during my sophomore year. It was specifically for the visually impaired. There was a long jump competition and I won. But it was frightening. I’m realistic and the idea of running (at full speed) and jumping was scary and crazy.”

Whitmer, who is also visually impaired, taught Gillette the basics of the event.

“A lot of it (the training) is trust. We developed a system. He would clap and yell. My job was to run toward the noise. It started with a five step approach.”

Indeed, Gillette ended up with an array of bumps and bruises from approach missteps. But he remained steadfast in his desire to succeed at track, and by his junior year had joined the squad at Athens Drive, working his way to team co-captain as a senior.

Gillette’s next step was East Carolina University in nearby Greenville.  He had initial talks with then-ECU coach Bill Carson about joining the Pirate team, but ended up realizing he would be continuing his training alone.

One of his biggest decisions came after a phone call from the United States Olympic Committee.

(continued on page 20 at TrackSide Magazine) --