Mac Marcoux wins 2nd Paralympic bronze in super-G – Brandon Hicks

Rating: ***

This article presents a story that seems impossible and does a superb job of displaying the adrenaline that this 16 year old boy felt. Although, the story did not do well on choosing where to focus their attention on throughout the article, it deserves 3 out of 4 stars.

The story explains to us how a Canadian teenager named Mac Marcoux, who has only 6% of his peripheral vision and 0% of his central vision overcomes radio failure between him and his guide, but still manages to win a bronze medal at the 2014 Paralympics. It was not his first bronze medal either, earlier during the competitions he won a bronze medal in the super-G competition. (a downhill skiing race). They have drilled this technical difficulty before in practice, but obviously, the situation and atmosphere is much different during the actual event.  Robin Fémy, his guide, stated “I’ve never yelled so hard in my life.” Luckily, Mac heard his guide direct him through the whole course while he was travelling at speeds of 100 kilometers per hour. It is without a doubt a much more incredible accomplishment than winning the silver or gold medal, and proves that this teenager has a lot of potential for him in the future.

This article demonstrates to me that any challenge can be overcome and that you can still manage to find success (in this case the challenge was the radio failure and the success was a bronze medal). This story does not really make me think of anything particular because I have nothing relatable to this amazing accomplishment, but it could be related to other types of seemingly impossible stories. I learnt that even if you come to a hesitant and unpredictable situation, to remain calm and not to panic. Mac Marcoux stated that when he realized he had technical difficulties that he was scared but that he did not let it affect him. The only inspiration that this article gives me is to make my goals in life higher, because Mac is the same age as me and has accomplished so much more, even with his disadvantages. This might make me change my behavior when I am put in a position where the odds are highly against me. This is because the story teaches you to trust your instinct when faced with the ‘impossible’.

The only critical remark I have with this story is that I would rather it focus more on the incident than results of the super-G.  The concluding paragraph states the results of the super-G and compares them to Mac Marcoux. Overall, the article presented a story that you would think to be impossible in a decent fashion.

 

Hicks, Brandon. "Mac Marcoux wins 2nd Paralympic bronze in super-G - Paralympics News - CBC." CBCnews. CBC/Radio Canada, 9 Mar. 2014. Web. 23 Mar. 2014. <http://www.cbc.ca/sports/paralympics/news/mac-marcoux-wins-2nd-paralympic-bronze-in-super-g-1.2565362>.