Gary Hardt takes double gold at National Special Olympics

In May Gary Hardt was wearing red as he graduated from Maricopa High School. This month, however, he’s wearing gold—the gold medals he and his Arizona teammates won in two separate events, Four-man Bocce Ball and Doubles Bocce Ball.

The wins came at the Special Olympics National Summer Games at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln during what Hardt termed a “once in a lifetime” experience.

Hardt learned bocce ball as part of the Special Olympics team activities offered through Maricopa Wells Middle School and Maricopa High School by coach Pam Herrera.

According to Laura Done, his mother and a Maricopa Elementary School special education teacher, “His participation has increased his physical activity and his self-esteem.”

Physical activity was only a remote possibility when Gary was adopted as a premature infant, hooked up to wires to help him breathe and monitors to sound an alarm if he didn’t.

Prior to his trip to Nebraska, Hardt was looking forward to an airplane ride. He said then, “I feel excited and a little scared. I feel special to be able to go to Nebraska and be on the Arizona team for bocce ball.”

Hardt almost didn’t get to wear a red cap and gown or have the opportunity to win those gold medals. In April, just before graduation, he ended up in the hospital with a ruptured appendix.

Yet he never wavered in his quest for the gold. Before flying to Nebraska he said, “I will try to do my best, and I think I will make a lot of new friends.”

And he did.

Submitted photo