As Fernando Rufino recounts the extraordinary list of mishaps and injuries that have shaped his life, you begin to suspect that you've been transported to some other dimension.
One of Brazil's best-known Paralympians, Rufino has earned the nickname “Iron Cowboy” for his canoeing exploits, a reference to his past as a rodeo rider and the fact that, at age 21, he fell off a moving bus and was crushed by the wheels, leaving him with a metal plate in his spinal cord.
That alone would be an amazing story, but we haven't even heard the half of it yet.
He has been trampled by an 800kg bull, dragged to the ground by a galloping horse and has been in accidents involving cars, motorbikes and horses.
“I broke my thumb,” Rufino said. Athletic“I cut the tip of my finger off and a tiny saw blade went down my face, right under my eye. My brother and I used to try to re-enact fight scenes from movies and one time he hit me with a wooden plank and sliced open my head.”
“As a teenager, I had my jaw broken by a bull, then I was hit by a bus. I drove my motorbike into a tree at 100km/h. A metal bar fell on me while I was lifting weights at the gym and broke my nose. I broke two ribs from overtraining and spent two weeks training thinking my broken leg was just a muscle problem…
“And then I got struck by lightning.”
lightning?
“Yes! Right on the front door of my house. I felt the energy coursing through my body. I was thrown into the air. It landed on the back of my neck and cut my elbow. My muscles were rigid and I writhed on the floor for about 15 minutes. I could smell a burning smell for three days afterwards.
“When I have an accident, I'm so happy because it gives me another story to tell. I'm a country guy, a warrior who wants to win in life, a Paralympic gold medal winning cowboy.”
And today, the reigning Paralympic Va'a 200m VL2 champion and three-time world champion will take to the water looking to defend his title.
Rufino grew up on a traditional farm in Mato Grosso do Sul state in central-west Brazil, where he and his parents still live with their horses and cattle, and the money he earned from canoes was used to run the farm, following the example of his grandparents.
Rufino became a rodeo rider with dreams of traveling the world, but after suffering a spinal cord injury, he knew his career was over.
He learned to walk again on the farm with his father's help, and spent most of his rehabilitation at home, enjoying horseback riding and swimming in the reservoir. “The animals are my story, they're a part of me,” he says. “They helped me walk again.”
But Rufino still wanted to travel the world. Sports was the way to do it. A friend found a center that trained athletes with disabilities. He tried a few sports, and at 8 a.m. on August 7, 2012 – the date he remembers clearly – he tried paracanoeing.
“When I'm on the water I forget about my disability,” he says. “I feel like everyone else. If you see me paddling next to someone without a disability, you wouldn't know which one of us is disabled. It's liberating.”
The 39-year-old missed the 2016 Rio Paralympics because of high blood pressure and an enlarged heart, but a lower training load allowed his skill to improve. Making his Paralympic debut at Tokyo 2020, which was postponed for 12 months because of the global pandemic, he made a statement, even with a lush bush of silver hair, becoming the first Brazilian to win a Paralympic gold medal.
Fernando Rufino hit his stride in Tokyo (Yasuyoshi Chiba/AFP via Getty Images)
With his family cheering him on from his home farm, Rufino will be competing against his best friend and compatriot Igor Tofalini, also a former rodeo cowboy and best man at his wedding in 2018. The two live, eat and train together at the National Canoeing Center in Ilha Comprida, Brazil. They are rivals on the water, but good friends off it, and they share everything.
“If he wins, we'll celebrate with a barbecue. If I win, same thing. But the gold and silver medals are ours.”
The bald, bushy-bearded Rufino, who wears a cowboy hat in his room in the Paralympic Village and will annoy everyone with “the saddest country music” on race day, says he is mentally and physically ready for Friday's heats and Sunday's final, if he makes it.
“I don't want to sound arrogant, but I have won everything there is to win in my sport and I believe I can leave here as a double Paralympic champion.”
Rufino, 43, said Los Angeles 2028 will likely be his last Paralympics but all that matters to him is to be remembered as “a true Iron Cowboy”.
“I will definitely die old. I have tried to die young, but I have never been able to do so.”
(Top photo: Dean Motaropoulos/Getty Images)
