A 50-year-old Spring Hill, Florida, man is drawing headlines and admiration from across the nation not only for his spectacular performance on the Professional Bowlers' Tour but also because he's doing so blind!
Despite the handicap of being legally blind, Henry Svetina is routinely scoring in the 250 range and has even hit 300 twice as part of a competitive bowling team called Pro-Arms. His form is just about perfect thanks to a his methodical approach, which includes taking the exact same amount of steps each time he releases the ball.
Svetina is legally blind, the result of a horrific accident that occurred while he was working at New York's Long Island Airport back in 1991. Sulfuric acid was accidently sprayed into his eyes and he lost his vision instantaneously. Svetina says he can only "see" blurry colors from objects a couple of feet ahead of him and that anything further than that is simply pitch black to him.
"It's very tough," he said. "When I woke up the morning after [the accident], I couldn't see at all. It was a hard thing to get over."
"When I first started, I never thought in a million years that I could bowl and do this," he told NewYorkCBS. "At first I used to hope that [the ball] hit, you know. Sometimes you gotta go with your senses and hope your direction is right," he said. "People are shocked when they see me out there. They're like, 'Oh my god, this guy!' "
Svetina is starting a program he calls Visually Impaired Persons of Southwest Florida. He hopes that this fundraising program for local bowing will help other legally blind and visually impaired men and women. Fort Myers pro bowler Lee Rucker has said he would help with the fundraising since there seems to be a lack of support and interest from other pros in the sport, reports TampaBay.
"I wanna go out and enjoy myself, and to show other people in any condition that they can come out and bowl and do just as good as I can and that's it."
Svetina will compete next in the Pro-Arm World Series of Bowling that will be held in Las Vegas in December.
