Martín De la Puente, the first Spaniard to win a wheelchair tennis Grand Slam: “I still don’t believe it”

The Galician athlete has conquered the US Open in the wheelchair doubles modality“As a child I wanted to be a footballer and play for Celta”, he told NIUS in an interview granted after the victoryThe tennis player, a native of Vigo (Pontevedra), suffered the amputation of his left foot when he was 8 years oldA few hours ago he arrived in Barcelona, ​​the city where he lives and trains since 2017. But the Galician paralympic tennis player Martín De la Puente is still in a cloud after the feat achieved in the United States Joined. He has become the first Spaniard to win a wheelchair tennis Grand Slam. “It’s crazy, a dream come true. I still don’t believe it,” he tells NIUS. The 23-year-old athlete from Vigo (Pontevedra) was proclaimed the winner of the US Open last weekend in the wheelchair doubles category. He achieved victory forming a pair with the French tennis player Nicolás Peifer. The duo formed by the Galician and the Frenchman managed to beat the top favorites, the British Hewett and Reid, in the final. They turned a game around that ended 4-6, 7-5, 10-6. “Reaching the final and winning it was something I didn’t expect,” acknowledges the tennis player. De la Puente and Peifer had reached the final after beating the Dutch Tom Egberik, number one in the world, and the Belgian Joachim Gerard, in the semifinals. a match that was resolved 3-6, 6-4, 6-10. “In the semi-final there was a moment when I thought the door was closing on us. But, in the end, we got it”, he says with satisfaction.He did not imagine then that his name would end up written in gold letters in the history of world tennis. A story of overcoming after an amputation at the age of eightBeing a tennis player was not something that Martín De la Puente dreamed of when he was little. “As a child I wanted to be a footballer and play for Celta,” he admits to NIUS. At the age of three he was diagnosed with Proteus Syndrome, a congenital disease associated with bone growth. “I played soccer, but I couldn’t run well because I was dragging my foot,” he explains. It wasn’t until he was eight years old that his life changed forever. “My mother told me that they had to remove my left foot,” he says, while he acknowledges that at the time he did not know exactly what that involved. That amputation complicated his goal of being a soccer player, but it did not end his desire to play sports. His family encouraged him to try water polo, swimming and wheelchair basketball. It was his little brother who pushed him to practice tennis. “The first day I was in contact with the chair I didn’t even want to get on it or know what it was about. He said that it wasn’t tennis, or sport, or anything. But, later, they convinced me that the chair ran a lot and skidded and, when I tried it, I liked it a lot”, he confesses. That happened when he was 12 years old. A year later, at 13, he started competing. “I have had to live parts of life that are quite hard. Facing a disability with 8 years or 15 operations in 16 years is not something that many people go through. But I am a very hard-working and optimistic person, I fight for my dreams, to get ahead and always give my best”, affirms Martín. De la Puente, in the tennis eliteHis tenacity, courage and optimism made him win his first national title with only 15 years. At 18 he entered the Sant Cugat High Performance Center (Barcelona). On those courts he has started a meteoric career that has already accumulated numerous titles, being the first Spanish wheelchair tennis player to enter the top 10 of the world ranking. After participating in Roland Garros, he has now achieved this historic triumph at the US Open. Martín De la Puente has received these days congratulations from the world of sport, but also from the Royal House and the Xunta de Galicia. It had been 23 years since any Galician tennis player achieved a similar feat. The last one took place in 1999, when the tennis player from Pontevedra Lourdes Domínguez was proclaimed champion of the Junior category at Roland Garros. The tennis player from Vigo hopes that this will be the first great triumph of many. “The next challenge is simply to continue. Hopefully this is just the beginning,” he assures. Now he has to enjoy what he has achieved in the United States, but more international tournaments are coming soon. There are still many more deeds to write.