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Video: Challenged Athlete Of The Year Andre Kajlich

  • By Steve Godwin
  • Published Mar 12, 2012

On Saturday night at the Endurance LIVE Awards in Los Angeles, Calif. Andre Kajlich was presented with the award for Challenged Athlete of the Year.

PHOTOS: 2012 Endurance LIVE Awards

Watch our interview with Kajlich above and then learn more about him below:

In December of 2003, Andre Kajlich (pronounced Ky-Lick) was in the Czech Republic taking a biochemistry classes. After a late night and early morning out with friends, he headed to the subway station for the trip home. The next thing he remembers was waking up in the hospital three weeks later and being told that he had somehow ended up on the subway tracks and had lost both legs above the knee. Add to that six broken ribs, a broken arm, collapsed lungs and a badly cut back, and the 24-year-old was lucky just to be alive.

In October of 2010 he participated in his first triathlon as part of a relay team and swam 1.2 miles in the ocean before completing a ten mile run using a racing chair. Andre was hooked. He did an Olympic distance triathlon in the spring of 2011 and qualified for the New York City Triathlon, which is the national ParaTri Championships. In June of 2011 he did his first 70.3 in Lubbock, Texas and qualified for Kona in his first attempt. In August of 2011 he raced New York, took second, and qualified for Beijing a month later where he took home the silver medal at the World’s. Finally, he completed the Ironman World Championship in October of 2011 with a time of 10:25:21.

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Steve Godwin

Steve Godwin

Steve Godwin is the Senior Video Producer at Competitor Group. When he's not on location shooting or editing in the studio, you can find him out training for his next race. Follow Steve on twitter @sgodwinfilms

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