Amazing swimmer comes back from cancer to win World gold
Maarten Van Der Weijden from Holland battled more than just the other competitors on his way to achieving his dream of Olympic qualification in the 10k open water swimming event and winning gold in the gruelling 25km event.
The 27 year old star also had to overcome cancer to qualify at the World Open Water Swimming Championships in Seville, and win a dream bronze medal in the 5km event.
The 27 year old 6ft7 giant's route to Beijing has included chemotherapy and a stem cell transplant. At 20 he was diagnosed with Leukaemia and given only a slim chance of survival.
He said: 'I was diagnosed in March 2001 and didn't think I would ever swim again. I had been to the world championships in 2000 in Hawaii and finished 9th and 10th. I was 19 years old and it was expected that I'd do good things in open water swimming.'
'After my treatment I lost 13kg, I couldn't sit, stand or anything. Two weeks after getting out of hospital my mother persuaded me to go swimming again, to enjoy the feeling of being in the water and start to get back into some sort of shape again.'
'I hadn't even thought about a come back at that stage. I would look at my body in the mirror all the time and wonder if I was getting better or whether the cancer would come back, but in the pool I didn't feel any fear that the cancer would come back. I felt relaxed and happy in the water.'
'By 2003 I was back in the team and finished 15th and 16th at the Barcelona World Championships. Before the decision that the 10k would be in the Olympics my main goal was to be world champion at the 25k. I trained a lot of hours and I didn't think I had the speed for the 5k or the 10k.'
'I decided to do a swim across a 20km wide Dutch lake. I won in a new record time and raised 50,000 euros for Dutch Cancer. I believe that I didn't fight cancer, I just had the right treatment, so I wanted to raise money to help fund treatments for other people.'
'That was 14th August 2004 and I hope 21st September 2008 will be another important date for me, that's the 10k at the Olympics. It would complete the story if I won gold, but I'm a realistic person and I need to be very lucky.'
Maarten will have to beat Britain's David Davies to win gold in Beijing, you can read his story in our swimmer interview this month.
