Brady employee wins gold medal in bocce
Harry Besleme placed first in bocce ball at the Special Olympics.
Published Oct. 30, 2007
Some students eating at the Brady Food Court could be unaware that a worker who helps clean up after them is a gold-medal-winning athlete.
Harry Besleme won a gold medal in bocce ball at the Special Olympics World Games in Shanghai, China.
Besleme plays with family friend Bob Stephens as a unified double, which means the team is composed of one person with a disability and one without. The two have been playing with one another for two years, winning the gold medals at district and state competitions. The team was then sent to a sports camp for a week to determine their place on Team USA.
"They thought I was the best qualified for the world games because of my sportsmanship, that sort of thing," Besleme said.
Besleme was born with Asperger's syndrome, a milder form of autism, which qualifies him to compete in the Special Olympics. He has worked full-time at the Brady Food Court for two and half years, cleaning tables, taking out trash and keeping the common area clean.
The Special Olympics is an organization that gives people with disabilities the opportunity to compete in sports.
Bocce ball is a sport where players, individually or in teams, throw a small ball first called a pallino. The players then throw larger balls, aiming to be closest to the pallino. Players can also throw to knock the other player's balls away.
Besleme said he has played this Italian game for seven years, winning districts, states and now the Special Olympics.
Besleme and Stephens spent 19 days in Shanghai with other American Special Olympics athletes who competed in a large number of sports, including other teams competing in bocce ball, Stephens said.
The team competed in two events: one for doubles and the other as a team of four, Stephens said, winning them two gold medals.
For the doubles match it was just Besleme and Stephens, but for the team competition, they paired up with a father-daughter team from Oklahoma.
The last game against Hong Kong, which determined the gold medal winner, was particularly exciting for Besleme, he said. The two won 16-14, guaranteeing them a gold medal.
Besleme's father, Jim Besleme, said 4,000 athletes competed at the event.
"The place was packed for the last game," Jim Besleme said. "Everyone came to watch it, even the Chinese police. It was amazing."
Besleme was joined in Shanghai by his father and sister but not by coach Frank La Mantia, who taught the team more refinement in the last months of their training.
"It was really nice," Besleme said. "It was my first time in China. They were very friendly."
Besleme and Stephens were also honored by being introduced to fans at the MU football game against Illinois State.
On his first day back to work, Besleme was honored in a reception to congratulate him, Brady Food Court manager Alan Petersen said.
His coworkers presented him with materials to create a scrapbook to preserve the memories of Shanghai. Besleme said the difficult thing for him was getting back into the work habit after three weeks away from work.