11-year-old champion is given running shoes

11-year-old Ángel Alexander Tzakum González

won first place in a race against 19 competitors last December 5 in the state of Yucatán . The boy ran barefoot and with no special equipment.

Ángel is currently in sixth grade of elementary school and considers himself to be an average student. His favorite subject is math, though he still hasn’t contemplated a career choice.

However, he is passionate about soccer and athletics: “I like to run and feel like I can outrun others.”

He stated that it was his mother, Leslie Maribel González , who taught him that sports were the best way to stay healthy and maximize his capacities in all areas of his life.

The 35-year-old woman has two jobs and tries to set an example for her three children: During her teenage years, she was a runner and won a medal for her efforts.

Ángel’s siblings Gibrán Farid, aged 23, and Leslie Arleth, 15 , have also participated in athletic races and won awards. Meanwhile, the 11-year-old boy has already won four.

The young boy told EL UNIVERSAL that he had had no knowledge of the race until that Sunday. Once he arrived in the main square of Tekax , which was celebrating its 177th anniversary , he decided to take off his school shoes so that they wouldn’t get damaged.

He was wearing casual clothes: A pair of jeans and an undershirt, but that didn’t stop Ángel from reaching the finish line.

He was awarded with a steel medal and given the right to stand on the first place podium. He also won the admiration of his community and social media users. He even got to know the governor Mauricio Vila Dosal during a tour last Thursday in the Oxkutzcab municipality.

He was given a t-shirt and running shoes, as well as a package with school materials and a backpack.

Ángel has stated that he finds great joy in running and that running without shoes posed no challenge for him, since he has grown used to it. “I want to play soccer and keep running forever,” he claimed.

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