Lifting Expectations
Angel Muñoz May Be the Buffest Guy in the Gym, Even if He's In a Wheel Chair
By Elizabeth Gonzalez

Twenty-three year old Angel Muñoz is not the person you think of when you hear the word “bodybuilder.” That's because he is partially blind and is in a wheelchair. Angel reveals, “We don't do what we want, we do what we can.”

I walked into the San José City College weight room to meet the soft-spoken young athlete who preferred we talk in Spanish. Wearing a black tank and a baseball cap, Angel was sitting at one of the machines. I also met his mother, Maria, who was working out on other equipment in the room.

Angel was born in Santa Clara with spinabifida and had several operations as a child, including one to insert a valve that ran from his head to his stomach. His legs were weak as an infant, but at the age of two he was able to walk with the help of physical therapy. At the age of five his family moved to Mexico where his father had bought a ranch in the state of Jalisco.

He began to have problems with the valve that was inserted when he was a baby, he got an infection and during one operation his optical nerves were damaged and he partly lost his sight. That's when he and his mother decided to return to the U.S. because Angel was then scared of having any more operations. They also thought they could receive more help being here and so at 18 years old he and his mother returned to San José with the intention of only staying a year.

After about a year of therapy, doctors told him that if he still had hopes of walking one day he had to loose weight. Angel decided to enroll at San José City College to take a few courses and exercise in the weight room.

The Beginnings of a Body Builder
Angel says he started bodybuilding as an accident and only with the help of specific people. Last year, Hawk, a P.E. aid for 8 years, and now Angel's trainer, mentioned that he should compete in the bodybuilding competition at the school. He saw Angel working out in the weight room and thought he could represent the college in the wheelchair division. Angel thought the event involved swimming or a race of some kind. A few days later Hawk told him he had to train his body. Angel was surprised, but said he couldn't back out because he had already agreed to do it. He began training in September 2004 and had two months before the competition.

When he told his family he was going into bodybuilding they were happy for him, but he really didn't believe he would continue with training. He didn't see bodybuilding in his future.

The day of the competition Angel remembers being very nervous. He thought the competition was very imbalanced, pairing him with a man 20 years older and much bigger than himself.

Hawk is a former bodybuilder himself and has experience in running shows behind the scenes. He explains that there are no weight classes in the wheelchair division competitions. He says that judges look at symmetry, definition, plus density when judging the wheelchair competitions. In some ways that makes it much harder.

When Angel took second place he was very excited and happy hearing the applause of the audience. He loved the rush that he experienced. Over the last year he has trained and participated in a total of four competitions.

Pushing Up Inspiration
Currently he is studying English and taking a swimming class and says he hangs out with friends and family like everyone else. He works out in the weight room at San Jose City College with lots of other students, but says they don't say anything directly to him. His coaches, though, say he is an inspiration. They tell him that other students say that if he can do it, then they can too. “When he does lifts, everyone is looking at him - not feeling sorry, it's respect. He can do a lot more than other guys and his personality is a plus,” Hawk says proudly.

His trainer, Hawk, says he almost wouldn't have made it because there was a fierce resistance to Angel's participation in the sport. Hawk faced trouble from the Adaptive P.E. specialist who didn't want to work with Angel saying he could get hurt and needed a doctor's release. To make things worse, they suggested Hawk approach Gold's Gym to give Angel a free membership to train for the competition, when Angel lives minutes from the campus and is able to wheel himself there.

Hawk could not believe that Angel was being prevented from representing his college at a competition held on campus. That's when Hawk went to someone higher up. He approached the Dean of Special Programs, Zeke Garcia, about the problem as well as long time college baseball coach, Coach Woodhead. The two stepped in and signed Angel up for one of his classes so that he could legitimately use the weight room to work out.

Coach Woodhead has been a coach at San Jose City for 20 years, leading one of the top baseball teams in the state, and is now a P.E. instructor after a stroke left him in a wheelchair. He says it is not hard to be supportive of Angel at all. “He's a great kid with great work ethic. He's gone through hell with all the operations and probably more coming up, but he never lets it get in his way of what he wants to do,” says the supportive coach. “Thanks to especially Coach,” Hawk says, “Angel was able to compete in his very first show.”

Angel's mom, Maria, says that bodybuilding has changed her son for the better. “Now instead of being very serious, he is happier and more sociable.” Maria says Angel has hopes of going forward with this, but they have had financial difficulties. His biggest hope is to compete in the wheelchair divisions of the Amateur Bodybuilding Association, which hold 3 levels of competition from USA, to Universe, and Olympia.

But that dream is on hold for now because Angel is taking a break because of his most recent operation and it is difficult for them to continue to go out to competitions without financial backing. Right now, his trainer Hawk is searching for sponsors so that Angel can continue his new found passion and compete in bigger shows that want him there, like being a part of Team USA and Natural Universe.

For others in his situation, Angel says, “We can do things one way or another in spite of our handicaps. There are no limitations on anything. It doesn't matter if you're disabled. If you want, you can do everything.”

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