Alex Roca Campillo is first athlete with 75% disability to finish full marathon

©Ankit Karnany via Unsplash

Some stories touch you. Not because they're moving, but because they're real. They force you to let go of certain phrases you automatically use, such as "that's not possible" or "that's not for everyone". The story of Àlex Roca Campillo is exactly like this: it doesn't ask for pity, it asks for attention.

Alex Roca Campillo was born in Barcelona in 1991. At six months old, he contracts viral herpetic encephalitis that causes permanent cerebral palsy. The left side of his body has greatly reduced mobility, his speech is affected, communication is mainly through sign language. His disability is officially recognized at 76%. A figure that weighs heavily on paper. But in his life, it has never become a label.

Àlex talks about his disability neither as a tragedy nor as a badge of honor. He talks about it as it is: a condition you have to learn to deal with every day. Without rhetoric. Without heroics but with a quiet determination very similar to that of someone who just decides to try.

The Barcelona Marathon

On March 19, 2023, during the Barcelona Marathon, something happens that no one can ignore. Àlex Roca Campillo crosses the finish line after 42.195 kilometers, with a finishing time of 5 hours, 50 minutes and 51 seconds.

It's not 'just' a marathon run. It's the first time someone with a 76% disability has officially finished a race over this distance. The crowd senses this immediately. The applause moments are not a polite applause. They are long, heartfelt, almost necessary.

The images of his arrival make their way around the world. And they go viral, not because they show a superhero's achievement, but because they undercut a phrase we use far too often: "I can't do this".

Those who think Barcelona was an exception are wrong. In 2019, Àlex had already competed in - and crossed the finish line of - the Titan Desert, one of the toughest cycling races in the world, in the heat, sand and mountains of the Moroccan Sahara. There, too, he was the first athlete with cerebral palsy to accomplish that feat.

Over the years, he ran half marathons, competed in triathlons and endurance races. Always with the same approach: adapted preparation, a solid team, and a clear awareness of his physical limits. And with one thing crystal clear in his mind: a limit is not a fixed line, but something that can shift.

Not just sports

Àlex Roca Campillo today is also a speaker, an author, a man who has chosen to go public.

In his book El límite te lo pones tú , he tells his trajectory without filter, with disarming simplicity. He is also an ambassador for the FC Barcelona Foundation, a role in which he works around inclusion, accessibility and sport as a tool for growth.

He speaks at schools, in companies, at events. Not to 'motivate'. but to share. And maybe that's exactly why it works: he doesn't speak from above, but alongside you.

Àlex Roca Campillo's story is interesting not because it's 'extraordinary', but because it puts many everyday excuses into perspective. It does not claim that everyone can do everything, but questions the idea that certain limits are objective and definitive. And perhaps, in a world that moves forward at lightning speed and judges even faster, that in itself is a huge revolution.

(©alexroca91 via GreenMe.it 2026/Managing Editor: Julie Morgan - The Press Junction/Picture: ©Birucao via Unsplash)