For Peachtree wheelchair race vet, tradition rolls on - Atlanta News, Weather, Traffic, and Sports | FOX 5

On Wednesday, 78 wheelchair athletes will race down Peachtree Road, hitting speeds of up to 30 miles per hour as part of the Peachtree Road Race.  The youngest competitor this year is 18, and the oldest is 68 years old.

The Peachtree Road Race has become one of the largest and fastest wheelchair 10K races in the world.  And for Rafy Ibarra, it has become a tradition that has shaped his life.  

A lot has changed since Rafy started doing the Peachtree in the mid-80s.  The race is faster now, and the chairs are more sophisticated.  But for Rafy, the thrill of holding his own in the pack is always there, and that's what keeps pulling him back.

Ibarra, 56, now has a streamlined racing chair which is nothing like the braces and crutches he grew up with because of Polio.

"I missed the vaccination at a very young age," Ibarra explained.  "I was born in Mexico, living in a very rural part of the country."   

Ibarra says he tells people that the Polio vaccine didn't find him, but Polio did. He was raised in Los Angeles, and in 1983, he started using a wheelchair full-time.  That's when he discovered racing, and he says he was quickly addicted.

Back then, race chairs had four wheels instead of three, and they were much less aerodynamic than those of today.  But racing was still a rush.

"When you walk with crutches and braces, it's not like you're running the 100-meter dash," said Ibarra.  "But all of a sudden in a wheelchair, it's like, "Oh my gosh, I can go 12-13 miles an hour!'"

As Ibarra started winning, he began hearing about the Peachtree Road Race,

"My first time I was here, I was in awe," he says of Atlanta.  "The city, everything was so lush and green compared to California, where it's brown."

Ibarra says he was struck by the work going on at Shepherd Center, and the way Georgians embraced wheelchair athletes.

"Shepherd and Atlanta welcomed us and treated us like the elite athletes that we were," said Ibarra.  "As opposed to, 'Ain't that a special division?'"

Ibarra's first Peachtree-- with its hills and humidity-- was no personal best,

"But I said, 'I'm going to train hard, I want to win this race one day,'" he remembered.

He's almost done won twice, competing in 25 or 26 of the last 29 Peachtree Road Races.

"I think it's probably my number one race, I know now it is," he said.

Ibarra now lives in Tucker, and he's been preparing for Wednesday's race with his son, Evan, holding off of training to let a cut thumb heal.

When he's not racing, Ibarra volunteers at Shepherd Center, coaching new wheelchair athletes to find their own inner fire.

"Just to show them that yes, you can still be successful, go to college, get a degree, get married, have a family," Ibarra said.

He says his biggest challenge was getting acclimated to the humidity.  Ibarra told FOX 5 he and a buddy once tried training in a garage with the clothes dryer running to simulate July in Georgia.  He says it didn't work out so well.

Link: Peachtree Road Race website