Not so long ago, Léon Schäfer was sitting in front of the television at football games, a little melancholy. Especially when Julian Brandt played. He is a year older and, like him, played in the Bremen selection. Today Brandt is a star at Borussia Dortmund and a national player.
Schäfer’s dream ended at the age of 13. After suffering from bone cancer, his right lower leg and knee had to be amputated. When he watches Brandt, he often says to himself, “that was my dream too,” Schäfer once said.
Today the bursting career as a professional soccer player is far away. And Schäfer no longer mourns her loss. “The topic is through and no longer in my head,” he told the German Press Agency after his gold jump at the Para World Championships for track and field athletes in Paris. “The love for football has been lost,” said Schäfer: “The way it has developed in recent years, I no longer care that it went like this.”
World record jump in Paris
Cutting the umbilical cord was also so easy for him because he had long since found his second sporting love: athletics. And here especially the long jump. On Monday he won World Championship gold for the second time with a world record jump of 7.25 meters in the last attempt. And for German disabled sports, the 26-year-old has long been much more than just a medal provider. He is a figurehead with absolute star potential.
For his mentor, the 2012 Paralympic champion Heinrich Popow, Schäfer is “a painted sexiest man alive”, DBS President Friedhelm Julius Beucher calls him “a wonderful grenade” with a smile. Schäfer is “a charming boy with unbelievable performance potential. When he runs through the air, that’s good for every sports photo of the year”. Born in Hanover, he never had to explicitly talk about inclusion, Popow emphasized: “He comes through his charisma and performance. He simply embodies competitive sport and carries that over to the younger generation.”
Schäfer is particularly popular with them. Alongside football stars Mario Götze and Leroy Sané, he is an advertising face for Nike. In Paris he jumped with a durag, a headscarf like the ones worn by rappers like 50 Cent or LL Cool J. “The hair is too long and I’m too lazy to style it,” he said, laughing. And he’s tattooed. “A warrior on the upper arm with two angels on the left and right,” he said: “The warrior is my mum, the angels are my sisters. I have a sun above the breastbone under the larynx, which means: Always on the sunny side of the sun life. And on my forearm I wear a phoenix from the ashes. I just had it done recently.”
Also gold over the 100 meters?
The 2021 Paralympics in Tokyo felt like a defeat for him. He had won silver, five centimeters behind. But he had been considered a sure gold candidate. “That showed me that I shouldn’t be too arrogant,” he said openly: “And it made me even hungrier. I wanted to shut up the emerging self-doubts. I have to continue to do it with self-confidence. It just can’t be over Drift off overbearing. I always have to keep my focus. I learned that lesson.” In Paris he showed nerves of steel. After two failed attempts at the start, he was about to be eliminated, and the winning jump came on the sixth attempt. “I felt as soon as I started: Now it’s showtime!” he said afterwards, relieved.
At the end next Monday he will start in the last competition of the World Championships over 100 meters. The goal there too: gold. “I got the first gold medal for Germany here, I’ll get the last one too. That would be a nice fairy tale,” he said with a laugh. “And if I could then get that at the Paralympics next year, that would be a big number. That would be really cinematic.” Like his whole life and his two loves for sports.
