Ron Gooch, a blind amateur bowler from Chicago, has just scored a perfect 300 game.
Ron Gooch was born with nystagmus, a condition that makes his eyes move involuntarily. His vision is so shaky that he is legally blind, although he is able to make out shapes and figures that are directly in front of him. Still, it’s safe to say that his blurred vision puts him at a major handicap when it comes to knocking down the pins in a bowling alley.
But Gooch has been an avid bowler from a young age, ever since his father took him to Chicago’s Echo Lanes at age 6. Gooch’s father figured that with practice, his son might be able to become a good bowler despite his lack of sight.
Even though Gooch had trouble making friends at school, “they didn’t make fun of me at the bowling alley,” he said. He was the first Junior League bowler in his class to score 100—and now, at age 52, he’s just scored his first perfect 300-point game, becoming one of just 11 blind bowlers on record to do so in the U.S.
And just after bowling that last perfect frame, Gooch knew he had a phone call to make to the people who’d believed in him all along: his parents.
“I just lost it,” said his mother, Sharon Viano. “I called everybody — California, Idaho, Florida, Arizona. It’s been amazing — it’s a big thing in town. People are saying, ‘You must be a pretty proud mommy.’ Well, yeah, but I’d be proud of him without the 300.”