PHOTO: Bildbyrån
He wrote Swedish sports history by tearing down the Great Wall of China.
But in the middle of his career, the legend suffered from a hidden illness.
Now WC gold hero Erik Lindh opens up about his new life as a 60-year-old.
A true blue-yellow hero recently turned 60. He is one of the great legends of Swedish table tennis, but few know who Eric Lindh is.
Swedish legend
As a 15-year-old, he broke through as a major talent and made his debut in the Swedish A national team. Just one year later, the first big success came when Lindh was part of and won EC gold as a team.
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It would be the start of a pure success story and blue-yellow heyday in table tennis. Erik was on the team when Sweden made unforgettable sporting history in the WC in 1989 when, together with Jan-Ove Waldner, Jorgen Persson, Mikael Appelgren and Peter Karlsson managed to tear down the Great Wall of China and win a sensational WC gold as a team.
Hidden disease
There would be a total of three World Cup golds, five World Cup silvers, two World Cup bronzes, seven European Championship golds and one Olympic bronze during the successful career. But at the age of just 28, Lindh received the tough news that he had suffered from rheumatism, a variant previously known as Bechterew’s disease.
– It is a rheumatic inflammatory disease that mainly settles in joints and muscle attachments, he says in an interview with Expressen and admits that he did not feel well for several years.
– I was light, well trained and played at my best, but my body was not feeling well. Now I understand that I was sick before I was diagnosed.
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But the ping pong legend chose to keep the illness a secret and didn’t tell anyone. Instead, he fought the pain and played on in the national team until the age of 34 before it became too difficult to continue.
– I chose it because I didn’t want anyone to feel sorry for me and that people would think that I was to blame for the illness if I played badly, he tells the evening newspaper.
– I had too many problems with my body. I had neither the energy nor the motivation to continue at world level.
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Erik Lindh recently turned 60 and was celebrated by old national team teammates Waldner, Persson and Appelgren and others who came to visit. Today he lives a completely different life and works at the grocery store Willys in Falkenberg.
– I take the bike to work. The journey takes five minutes. I enjoy my job, he says in the interview and opens up about the disease these days.
– I have received various medications, both drips and injections. Life is pretty okay, but of course I can feel that I’m a little stiff sometimes. But I’m not 20 anymore either.
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