Kyle Maynard — the headline-grabbing, record-breaking Gwinnett County native born with no legs and arms below the knees and elbows — recently made a very special friend.
His name is Francis, he's almost 3 years old and he was "born literally almost identically to me," Maynard wrote on Facebook on Saturday.
He called meeting the boy "one of the most special nights I've had in recent memory."
"He has amazing parents and this will make all the difference for him," Maynard wrote. "We played with his Thomas the Train set for a long while, then he wanted me to chase him around until I collapsed from exhaustion."
Maynard also shared a short video of the encounter. It had more than 43,000 views by Monday afternoon.
Maynard, 30, attended Collins Hill cluster schools, where he played football before switching to wrestling in high school.
In 2008, he opened a CrossFit gym in Gwinnett called No Excuses and, four years later, became the first amputee to summit Africa's tallest mountain without the benefit of prosthetics.
During this summer's Olympics, he was featured in a Nike advertisement that highlighted "premier athletes" and "the resolve that victory requires."
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