Luis Fernando Montoya Soto (born 2 May 1957) is a former Colombian

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

manager, best known for leading

Once Caldas Once Caldas S.A., simply known as Once Caldas, is a professional Colombian football team based in Manizales, that currently plays in the Categoría Primera A. They play their home games at the Palogrande stadium. They were the surprise winners ...

to winning

2004 Copa Libertadores The 2004 Copa Libertadores de América (officially the 2004 Copa Toyota Libertadores de América for sponsorship reasons) was the 45th edition of the Copa Libertadores, CONMEBOL's premier annual international club tournament. The tournament was ...

. He was shot during a robbery in December 2004. Since then he has been struggling with a

tetraplegia Tetraplegia, also known as quadriplegia, is defined as the dysfunction or loss of motor and/or sensory function in the cervical area of the spinal cord. A loss of motor function can present as either weakness or paralysis leading to partial or t ...

Career

He started his career as a technical manager in Caldas, where he stood out as a good contributor then he began his physical training at the Jaime Izasa Cadavid Polytechnic at

Medellín Medellín ( or ), officially the Municipality of Medellín ( es, Municipio de Medellín), is the second-largest city in Colombia, after Bogotá, and the capital of the department of Antioquia. It is located in the Aburrá Valley, a central re ...

, although this was hidden from his father, who he did not want to share his studies where he focussed on his passion of sports. Years after he went to different Antioquia leagues, where he got several titles, which led him to direct Colombian teams in minor football

soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...

divisions. He made an excellent career in the minor divisions of the National Athletic professional soccer team gaining champion titles in different categories. He led

Atlético Nacional Atlético Nacional S. A., best known as Atlético Nacional, is a Colombian professional association football, football club based in Medellín. The club is one of only three clubs to have played in every first division tournament in the countr ...

to the Colombian Professional Football Championship getting the subchampionship in 2002 into the second semester. Montoya coached

leading the team to win the

Mustang Cup The mustang is a free-roaming horse of the Western United States, descended from horses brought to the Americas by the Spanish. Mustangs are often referred to as wild horses, but because they are descended from once-domesticated animals, they ...

for the first time in their history (apart from 1950 win) and the

Copa Libertadores de América The CONMEBOL Libertadores, also known as the Copa Libertadores de América ( pt, Copa Libertadores da América), is an annual international club association football, football competition organized by CONMEBOL since 1960. It is the highest level ...

in 2004, those achievements made Montoya the South American Coach of the Year in that year. Now, he writes for popular Colombian newspapers like El Tiempo and

La Patria ''La Patria'' is a newspaper published in Oruro Oruro (Hispanicized spelling) or Uru Uru is a city in Bolivia with a population of 264,683 (2012 calculation), about halfway between La Paz and Sucre in the Altiplano, approximately above sea ...

and teaches sport journalism in several Colombian Universities.

Personal life

He was born in the town of Caldas, Colombia. He married Adriana Herrera in 1998 and had a child in 2001 named José Fernando Montoya who has been a symbol of Luis Fernando's life spirit. In December 2004, Montoya was left

paralyzed Paralysis (also known as plegia) is a loss of motor function in one or more muscles. Paralysis can also be accompanied by a loss of feeling (sensory loss) in the affected area if there is sensory damage. In the United States, roughly 1 in 50 ...

after he got shot during an attempted robbery in Caldas near

. Since then he had been under experimental

stem cell In multicellular organisms, stem cells are undifferentiated or partially differentiated cells that can differentiate into various types of cells and proliferate indefinitely to produce more of the same stem cell. They are the earliest type o ...

treatment to help him get better. A practicing Catholic and full of tenacity, he has become an example of permanent hope against paralysis to Colombians and has been called The Champion of Life. Nowadays, he lives in

with his son and his wife.

References

1961 births Living people Colombian football managers Atlético Nacional managers Once Caldas managers {{Colombia-footy-bio-stub