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March23, 2005 - Adaptive Sports And Recreation >> |
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================================================= Adaptive Sports & Recreation March 9, 2005 Vol. 1, Issue 11 ================================================= Stephen Michael Kerr, Publisher To subscribe, send a blank email to: 41809-subscribe@zinester.com Copyright 2005, Stephen Michael Kerr. ================================================= Privacy Policy ================================================= Your privacy is very important to me. Your email address will never be sold, shared, or distributed with anyone. You may forward copies of this newsletter to friends and family, and encourage them to subscribe. If you feel you have received this ezine in error, you may unsubscribe at any time; information on how to unsubscribe is at the bottom of this message. Some email programs automatically block or filter group mailings, so you may be missing emails and not know it. To make sure you receive each issue of this ezine, please add the following address to your approved email list: AdaptiveSportsAndRecreation@Zinester.com ================================================= In This Issue ================================================= - From The Publisher - Spotlight: Rising To The Challenge by Stephen Michael Kerr - Profile: Disabled Skiers Providing Inspiration at 70mph by John Marshall, Associated Press - In The News - Keeping Fit: Know All About Power Push Ups by Venkata Ramana - Helpful Links - On Deck - Contact Information ================================================= From The Publisher ================================================= Welcome to Adaptive Sports & Recreation, delivered to your inbox every other Wednesday. You'll find useful links and fascinating articles about unique sports played by people with many types of disabilities. Whether you're a friend or relative of a disabled individual, an adaptive physical education teacher, or a disabled person looking for ways to lead a more active life, this ezine can provide the information you're looking for. There's even a health and fitness section that anyone, disabled or not, will enjoy. Your feedback is always welcome. Please email me at: stevekerr@ev1.net ********** I have to admit, I'm ready for spring to arrive. Not just because it means budding trees and nicer weather, but I'm hoping it will put an end to all the sickness that's going around. It's been a rough winter for my family, particularly my wife and kids. A virus, upper respiratory infection, bronchitis, ... you name it, we've had it, one right after the other. As the old saying goes here in Texas, "if you don't like the weather, just wait; it'll change." Well, it has certainly done that. One day, it's 80 degrees, the next, 40, and it's been one of the wetter winters we've had in a while. I hope you are well, wherever you live. If you're waiting for spring like me, take heart: it will be here by the time your next issue of ASR arrives on March 23! Talk to you soon. ------------------------------------------------- Stephen Michael Kerr is the publisher of Adaptive Sports & Recreation, as well as a radio broadcaster and freelance writer in Austin, Texas. Blind since birth, Stephen has written various articles and given numerous speeches on disability awareness. ------------------------------------------------- ================================================= Feature Ad ================================================= NewsFlash*SnowPack is an ezine for the athlete in all of us. Filled with health and fitness info, tips, links and recipes, NewsFlash is your source for the latest healthy news. Articles include information about natural pain relief, the latest exercise research, a personal hiking journal, book reviews and so much more. Subscribe today at http://home.netcom.com/~newsflash Or send an email to: newsflash@ix.netcom.com with Subscribe in the subject line. ================================================= Spotlight ================================================= Rising To The Challenge by Stephen Michael Kerr One of the few annual track and field competitions for disabled athletes in and around Wichita, Kansas, is just around the corner. The 2005 Challenge Games are scheduled for May 7 at Panther Stadium in Derby, which is just outside Wichita. The event, held each year since 1989, draws anywhere from 50 to 70 athletes with many types of physical disabilities for a day of fun and the chance to advance to national competition. "There are several Challenge competitors every year who go on to nationals," Meet Director Carol Keller says. "We've had three Paralympic athletes compete at Challenge also." Participants are divided into wheelchair and ambulatory divisions, and are classified according to standards set by the National Disability Sports Alliance and Wheelchair Sports, USA. Athletes with cerebral palsy, head injury, spina bifida, muscular dystrophy, and amputations are eligible to compete. Track and boccia events will be held in the morning, while the afternoon will feature field events. A victory party with awards will close out the Games late in the afternoon. Medals for first through third place finishes are given in each division of every event, with fourth through eighth place finishers receiving ribbons. Although many of the athletes come from Kansas, the event has expanded over the years to include participants from Oklahoma, Missouri, and Arizona. Thanks to generous donations from the Wichita community, the entry fee for the Challenge Games is a very affordable $10 per athlete, which includes a T-shirt, lunch, dinner, and admission to the victory party. "It has been done through donations and grants," Keller explains. "We are now a nonprofit corporation in anticipation that the larger donations may become harder to get." Though disabled track athletes in the Southwest have had few opportunities to test their skills against other disabled athletes, more events similar to Challenge are popping up. Kansas City will host the Mid America Games in April, while the Endeavor Games will take place in June in Oklahoma City. Some elite wheelchair athletes and those with cerebral palsy who have good balance and don't use assistive devices typically compete in regular track programs. This cuts down on the number of participants in adaptive events such as Challenge. For those who do compete, the lessons are invaluable. "It is a wonderful opportunity for people with disabilities to develop relationships with others who share the challenges of physical disability, and for some positive mentoring to occur," Keller says. "My desire, as a coach and a meet director, is to help the young athletes to recognize that hard work can have satisfying, positive results. I hope that this motivation will carry over into their lives outside of sports." To learn more about volunteering, competing, and donating to Challenge 2005, go to their website: http://www.challengegames.org ** If you have an idea for a spotlight on a particular adaptive sport or organization, send it to: stevekerr@ev1.net with "Spotlight" in the subject line. ================================================= Profile ================================================= Disabled skiers providing inspiration at 70mph By JOHN MARSHALL ?© The Associated Press DENVER (AP) - Skiing is freedom to Joe Tompkins and Chris Devlin-Young, a chance to climb out of their wheelchairs and regain some of the self worth lost in accidents that swept away the use of their legs. But personal fulfillment is only part of the joy. By racing a high-tech chair strapped to a ski at speeds up to 70 mph as part of the U.S. Disabled Ski Team, Tompkins and Devlin-Young are spreading a message of hope. "The main reason we're in it is to touch other guys and gals who have disabilities, to show them that life isn't really over, like I thought it was for a few years," Devlin-Young said. Like most members of the team, Tompkins and Devlin-Young use off days and breaks in their schedule to visit schools, hoping their stories can provide a lift to kids who are down or an inspiration to those who need a little nudge in the right direction. Tompkins, of Juneau, Alaska, also is heavily involved in junior racing and constantly trying to recruit new skiers, hoping they can get the same joy from it that he does. Devlin-Young offers advice and inspiration at every turn, working with instructors and coaches to give people with disabilities an outlet for their frustrations. "They definitely enjoy what they do and they like to pass it on to other people," coach Kevin Jardine said. "All the athletes on our team have different reasons for doing it, and Chris and Joe are old enough and mature enough and been involved in the sport long enough that they really enjoy that side of it. The fact that they have been through what they've been through and have such a positive attitude about it is really key." And they have been through a lot. A surfer growing up in Santa Cruz, California, Devlin-Young was partially paralyzed below the waist in 1982 when he was on a rescue mission with the Coast Guard and his plane crashed into a mountain in the Aleutian Islands. For two years, he grappled with feelings that he was half a man, raging and drinking to the point that he wondered if he'd see his next birthday. "I got seven speeding tickets in one month and talked my way out of two others when I was drunk," said Devlin-Young, who now lives in Campton, N.H. "I'm luckier to be alive from the two years after the disability than I am after the plane crash." Convinced by a friend to check out a weeklong disabled veterans ski clinic, Devlin-Young figured he had nothing to lose. Now he's coming off the best of his 11 seasons and ready to make a run for a medal at the 2006 Paralympics in Turin, Italy. "Right away, I got hooked to skiing, got hooked to racing and unhooked to being angry," said Devlin-Young, who turns 43 on Sunday. "Skiing really changed my life. It gave me back adrenaline, it gave me back control of my life, over my parts that I'll never being able to control ever again." Tompkins knows all about losing control. He was injured in 1988, when as a 19-year-old he hopped into the front seat of a car being driven by a drunken friend. The driver crashed into a tree, killing one of the passengers and leaving Tompkins with a broken back and paralysis from the waist down. Like Devlin-Young, he fell into depression, recklessly using drugs and alcohol to fight his inner demons. Skiing later became a way to break free of his wheelchair, but it was a pair of beaming eyes - those of his son, Donald, born a month before the accident - that made him realize life wasn't over. "At 21, I took a look at my son and said, 'That boy is never going to call anybody dad, besides me,"' Tompkins said. "And from then on I quit drinking and doing drugs and started to live my life again." Tompkins, 36, got into skiing after a friend at a wheelchair basketball game asked if he had tried it. Though he was tentative for a few years after watching a friend's fatal crash into a tree, Tompkins won a World Cup race last year and was bumped up to the "A" team this season. "If you've seen a bald eagle up there soaring around, just letting it go, that's exactly how I felt," Tompkins said of his first time out. "I felt like I was untouchable, I was just going to glide around that snow." It's a feeling Tompkins and Devlin-Young believe everyone should experience, whether they're in a wheelchair or not. That's why they spend so much time promoting the sport they love. "It's not just disabled people, it's people who start feeling down because they lose a girlfriend or a boyfriend, a husband or a wife or they're going through the 'poor-me' phase when they lose their house," Tompkins said. "Chris and I went through that same thing after our accidents for about two years and something finally clicked for both of us. "We want it to click for other people, too." ** Have an idea for a profile? Just send an email to: stevekerr@ev1.net with "Profile" in the subject line. ================================================= In The News ================================================= Fast Track, the organizers of the 2005 Paralympic World Cup, announced at a Feb. 22 press conference in Manchester, Great Britain, details of the event, and the sports the disabled athletes will participate in. The World Cup, which is the largest annual multisports event for elite disabled athletes, will be held May 12-15, 2005. More than 350 athletes, representing 50 different countries, will compete in track cycling, swimming, wheelchair basketball, and athletics (otherwise called track and field). For more information about the event or to purchase tickets, log onto the official website of the Paralympic World Cup: www.paralympicworldcup.com. ********** While the National Basketball Association held its annual All-Star Game in Denver the weekend of Feb. 19, the National Wheelchair Basketball Association held its own annual All-Star Classic that same weekend. Raul Ortega of the Dallas Wheelchair Mavericks and Eddie Lopez of the United Spinal Nets led the East Team to a 57-46 win over the West at the Denver Civic Center. Dallas" Chuck Allen and David Wilkes of the Charlotte Bobcats had eight points apiece for the East, while Taz Capaso of the Denver Wheelchair Nuggets had 20 points in a losing effort for the West. He and Lopez were named co-MVP's of the game. A crowd of several thousand attended the game, including National Basketball Association Commissioner David Stern and former NBA greats Kenny Smith and Charles Barkley. To read more about the National Wheelchair Basketball Association, go to: http://www.nwba.org ** If you know of an adaptive sports event for this section, send it to: stevekerr@ev1.net and put "News" in the subject line. ================================================= Keeping Fit ================================================= Know All about "Power Push Ups" by: Venkata Ramana Push ups are the most convenient way to build up your chest, shoulders, arms and upper back. It can be performed at any place, and you don??™t need to carry your gym with you wherever you go. Do you know that most of the men who train with weights cannot do single handstand pushups? When I first found this out I was stunned. A few Things to keep in mind: ?? Always keep your hands slightly wider than shoulder width apart, with fingers together and pointing straight ahead. ?? If you have ever had any shoulder pain, stick to the 90-degree limit. Deeper push ups can stretch the shoulder capsule and put strain on the joint. This can cause pain. ?? Start in the upper position with your arms straight. ?? Inhale as you lower yourself towards the floor. ?? Don??™t go lower than forming a 90-degree bend with your elbows. ?? Exhale as you push yourself up from the floor. ?? Don??™t lock your elbows at the top. ?? Your back should be straight. Don??™t let it sag and don??™t stick your butt up in the air. About The Author Venkata Ramana is a Fitness Enthusiast and a Professional Body Builder. Visit his http://www.awbodybuilding.com/ and http://www.awweightloss.com/ websites and gain maximum Information to stay fit and healthy. venkata@awbodybuilding.com ================================================= Helpful Links ================================================= Disabled Sports USA Established in 1967 by disabled Vietnam veterans to serve the war injured. Offers nationwide sports rehabilitation programs to anyone with a permanent physical disability. Activities include: winter skiing, water sports, fitness and special sports events. http://www.dsusa.org National Wheelchair Basketball Association Serves as the national governing body for men's, women's, and youth wheelchair basketball in the United States. Based in Colorado Springs, Colorado, it is the nation's oldest and largest disability sport organization. http://www.nwba.org World Wheelchair Sports Dedicated to providing outdoor activities for people of all ages in the Pacific Northwest with mobility impairments. Sports include: track and field, road racing, cycling, kayaking, and more. www.efn.org/~wwscoach Ski for Light Brings blind and mobility-impaired skiers together with sighted instructors for cross-country skiing and social activities. www.sfl.org DeafNation.com The online destination for what's happening in the deaf and hard-of-hearing community. Provides news, video clips in sign language, and the latest in deaf sports. http://www.deafnation.com/ ** If you have a link to an adaptive sports organization that you would like listed in this section, email it to: stevekerr@ev1.net with "Helpful Links" in the subject line. ================================================= Feature Ad ================================================= DO YOU QUALIFY TO GET YOUR PRESCRIPTIONS FREE? Most people don??™t realize this, but there are over 800 different programs that will provide nearly every medication on the market, free to those that qualify. And you DON??™T have to be poor to qualify. See if you do at: http://www.netterweb.com/rexaid/. ================================================= On Deck ================================================= Here's a peek at what's coming up in the next issue. ** The 2005 Special Olympic Winter Games just wrapped up in Nagano, Japan. Get an overview of the Games in our next "Spotlight". ** Being born with a deformed left leg made track athlete Sarah Reinertsen feel different from everyone else. Today, Sarah is different, but not in the way you might think. Read her inspiring story in the next "Profile". ** There are many good reasons to exercise, not the least of which is to maintain a healthy heart and minimize the risk of heart disease. Guest contributor Louise Roach discusses this very important aspect of our health in "Keeping Fit". ================================================= Contact Information ================================================= Stephen Michael Kerr, Publisher stevekerr@ev1.net 1218 Hughmont Dr. Pflugerville, Tx 78660 There is no charge to subscribe to this ezine. Just send a blank e-mail to: 41809-subscribe@zinester.com To unsubscribe, send a blank e-mail to: 41809-unsubscribe@zinester.com ================================================= Disclaimer ================================================= Although we believe our advertisers to be honest in their practices, we cannot be held responsible for the products or services they offer. Please make sure to check out all opportunities, products, or services before you buy. |
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