Inspiration
There are some athletes that make everyone stop and watch.
Jamie Dean is one of them, though he might not know it. Jamie’s competing at Worlds in the “mixed coxed four”- the coxswain being critical because Jamie is blind.
I met Jamie and Priscilla, his seeing eye dog, yesterday. Jamie’s one of our U.S. Adaptive Team rowers competing at the World Championships in Munich (and shooting for the ParaOlympics in Beijing, held immediately after the Olympic Games there in August). Watching these athletes rigging boats, stretching, talking technique, getting nervous, and launching with the same intensity and determination of all the other athletes has to give you pause. While Jamie and I chatted about rowing, racing and life, I was stopped mid-sentence as several adaptive rowers powered wheelchairs past us and UP a set of stairs toward the boathouse. Wow! Wow! What can you say? How can you not be inspired by the whole situation? Wow!
After hearing more from Jamie, I decided (1) he had to write something for my blog to share with athletes and sports fans who might never see him on television, and (2) I had to become a volunteer at the ParaOlympic Games in 2012.
Jamie agreed, and today he sent me this to post:
“My first encounter with the national adaptive team was a chance meeting with the team’s manager, Isabel Bohn, at the Dad Vail Regatta in Philadelphia. Isabel was working the registration desk and one of her colleagues pointed me out to her after noticing my white cane.When Isabel approached me and asked if I’d be interested in trying out for the national adaptive squad, I had only one concern: would the athletes be serious enough? Now sitting in my hotel room counting down the hours until the first heat of my second world championships, I can say that the answer is a resounding ‘Yes!’
Our team consists of nine athletes in four boats. There is the coxed four in which I row three seat. All of my crew members have leg, trunk, and arm ability to one degree or another. There is Jesse, a recent graduate of Princeton University; Aerial, a masters rower out of Marin Rowing Club in San Francisco; and Tracy, a former college rower and masters rower in Philadelphia. Our coxswain, Ryan, is about to enter his first year at St. Joseph’s University, and I am a law and business graduate student at Wake Forest University.
The other three boats are fixed-seat sculls. The double is rowed by five-time world champions Scott and Angela. They have trunk and arm ability. The single scullers are Ron, a Californian who was an elite level rower from MIT before becoming disabled, and Laura, a former Paralympian in track and field, each of whom rows only with arms.
Often the term “adaptive” has a pejorative connotation. People think that because race times are slower and athletes are physically limited that, somehow, this means that our sport is not serious, but this couldn’t be further from the truth. The training, the attitude, and the intensity are what one would expect of any elite level athlete. The competitiveness, too, is extraordinary because our rowers are fighting not only for medals, but for international acceptance and legitimacy.
I have been amazed at the growth of adaptive rowing even in the few years that I have been a part of the U.S. team. This year there are enough entries to have heats, semifinals, and finals in all categories but one. The quality of participants, too, has improved as nations have intensified their recruiting and training.
Ultimately, though, numbers and times don’t tell the whole story of adaptive rowing. I know, for example, that it is a sport every bit as serious as the non-adaptive rowing I did in college because of the caliber of the individuals involved. I am a competitive person. I enjoy going to an academically-challenging law school, I enjoy being in the top 10 percent of my class, I enjoy being in positions of leadership in clubs and organizations of which I’m a part. In short, when I commit to doing something, I do it enthusiastically and with the goal of succeeding to my maximum potential.
This is not a trait unique to me, but it is something all of my teammates possess. If adaptive rowing were an exhibition or a charity competition, none of us would be racing. The truth is that adaptive rowing is a legitimate, challenging, competitive endeavor just like rowing for the able-bodied. One who believes otherwise need only examine the participants in the sport who stand as living testaments to its validity.
Tomorrow at 3:20 PM I will have my first heat in the 2007 FISA World Championships. It will not be enough for me or my crew just to feel good about ourselves or to participate. We have trained all year for this one week of rowing. We want to win. I know that all those I will be racing share these sentiments. The bodies of adaptive rowers may not match those of the other competitors in Munich, but our hearts are the same.”
Follow Jamie’s racing at www.worldrowing.com. Learn more about the International ParaOlympic movement at www.paralympic.org, and find out how you can compete, coach, or support local adaptive athletes by contacting your country’s Olympic Committee.