Results tagged “disability sport” from Looking Up

This weekend, I got to tick another box on the 'Bumper List Of Unusual Experiences.'

It was quite tricky finding the box marked 'Played tennis in Trafalgar Square', hidden as it was between 'Pickled a jar of ants eggs' and 'Pleated home-made kilt'. Some say it is pointless keeping such a list, but as I demonstrated on Saturday, you never know what opportunities life may present.

The event was the Liberty Festival 2010, an annual event in Trafalgar Square which celebrates all aspects of disability arts. Sadly, the event suffers from a real lack of publicity, as can be seen with a quick web-search. The top hit is a hotel group website that announces,
"The Liberty Festival provides deaf and disabled people a golden platform to expose their instinctive talent in front of British people."

Though we sadly lacked a 'golden platform', I took part in the event as a part of the Wheelpower presence. We were there to demonstrate wheelchair sport as part of the wider move to publicise disability sport ahead of the Paralympics in 2012. It was great to play a a little 2 on 2 basketball, which reminded me of the fun to be had with the sport. I have great intentions of joining the training with my local team, should I ever get around to it.

Following the basketball, we attempted to demonstrate wheelchair tennis in a space that was 10 meters square. With a small net and transition balls in an attempt to reduce injuries among the crowd, we ran through some drills and got some of the kids in the crowd to have a go in a sports wheelchair. Luckily I only walloped one person (who was part of the staff) when we tried to demonstrate the service action. The rest of the event passed off peacefully and the response from onlookers was really positive. I felt proud, having 'exposed my instinctive talent in front of British people.'

An exciting extra dimension to the Wheelpower contribution was provided by Rachel Gadsden, who set about capturing the event in dramatic style on a huge canvass in front of the National Gallery. The coming together of art and sport in this way was really inspiring, and has led me to add a number of other boxes to my Bumper List...

So, it was as I predicted. I choked, I froze, I generally went to pieces on the baseline, and the court stubbornly refused to open up and swallow me. In short, I did more to demonstrate the importance of good sports psychology in one weekend than could have been achieved in a year of victories.

But for all of that, I came back from the weekend feeling energised and more enthusiastic about tennis. I remain a passionate believer in the vital role that sport can play in physical well-being for many people, especially after sudden disability. But there's something more and, not for the first time, I find an entry on Andrew Farrow's blog that is both timely and apposite.

For me, tennis provides me with moments of total focus when I am oblivious to all else. It was this sense of my 'mind quietened' that drew me to climbing and working at height (up a tree for example). This coupled with an acute awareness of every movement, and an almost hyper-reality that I felt which no doubt came from overcoming one's instinctive anxiety about being off the ground.

However, tennis involves something altogether less familiar and utterly fascinating. When playing under pressure, the body suddenly decides to do something completely different to what is asked of it. Instead of fluid hitting through the ball, the shoulder decides to get heavily involved and a simple topspin forehand becomes a drive that a pro-golfer would be proud of.

Please forgive me if it sounds like I am covering the same ground as in numerous previous missives. It's just that I think I am beginning to understand what fascinates me about the collapse in my co-ordination...

Over the last five years, I have spent many, many hours becoming extremely aware of my physical manifestation. The loss of function and sensation in one half of my body seems to have intensified my experience of 'how the other half lives'.

Coupled with this increased awareness of sensation has come a need to consciously think about how to look after the rest of me, the part I can't feel. I have had to learn how to assess circumstances or incidents in terms of injury risk without the signals that one instinctively relies upon. In other words, just because it don't hurt, doesn't mean it ain't broke. And fixing it is often more complicated, too.

I have learned how to balance myself and my wheelchair when even the tiniest movement can be enough to throw me off balance. There is a tendency among some in the SCI community to view people who still have functioning abdominal muscles as being able to balance and function like any able-bodied person sitting down. While it is true to say that I can sit upright in a chair without leaning on a backrest, it takes very little to unbalance me. If I reach out with one arm, for example, I have to work extremely hard to avoid losing balance, and I certainly couldn't pick up anything of even modest weight without holding on to something with the other hand for stability.

But all of this has become (almost) second nature, yet another example of our astonishing ability as a species to adapt and overcome profound adversity.

I still can't hit a tennis ball if anyone is watching, mind.

As predicted, there was a certain amount of precipitation during our camping adventure. Not enough to cause us to flee to the nearest hotel, but just enough to remind us that we were camping.

The other reminder that we were camping came every night when I attempted to lie on an air mattress. This was a cheap and cheerful model which we were using to make up the full complement for our tent, but could just as easily been employed as a fairground ride.

Getting on the mattress was rather like trying to climb on an irate dolphin in a paddling pool full of lard. But the real fun came when I tried to turn over in the night. Plunging my fists into the mattress in order to shift my weight would result in my backside being thrown up in the air. As soon as this happened, I would lose my balance, causing me to land awkwardly and bounce off sideways. Once I had regained my dignity, the whole process would start  again.

This worked well as a distraction from the pain in my legs which wakes me up most nights, but which was made worse by the cobbled streets of Chartres and the bumpy ground of the campsite.

Otherwise it was the usual litany of excess that France seems to subject me to. Lots of wine, cheese, and meat products topped and tailed with pastries and what must surely be the best bread in the world.

In fact, I didn't even manage to do much in the way of holiday reading, the calorific overload and the prospect of the effort involved in winding up the wind up lamp reducing me to idle thoughts, such as:

Why do so many people now lift the hose up and shake it after filling their car with fuel, when they have just used the trigger on the nozzle to turn the flow on and off?

and:

In dry cleaners, are those machines just behind the counter just pretend to give the whole place a cleaning vibe? There's never anything going around in them, and they look like a pimped up version of the machines in the launderette.

and, of course:

What's that crawling around outside? Should I try and get up to investigate, or will the airbed fire me out of the tent at high velocity, causing me to crush some kind of local endangered species?

So now we're back, and it's time to put the brain back into gear. For those that didn't see it, my weekly column for The Times finished this week with a look back and forwards.

It was great to have the opportunity to reflect on the fantastic stories, comments and support that I have received over the last six months, and I would like to offer my thanks to all of those who got in touch.

So now I'm getting ready to speak at a Symposium on Integration in Sport up in Nottingham tomorrow, of which more in due course...

Firstly, a pointer to my Travel article from Saturday's Times.

Then on to matters of the racket. Or racquet. Or whatever. You know, the bat with strings in.

Anyways. I am doing the equivalent of mumbling on the keyboard for I am plum tuckered out, and all I have to show for my endeavors is one measly 'runners up' trophy from the doubles. I lost in the semi-final of the singles, and the final of the doubles. Both B division, a step up from last year's novice category.

I did manage a fairly spectacular cough and splutter  midway through the first set, but we (Sarah and myself, who won the novice doubles last year, but haven't seen each other since, on account of her being in Scotland and me in London) rallied spectacularly, coming from 5-1 down to lose the second set 7-6 on a tie break.

All of which goes to show, dear reader, that I am now a tennis bore. Hooked on the horror of competition. I have never enjoyed horror movies much, nor roller-coasters, but I imagine there is a similar mental process involved, as I find the time on court in competition, terrifying and generally emotionally unpleasant, but once I come off, I can't wait to get out there again.


Enough of this drivel. I'm away to my bed.

Today's Times column. And I would like to clarify something. While wheelchair trolleys don't have baby seats in them, that is not the only reason why I have never used one.

I don't like wheelchair trolleys, as they are often ill-fitting, and they make the trip through the supermarket feel a bit like driving a milk-float through a...well, a supermarket.

Other news:

I have a cold. Yep, middle of May, and I have a cold. Thanks to our beloved daughter for bringing it home to share with the family. Unfortunately, timing IS everything, and so I am trying to shake it off in time for my attendance at the National Wheelchair Tennis Championships at the weekend.

Yes, it's that time of year again. After some emotional turmoil, I have decided that I can not, in all conscience, defend my Novice Title. It would certainly be a linguistic contradiction if nothing else, and so once again, I step up to the B division, as I did when I so famously CHOKED in Cardiff.

Well not this time. I shall cough and splutter because of my cold, but that only adds to the chair adjustments and new rackets that I have gathered together to ensure that I have a basket full of excuses to draw on when the going gets tough.

An interesting and well made point by fellow blogger Andrew in his recent entry.
To be described as inspiring just for getting on with the everyday stuff can make me feel uncomfortable. The first question it begs is,
"What does it inspire you to do, exactly? Cook while sitting down? Or drive the car without using your feet, perhaps?"
I'm sure some people will feel rebuffed by this, but my everyday is dominated by just trying to feel normal. Anything that emphasizes my changed circumstance is jarring and emotionally difficult. Still. Even after three years.

On a more positive note, Andrew does also mention a sport that he has tried and that I would love to try, if only we had a few miles of empty sand nearby...

An outing to the London Fields Lido to take advantage of the first summer of 2008. The first summer usually lasts about a week and takes place in May. The second summer usually lasts about a week and takes place in September. Between lie torrential rain, hail, hurricane, snow, floods, plague, pestilence, sleepy, grumpy, doc, dave, dee, dozy, beaky, mick and titch.

The Lido has been beautifully renovated, and feels almost Australian when it's sunny and over 20c. We had a great swim, my daughter R bedecked in armbands and a rubber ring, me with a float around my ankles (stops my feet scraping on the rough tiles on the bottom of the pool), and Penny pulling us up and down like a family tug. Once out of the pool, I sat with R and watched as Pen swam a few lengths.

 The swimming pool is another of those bitter-sweet environments. Whereas the playground experience gets easier as R gets more confident, it's going to be an awfully long time until I can take her swimming on my own. Watching dads taking their toddlers for a swim, and hoisting them on to the hip, or throwing them in the air, all these things pull at me. They pierce the protective layer painstakingly built up over the last three years, and suddenly it's all fresh and new again. In truth this happens a little less frequently these days, but summer will  increase the potential for such sharp reminders.

If you're wondering why I'm so maudlin, it may be in part excused by the ominous rumble of my 40th birthday, groaning and wheezing as it comes lumbering over the horizon. It is tomorrow. With this in mind I should like to take this opportunity to unveil the first phase of my mid-life crisis...




(Rest assured, I shall NOT be sporting leather trousers any time soon)

Well, folks. It's up. My first contribution as a columnist on Ouch! the BBC disability website. I hope that I'm not attacked by a gang of irate medal contenders who feel that my attitude is, well, that of someone who knows that they are destined to always be mediocre in any sport undertaken. With this in mind, I feel obliged to offer a clarification, especially as I will no doubt fall under a hail of disabled rock climbers abseiling down on my ass.

Not only do I have no problem with people who achieve such a high level of expertise in their chosen field, but I too find them inspiring. My point is merely, some might say trivially, that we can't all be the best. It's just not possible. A pyramid, by definition has a pointy top, and that's where the best Paralympic athletes reside. They have to be the best, as anyone who's attempted to push a wheelchair up a pyramid will tell you.

Just as you don't have a 100 meters for people who are a bit crap at running, there has to be canon fodder in every sport.  But there are occasions where, unbeknown to the elite, the canon fodder get together and enjoy pretending that they're actually pretty good. And if they hadn't had that knee injury or tennis elbow or gone to college or work or prison, they could have made it into serious competition.

It is this level of sporting competition that I miss. But hopefully tennis will provide me with that thrill. The local park, way too much kit and the complete deterioration in the standard of play as soon as anyone's watching. Ah, you should have seen my last shot...