Latest Case Studies for Release: National Junior Games 2018
Case study 1: Jessica Green, Age 14 years, from Colchester Jessica’s thoughts on the Games? “Really good fun. I’ve been doing archery, powerlifting 20 kilos. I’ve been on TV, (National Junior Games feature on ITV news) it was really good being on TV, I feel more famous and I’ve been signing autographs. What about taking part in the junior games? I felt really excited to come down here because meeting new friends, meeting loads of new friends. I’ve tried boccia, it’s good, powerlifting and handcycling. It was really scary at first, because I felt I was falling off the bike, but you get used to it. (What about the speed?) I felt like I was running. What other sports have you done? Archery, wheelchair slalom, shot put, discus and swimming. Did you go to the disco last night? Yes, it was a bit loud, I’ve got a sore throat from all that singing, Jessica’s mum – Rebecca quotes: What is it like coming to the National Junior Games for Jessica?
“It’s been incredible fun, it’s an experience that you can’t get anywhere else” Especially the breadth of sports she’s been able to try, she had never tried handcycling before until we came here two years ago, and she got the bug so quickly that within six weeks we’d bought her own handcycle. She calls it “Tink” after “Tinkerbell” (the Disney character) because it’s green, she says when she’s in it she thinks she can fly. We now come down here every one to two months and do handcycling on the track out there, for us it’s about a four or five hour round trip, so it’s quite a commitment, but it’s worth coming down just to meet the people that help us.
We got into Archery because of Wheelpower, she did it for the first time two years ago and they suggested we join a club, so we went along and joined a club so now all three of us, me, her Dad and Jess are all members of an archery club. We all have our own kit, thanks to Trevor (one of the British Archery Association coaches) it cost us a fortune. He got Jess into it and now all of us are involved. So Handcycling and Archery were her two main loves, but last year really to our surprise she discovered powerlifting and she lifted 30 kilos, which is over half her body weight. She’s such a girly girl and lifting that much and she just loved it and she would do it until she was exhausted, and they were having to send her away saying she needed to rest, drink and eat. She’d go away and rest and ten minutes later she’d say I’m going back to do more powerlifting. She also learned all about athletics and how to throw things properly, because we weren’t throwing things correctly, but now we know what to do. When she came last year, she learnt all about competing and the rules and the appreciation of how to be a real competitor and abide by the proper rules and instructions and officials. She went back to school and basically told that they had been doing it wrong and she went into the PE lesson and told them how it had to be done properly and they were proud of her of how much knowledge she’d brought back to school and she came a bit of an expert in certain sports. (Jessica interjected and said she was really proud). So WheelPower has opened the sporting world for Jessica? Absolutely, we had tried sports before, loads of different ones and it took us quite a lot of sports to realise that she hated anything with other people, she’s not good with a team sport, but we had to try everything until we discovered that. We kept trying to put her in wheelchair basketball and rugby, table tennis and tennis, but anything that involves another person she struggles a lot and we found that the individual things like archery, handcycling, athletics and swimming suit her personality better because she can concentrate on herself rather than having to rely on other people. She has learning difficulties and sometimes people don’t give her enough time to compute what’s going on, especially something fast like basketball, it moves too quickly (Jessica says “it’s crazy”) Things like archery she can do at her own pace and swimming she’s in her own little world, she doesn’t care what anyone else is doing and if she gets to the end she says I didn’t drown, (laughs) which we always feel is a positive!
Case study 2: Nakita Wright age 10 years from Trowbridge, Wiltshire. What does it mean to be here? “It’s really fun and inclusive because everyone’s doing the same stuff. Everyone knows what they mean and they can help you, let’s say if my foot fell off the handcycle they always come and get me they wouldn’t expect me to do it myself”
There’s a lot of stuff, there’s not just one thing or two things to do, there’s loads of stuff all around everywhere and they give you space to do stuff and it’s on all day so you don’t have to rush around and say be there, be there” What sports have you tried and what sports have you liked? I really liked racing, shooting, I liked rugby and basketball. I like the wrestling off it, but you have to race to get it and it’s fun but it really wears you out, but you have to get the ball and it’s like a team sport, you have to cooperate with your team. What did you like about shooting? It’s like a nice calming, nice calm one, you don’t have to race around all the time and you really have to focus on it. You have to aim it and then shoot it, while talking to someone else. I got mostly tens or nines. I like the rifles over there, but I might see if there’s a club near my house to try other sorts of guns or pistols.” What other sports are you looking forward to doing here? “I’m looking forward to the swimming and I haven’t done basketball this week. I go swimming four times a week because I live next to a swimming pool, so me and my friends go and swim for an hour.” What is it like being with people with similar disabilities here? “Yes they understand and it’s really inclusive. I haven’t made any friends yet, but I’m hoping to.”
Nakita’s mum Natasha Wright quotes: Nakita was a very active young lady and unfortunately three years ago this month (October) she was learning to surf and twisted her back with a hyperextension which led to her being paralysed. Since then we’ve had various rehabilitation efforts in St Francis ward in Stoke Mandeville. We were here in August where we met Ollie, (Oliver Buncombe, Sports Development Officer, Wheelpower) and he was talking part in basketball in the sports hall and she seemed to love it and excel and wasn’t afraid of bashing into people, even though she was playing with adults. Ollie came over to us and explained what he does and how Wheelpower works and that he would like us to come up and take part in the National Junior Games this week”.
“Nakita is in her element, she has got such a smile on her face and I had a bit of a moment over there at the track, I had a few tears in my eyes watching her going around”
“It’s so nice to see her with that smile on her face. She kind of lost that sparkle for a little bit and now it seems that she’s regained it, bless her. She’s not scared to try anything and she will give everything her all. For a little girl, she may only look tiny, but don’t be deceived by that, there’s a lot of power behind that.” Mentally, is it important for her to do something like this? “Yes we have struggle at home with adaptions, getting her inclusive in school, we’ve had a quite tough year in regards to her inclusion in sports within school. Her sports day was quite a challenging day for myself, they said that they were including her, but they isolated her out and made her race on her own against her own time. To me that wasn’t inclusion that was isolation and from that point we said we’ve got to get her into something, she’s got so much energy to burn. Unfortunately, where we live there isn’t so much within the local amenities, but we’ve been encouraged to come up to Wheelpower and everyone’s been so nice and welcoming. Even though we are on our own, we’re not with a group, initially if you’d have asked me three years ago I would have said no I wouldn’t do anything like that with her on my own, but now it’s just opened doors and there’s a big wide world out there. There is the support out there if you want it or need it, you’ve just got to put yourself out there.” “If it wasn’t for the likes of Ollie coming over, he’s such a lovely person and he makes you feel at ease straight away. He said “come up, come up you will really enjoy it” and within ten minutes we were signing a piece of paper to say yeah we’re coming up. That’s it you’ve done it, you’ve got us. But to see her like this it’s well worth the time off.” Are there local clubs in your area for people like Nakita? We have since found out that there are clubs in Bristol, there’s a shooting club and there’s a racing club as well which we can access. It’s important just to be around other wheelchair users because where we live she is the only one and everyone seems to know her, whizzing around, she’s such a great personality and it’s nice to see her sparkle.”
Would sport be a social thing for her or would she take it seriously, possibly Paralympics etc? “No I think she’s going to go all the way. I think she’s definitely got the drive behind her and if me and daddy support her and we’ve got the support of Wheelpower, then there’s no stopping her. There’s no reason why she can’t aim for the top. She’s good at her shooting and racing, she’s wiping the floor with me and daddy shooting.”
Case study 3: Alex Towns-Phil, Age 17 years, from The Village School, Kingsbury What’s your first experience of coming to the Junior Games? It’s been different, usually when you go on trips they don’t give you as much freedom to do what you want, but here they let you try different types of sports. I’ve tried shooting, archery, wheelchair basketball, wheelchair rugby, wheelchair cricket, I’ve tried a multitude of different sports so I’m happy that I took the opportunity to come. When you were offered the chance to come did you know what to expect?
“I wasn’t sure, I thought it was like a sports day with all different types of schools, I didn’t realise that everyone was so diverse, different and I don’t know who to explain it but everyone is open to talk to each other and they are not shy or anything, so it’s a help”. I’m still new to the Village (school) and getting to know people, so for me to come here has helped me come out of my shell and talk to everyone. What about the social side of the event? That’s been good, everyone is communicating with each other, even people from different schools, I’ve met a whole lot of different kids and whenever I see them they say “hi, how are you”, even with the staff as well. You’ve been helping other people as well? Yeah whenever I see a sport that I want to do, I make sure that someone is doing it with me, so I bring three or from my school and if I see anyone sitting on the side I’ll tell them to come as well.
What sports have you enjoyed that you didn’t know about? All the wheelchair ones, they are fun but really competitive. I’ve been playing wheelchair basketball all day yesterday and all day today. It’s tiring because you have to wheel the wheelchairs and you have to scream at everyone to get into position, but yeah it’s fun. What other sports have you done? I did shooting but I wasn’t really good at it, I had three shots and I thought nah not anymore for me.”
Case study 4: Sam Joyce, Age 15 years from Ashford, Kent What does coming along here mean to you? It means that I can come along and try out a variety of different sports that usually wouldn’t be accessible to me. It’s a lot of fun as well. You don’t really think about it, but then you have all these doors opening up to you. It’s incredible Before you came here what sort of sports were you taking part in? Slightly modified PE lessons at school, archery at the local club, they’ve both been great in trying to help me do well, but it’s just that it’s mainly for the able bodied it’s just not as specialized in a way. What sports did you do first time that you never thought you would do? Basketball, shooting, tennis, pretty much everything here…. there’s a load. I’ve tried out the rugby this time and managed to have a go on the handcycling, that’s been fun. It’s trying all the sports again that I tried last time. What was it about wheelchair rugby that you liked? Being able to go out really fast, in case you have the occasional knock with someone. That is quite fun. The same with the basketball. And what about the handcycling? How quickly you can go on a straight line, but it does tire you out, going along constantly pushing, the upper body strength, it’s quite tough, but really fun.
What about being here with other people, is that important to you?
“Back home you don’t see many people in a wheelchair, here there’s loads of people you can talk to and you can be open with them and they understand you, rather than an able-bodied person.”
What are you going to do over the next few days? A bit more shooting, a bit more of the hockey maybe, tennis, athletics, loads of things.
What does playing sport mean to you? It’s just the time to relax, do some exercise, get out there and do things you normally don’t do. Sam’s mum – Vicky: What does it mean Sam coming here to you as a parent? I think it’s great, it’s a way of him being able to come to try out sports. It gives him the opportunity to do stuff he wouldn’t be able to do otherwise in school. It gets him involved in and participating and meeting other people as well and having a bit of connection between all of them as well. So, I think that’s important, because disability can be an isolating situation, so to be able to be with a lot of other people in a similar situation is really, really good. It’s his second time here, what did he learn from the first visit? So much, I think. HE really enjoyed the participating, finding something he enjoyed like the shooting really gave him that enthusiasm and that strive to do more and get involved in more sports. It gave a positive spin on his work, educationally as well, it just gave him a little more oomph, a bit more to strive for. Has Sam always been interested in sport? Not really, he’s always enjoyed watching sports like the Olympics and other sports on TV, but because of his disability he’s not been able to participate. Here basically opened the door for him to do that. FOR MORE INFORMATION, OR TO ARRANGE AN INTERVIEW: Contact: Carolyn Fray Marketing, Communications & Engagement Officer WheelPower Email: carolyn.fray@wheelpower.org.uk T: 01296 395995 W: www.wheelpower.org.uk