EDMONTON – Chandra Round has been living with a severe brain injury since 2002. Doctors didn’t have much hope for her, but the local woman continues to defy the odds.
Despite needing help getting out of a vehicle and into her wheelchair, which she can only control with her wrists, Chandra is training for a triathlon: the half Ironman.
She’ll be racing with Morrie Ripley, who also has a disability.
“In September of 1999, I hit a moose and broke my neck,” the 38-year-old explains. He’s managed to regain most of his movement but still has severe muscle spasms and nerve pain. He was paralyzed from the neck down, but has since regained more of his movement.
“You wouldn’t know it my looking at me but I still get severe muscle spasms and nerve pain that is excruciating…it’s an invisible disability – you don’t see it. But every day I hurt.”
But that won’t stop him from swimming, biking and running, a total of 113 kilometres with Chandra. For the two kilometre swimming portion, Morrie will have a rope attached to him and the boat, which Chandra will be in. After pulling her through the water, the two will move onto the 90 kilometre bike leg of the race. Chandra will be sitting in the front seat of a specialized bike. That seat will detach from the bike so that Morrie will be able to push her for the 21 kilometre running portion. He’s quick to point out that he won’t be doing all the work.
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“Whether it be windy days, whether it be the cold and the wind, whether it be rain, hail, she’s gotta be able to sit and adjust herself. She’s gonna have the pressure of sitting for 6 hours or longer…She’s gonna have to have stuff blowing in her face and clearing out of her way, she’s gotta adjust the way she sits in the bike for the grooves in the road – it’s not something you can just do sitting at home.”
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The two found each other through the Canadian Paraplegic Association.
“Morrie just sort of was this angel who walked into our office and said, ‘hey, we wanna do this race and I wanna buy all the equipment and then I wanna make it available to people, and I want you to find someone who can do it with me,'” recalls Amy MacKinnon.
He was inspired by Team Hoyt – the American father who does triathlons with his disabled son. And he was looking for a specific teammate: someone not too heavy to lift, and someone adventurous.
“Someone that wants to make a difference,” he says. “They have to have one thing and that’s heart – and you gotta be out there and you wanna go and you wanna make that difference and Chandra is just – couldn’t have asked for a better partner.”
Their team Kwad squad is raising money for the CPA’s Adapted Adventures program, which supplies special equipment to people with disabilities for outdoor activities – like fishing, cross country skiing and cycling.
The bikes alone can cost as much as $7,000, though.
Through her computer, Chandra says she wants to give others what she has been given.
“It is hard to express in words the freedom and agility I feel when we are out. I cannot explain how grateful I am to Morrie. He has given me a gift that is above anything else.”
The duo will do the Great White North Triathlon in Stony Plain on July 7. If you’d like to sponsor them – with the money going to Adapted Adventures – visit kwadsquad.com.
With files from Su-Ling Goh, Global News
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