It is a winter day at Sandia Peak. A fifth-grade girl suffering from cerebral palsy is skiing down the bunny slope. One volunteer is tethered behind her and another is skiing beside her, but she is gliding down that slope as if flying to the moon. She spreads her arms wide and bursts into a loud cheer—a cheer for what she can still do, for the life that remains in her, for the pure joy that living still holds.
Another scene is last Saturday afternoon at Cochiti Lake’s Tetilla Peak Recreation Area. The sun is shining after the previous day’s rain, the sky is clear and a stiff breeze is blowing: perfect sailing weather. The small catamaran under full sail races in toward shore. Aboard are Brett Maul, directing the Adaptive Sports Program, and a family consisting of a disabled mother, a father and their daughter. The little girl jumps off the boat and splashes to shore, waving her arms in triumph. “Look at the grin on that kid’s face,” a volunteer sitting on the shore marvels.
These are two scenes from the Adaptive Sports Program of New Mexico, which over the past 29 years has given thousands of disabled people the opportunity to enjoy snow and water sports supposedly reserved for the strong and healthy.
This summer more than 100 disabled people are participating in 10 river running and lake events that include kayaking, sailing, paddle boarding and sail boarding. Last winter more than 300 participated in downhill skiing and snowboarding at Ski Santa Fe, Sandia and Pajarito.
Assisting them last winter were 272 volunteers. This summer 60 volunteers (including this writer) have helped out at events at Elephant Butte, Heron, Cochiti and Ute lakes as well as on the Rio Grande.
The logistics of these events are daunting. It takes hours to set up and take down the water sports equipment, which includes specialized gear to accommodate disabilities. ASP also serves a hot lunch (and at some events dinner and breakfast, too) to the mob of volunteers and participants and their families.
The program was founded in 1985 by Ken Ley, a Lovelace Hospital physician, who saw adaptive sports as an extension of his work with the disabled. Under Maul, who started off with ASP as a volunteer in 2007, the program has been expanding, with more growth ahead. With the addition of water sports last year, the program was renamed this month, going from Adaptive Ski to Adaptive Sports Program of New Mexico. Last year they organized a summer event in Colorado, and next summer they plan to expand to Arkansas.
With only four current staffers and a budget of just over $100,000 (plus the equivalent of $100,000 in free ski passes from Sandia and Santa Fe for volunteers and participants), ASP has managed to do a lot with a little. Fund raising is the bailiwick of executive director Katya Frangzen. Stuart Pendleton is charge of the Ski Santa Fe program and Doug Lewis runs the Sandia effort. The budget is financed by several annual fundraisers and cash contributions to the 501–C-3 organization. Maul said they plan to “expand into a regional and possibly a national program,” which will enable them to seek contributions from a wider field.
Overseeing both the snow and the water sports events is Maul, who has 23 years of experience in adaptive sports but only took over the ASP events a couple of years ago.
“I grew up on the water,” he said in an interview Monday, “particularly on Lake Powell. I started skiing when I was 3 and started racing when I was 12. I got a skiing scholarship.”
Early childhood experiences helped direct him toward his career with the disabled. He grew up in Ruidoso with a friend who was disabled but became one of the top five skiers in the world in his category. “I was with him two or three times a week.” Later, Maul went into the adaptive ski program at Ski Apache. As a young child, he also bowled regularly with his mother and became friends with a group of disabled bowlers including some with Downs syndrome. “They instilled some of the future things in me,” Maul reflected.
Asked what comes next for him after adaptive sports, Maul said, “I plan to retire in this profession. I’ve given thousands of lessons to those with disabilities. I get inspiration almost daily.”
Maul and ASP volunteers have seen the experience with sports reverberate through other aspects of the participants’ lives, giving them more confidence and sometimes even peace. Maul described an Iraqi veteran who functioned as a paraplegic when he joined the program with traumatic brain injury. Maul skied with him for two years on a tether. “Now he goes all over the mountain. He’s doing skiing independently, which is what everybody wants to be able to do. Things like that is why I see it as important. It’s a very fun thing but also extremely rehabilitative. This gentleman has come from being in a wheelchair and pushed everywhere to being able to walk. It’s a huge, huge recovery.”
Another participant that made a deep impression on Maul was a double amputee who lost both legs from diabetes. “He was pretty upset when I met him, harsh on the whole world. He looked me in the eye and said this is not going to work. There’s no way you’re going to teach me to ski. This is ridiculous.”
Maul told him he had to lose at least 35 pounds from his 240-pound frame. Once getting off a ski lift he fell on top of Maul and injured him. Maul read him the riot act. He believes those who are in poor condition or much overweight cannot expect to do high altitude skiing independently. “He got so mad he lost almost 50 pounds,” Maul recalled, “and now skis all over the country by himself.”
Such experiences have made Maul a believer in “tough love. Even though they’re disabled, we don’t have to enable them.”
He continued, “It’s a fine line. You do have to enable them somewhat. It’s just like when we raise our children. If they are going to do it, they have to take on the responsibility for themselves to make it happen.”
Most of ASP’s teaching is done by volunteers under the tutelage of the core of pros. He tells them to be aware of the participant’s mood that day, of the needs they have at that particular moment.
“The volunteers represent a lot of talent, a lot of experience,” Maul said. Half a dozen have been with ASP more than 20 years and at least 35 more than 15 years.
Volunteers and participants will be gathering for the last summer outing at Abiquiu Lake on Sept. 5-7, and new volunteers and participants are welcome, Maul said. The first day will be training for new volunteers.
To participate, volunteer or contribute to ASP go to the web site adaptiveski.org.
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