Winter Park, USA
The Winter Park course is an amazing opportunity for participants to ski in one of the best areas with excellent one on one instruction so you can progress at your own speed. The course is open to 1st time paraplegic and incomplete or low-level tetraplegics skiers. This course consists of 10 spinal cord injured skiers and 6 buddies, with the course running for 12 days, including 8 full days of skiing.
“I haven’t had so much fun in ages.
The freedom I felt from leaving my chair at the bottom of the slopes
was amazing. Just as fun if not more than skiing before my accident.”
Tim, L1, aged 23
For further details contact Ally or Catherine on:
020 8875 1805 or email
Winter Park Life
by Martin McNeil, group leader, Winter Park 2010
I was injured as a result of a motorcycle road traffic accident in February 2004, just a week after I had returned from my 14th ski holiday in France. I used to go skiing with my wife, Lorraine, and the three kids every year, so I thought that that part of our family life had ended when I became a T2 paraplegic. I had heard of sit skiing but assumed that it was a sport reserved for low level paras and those who had at least a modicum of balance and trunk control and not something I could ever do. I could just picture myself on a ski trip, confined to the gentlest of nursery slopes for the duration, not making any progress and becoming so frustrated that I made everyone else’s trip a misery. Anyway, I couldn’t go skiing. Ski resorts aren’t geared up for wheelchair users. How would I get around? There’s snow everywhere!
It was on a Back-Up multi activity course in Keswick that I met Jane Sowerby, a then rising star in the British Disabled Ski Team. She told me all about Back-Up's ski courses, and so February 11th 2008 found me at Heathrow Airport, bound for Denver, with a big bag of ski gear and a bigger bag of worries. Ten hours later I was in the USA having left a lot of my concerns on the plane. Flying long haul proved less of a dilemma that I had imagined.
I made steady progress during the course and was able to venture further up the slopes. It was so good to be back up a mountain again, in the sunshine with the only sound the gentle scrunch of the snow beneath your ski. The feelings of the wind in your face and the smug satisfaction of passing able-bodied skiers and boarders are incomparable.
I returned from Winter Park full of enthusiasm for my new sport and satisfied that an independent trip with family and friends was certainly achievable. Back-Up’s choice of venue, the professionalism and knowledge of the group leaders and Winter Park’s superb instructors made for a very enjoyable course. I would recommend it to anybody. Like any other Back-Up course, it's about making new friends, learning new skills and having fun. But above all, it’s about challenging yourself and pushing past your perceived limits.
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