By G. PATRICK PAWLING
Atlantic Citys Around the Island Marathon Swim is a 22.5-mile path of pain. Nobody denies that. But its Swimming Lite compared to what 16-year-old Kelly McAllister has gone through.
It was supposed to be a benign tumor in her leg, but it spread. They dug around in her a lot, and then they took part of her leg. She was 11, a girl who would take books out of the library to help her become a more competitive swimmer. The amputation, it was a relief. It signaled an end to the pain.
Well, an end to the physical pain. What would come later would hurt in different ways. Things like being cut from her swim team, after she had the courage to get out there in front of everybody and stand on one leg and do her best. Coach said she was too slow. A just decision? Maybe. Fair? Maybe not.
So she swims for herself now. Not to set an example, though she is, but because she loves it. Thats why she was in the bay on Friday, the day before the big race around the island. This race, the one McAllister did Friday, was for disabled people only. Its the one you dont hear much about but its the only one in the country, and its a success, thanks to the Bacharach Institute for Rehabilitation and the Viking Rowing Club.
And there was McAllister, swimming like crazy, and not liking the bay a whole lot because of the yukyness factor that fear of the murky that comes from having been mostly in pools. Being brushed by a fish didnt help.
There werent any spectators lining the course for this race, the Fifth Annual Disabled Open Water Swim. There were wheelchairs on the floating dock, other assistive devices, various types of prosthesis and friends and relatives who all made a lot of noise.
It wasnt a demonstration. It was an athletic event. Escorted by volunteers in kayaks, the swimmers went anywhere from 1K to 5K. Several also planned to compete in Saturdays around The Island swim as part of a disabled relay team.
Also in the water was Jason Wening, of Chicago, 26, who captained his (able-bodied, except for him) Division II college swim team and went on to become a force in the countrys Paralympics swimming scene. Wening, a research engineer at the University of Illinois, was born without feet and with a deformed left hand. How is it a guy with no feet can kick so much butt?
Like McAllister, he swims because he loves it. But he also wants disabled people to know whats possible.
Its good for the body, and it gives you a lot of the tools you need to be independent, he said. The flexibility, the upper-body strength, it helps disabled people achieve a level of strength they need to be more independent. The higher the level of your disability the more important it is to improve your tools.
Wening loves open water swimming because there are no flip turns, which are difficult for him and cause him to lose ground.
In the open water Im not starting 50 yards behind, he said. In the pool I get my butt whipped by people I can beat in a mile.
No, he doesnt swim with his two prosthesis. He does it all with his arms and torso.
Although Wening is a force, he finished well behind John Morgan of Highland Falls, N.Y., a linguist at West Point who was blinded in an accident that can only be described as freakish. He was exercising with a machine that used stretch bands and springs when the bands snapped, sending the springs into his face and damaging his retinas. Morgan cant bring his Seeing Eye dog James into the water, so he follows a Styrofoam noodle towed by a kayak, touching it every stroke to navigate.
I feel more freedom when I swim, he said. In open water I dont have to count my strokes (to know where he is). In the pool I have to count and Id rather not keep that in my mind.
This is the part of a story where somebody usually writes, but everybody was a winner in this event. Well, thats bull. Wening finished a distant second, and my bet is he would rather have been first. But my guess is he could also teach most people a little about perspective. Last year a team of four disabled swimmers beat a team of six able-bodied Ocean City lifeguards in the Around The Island Swim. You think they didnt enjoy that? The perspective is pretty good from in front.
Grover Evans, of Little Rock, Ark. theres a guy with perspective. He lost the use of his legs in a car crash. He drove up with his finance, Helen Malchan, to swim the 1K, and when he came out of the water he had used up just about everything but his sense of humor.
How you doing, Grover? somebody asked.
Oh man! I need an oxygen mask, he said, laughing. What day is today?
But he knew exactly what day it was. It was the day he swam open water for the first time, the day the bays buoyant salt water held his body and made him feel light, the way water always does, especially salt water the way it lifts us and holds us and makes us float, and insulates us for a time. A short time for most of us. But longer if youre a distance swimmer.
With faith and belief you can just about do anything, said Evans. It may not happen right away but it will eventually come. There is no such thing as cant.
Who is going to argue with these people? Who now has the nerve to say, I cant?
(Last weeks column on the Atlantic County Rowing Association gave an incorrect phone number. For information on the ACRA, call (609) 344-4104.)
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