Redefining Disability

At age 2, Amie Day sustained a spinal cord injury that left her paralyzed from the waist down as the result of a car accident. Discovering wheelchair racing at 12 gave her a sense of purpose and freedom. Starting with Great Lakes Adaptive Sports Association, or GLASA, Amie quickly rose through the ranks winning multiple medals at the 1998 and 1999 World Games. She would then compete for Team USA a...

Nico Calabria is a four-time U.S. Men's Amputee Soccer Team captain, board member of the American Amputee Soccer Association, and founder of the New England Amputee Soccer Association. An above-the-knee amputee who joined the national team in 2011, Nico has spent more than a decade not only competing at the highest levels of the sport but actively building the infrastructure around it — helping gr...

Crystal Skahan is a Clinical Assistant Professor at the University of New Hampshire's Department of Recreation Management and Policy. In addition, Crystal serves as the Education and Training Director at Northeast Passage, a Move United member organization affiliated with UNH’s College of Health and Human Services. A practitioner-scholar with expertise in adaptive sport and therapeutic recreation,...

Mia Busk grew up in Alabama as the youngest of seven siblings, playing soccer, swimming, gymnastics, and more from an early age — almost always the only athlete with a limb difference on her teams. Born without her left arm, she found her way to amputee soccer at 18 through an unlikely chain of connections and is now a goalkeeper on the U.S. Women's Amputee Soccer team. She competed internationall...

Joe Moore is the founder of Adaptive Expeditions, a Move United member organization based in Charleston, South Carolina. A lower extremity amputee since 2002, Moore drew on his personal experience navigating a gap in accessible sports programming to build a program centered on surfing, kayaking, and stand-up paddle boarding for people of all abilities. He has also helped lead American Canoe Associ...

Dr. Kiersten McCartney is an exercise physiologist, sports performance specialist, and a founder of the Arena Adaptive Football Club, Delaware's amputee soccer team. She serves as sports performance specialist for the American Amputee Soccer Association and has conducted research at international competitions.

Ryan Davis is a T54 wheelchair track and field athlete whose competitive drive was shaped early — after a spinal cord injury at age six led him to wheelchair basketball, and eventually to his true passion in racing. Now a nationally recognized Para High School All American, Ryan competes in the 400 meters and 1500, trains five to six days a week year-round, and has built a 2026 schedule that inclu...

Jesi Stracham is a trailblazing entrepreneur, speaker, and fierce advocate dedicated to transforming lives through her innovative ventures. As the co-owner of Freedom Longevity and Wellness LKN, she pioneers cutting-edge therapies that redefine holistic health and recovery. Jesi also co-developed the Wheel With Me Adapt Fit app, empowering wheelchair users to reclaim their independence through fit...

Three months after graduating from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, Joe Oppold had a cerebral aneurysm. Instead of reporting to OBC, or Officer Basic Course, he wound up in the ICU. Just a year later though, he was able to go skiing with some fellow disabled veterans, which he still enjoys doing today as well as other activities. The Move United Warfighters Ambassador wrote a book,” That’s...

Amanda Warren served with distinction for 26 years as a Major in the Army, specializing in Logistics Management. Transitioning from military to civilian life brought unique challenges, but Warren found the medical care needed for both physical and mental healing. She was introduced to adaptive sports through a networking event sponsored by Adaptive Adventures, a Move United member organization. Si...

Gabriel Cardier is an adaptive athlete, entrepreneur, and amputee advocate who lost his left leg in a 2014 motorcycle accident in Los Angeles. His athletic achievements include completing the Las Vegas half marathon and summiting Ecuador's Cotopaxi volcano with Range of Motion Project (ROMP), where his team became the first all-amputee expedition to successfully reach the summit. Drawing from his...

Katherine Hayes Rodriguez has been a pioneering force in adaptive skiing for nearly five decades. Beginning in 1976 as a volunteer with a program for visually impaired skiers in the Tahoe Basin, she became instrumental in professionalizing adaptive ski instruction across the United States. Katherine was an early leader of an organization that is now known as Achieve Tahoe, Move United’s first chap...

Marine Corps Veteran Gabby Wake was injured when a vehicle hit her motorcycle at a red light, resulting in a traumatic brain injury and damage to her back. Through the Wounded Warrior Battalion, she tried numerous adaptive sports. Gabby would medal at the DOD Warrior Games and Invictus Games in track and field as well as cycling events. But it is the sport of sled hockey that has really clicked an...

Kim Seevers has spent nearly three decades in winter adaptive sports, including serving as the sighted guide for an alpine ski racer who competed in the 2014 Paralympic Winter Games in Sochi Russia. Later that year, she developed the first bobsled and skeleton development camp for athletes with disabilities in Lake Placid, NY and has created a premier grassroots program for developing elite para b...

Josh Pauls was born without a tibia in both legs and had them both amputated at 10 months old. At age eight, he would be introduced to the game of sled hockey. Within eight years of first trying out the sport, he was called up to his first world championship team. Pauls made his Paralympic debut at the Paralympic Winter Games Vancouver 2010, where he was the youngest player on the team at 17. He w...

Pearl Outlaw's journey with vision loss began at age nine with a diagnosis of retinitis pigmentosa (RP). Now 27, she's experienced the full progression of RP—from night blindness in childhood to using a cane in high school, to a rapid transition in 2018 that left her almost completely without vision within months. Her introduction to Nordic skiing came in 2019 while attending the Carroll Center fo...

Bob Balk is a 6X Paralympian and Paralympic medalist, representing the U.S. in both summer and winter games for over three decades. He has competed in Nordic skiing, the pentathalon, and para canoe. He has chaired the IPC Athletes Council. Now, he's racing down ice tracks at 70 miles per hour with a singular goal: getting para bobsled recognized as an official Paralympic sport.

Gene Calantoc joined the U.S. Army as a Combat Engineer in 2011 and deployed to Afghanistan in 2012-2013 with the 101st Screaming Eagles. A motorcycle accident in March 2020 led to his medical retirement and it was during his recovery at Fort Sam Houston when Gene discovered adaptive sports. He has competed at the DOD Warrior Games and plays with the Texas Parasport wheelchair basketball team. As...

Shawn Meredith attended the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where he was a varsity athlete on their world-renowned wheelchair track team. He earned numerous national championships, national records, and four world records while at Illinois, and represented Team USA twice at the Paralympic Games in 1992 and 1996, winning a total of 5 gold and one silver medals. Shawn also played wheelch...

Kenley Teller was five years old when she started with adaptive sports, after going on a ski trip with Outdoors For All, a Move United member organization in Washington State. There, she was told about a swimming program and she has been swimming at the club level ever since. Kenley also started swimming at several of the para swim meets, including the Jimi Flowers Classic, The Hartford Nationals,...

In 2017, Kate Brim sustained a spinal cord injury when she went in for a routine surgery for a herniated disc. She was introduced to adaptive sports through Mary Free Bed Rehabilitation Hospital, a Move United member organization based in Grand Rapids. She particularly fell in love with handcycling because of the freedom and peace that it brought her. She now is an elite competitor, having won one...

Dominic Norris started playing ice hockey at three years old, having his jersey retired in Maryland after having the most points scored in state history (244 points in 58 games). He continued to play in college at Franklin Pierce University and Stevenson University, where he is finishing a master’s degree, as well as in Europe. While diving into the deep end a pool, Dominic would sustain a burst f...

JD Drinkard enlisted in the Alabama National Guard as the result of September 11th and would be deployed to Iraq with his unit. As the result of injuries sustained in country, he would be medically retired. He would be introduced to adaptive sports through the Warrior Transition Battalion, starting with wheelchair basketball. He now plays in the USA Wheelchair Football League with the Birmingham H...

As a teenager, Tyler Merren was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa, a degenerative eye disease which causes gradual deterioration in sight. He was introduced to goalball in 1999 at a sports education camp hosted by U.S. Association of Blind Athletes at Western Michigan University. He is now a 5X Paralympian, with one silver and one bronze medal, in the sport. Tyler recently retired from Team USA,...

In 2009, Mason Symons was on his way to the Armory to report to duty with the PA Army National Guard when he had a motorcycle accident and broke his neck. After that, he would discover the sport of wheelchair rugby. He loves the team aspect and camaraderie that comes with playing the game. He played for Team USA at the 2024 Paralympic Games in Paris, earning a silver medal. He also plays locally w...