Transforming Lives: Crested Butte's Adaptive Sports Center Empowering People Through New Experiences
Originally published in the Fall 2020 issue of SPOKE+BLOSSOM
Lonnie Bedwell describes blindness as being trapped in a room where you can’t see over, under, around or through the walls. He lost his eyesight in 1997 in a hunting accident when a friend shot him in a dense forest. Two months after losing his sight, he was lying on his couch in Indiana, fighting back tears and wondering how he could be a single dad to his three young daughters. The former Navy Petty Officer was scared to even mow the lawn, until his 5-year-old daughter Taylor said, “I’ll help ya.”
Her innocent offer was just the beginning of Bedwell’s appreciation of what an enormous difference a little assistance and compassion can make.
In 1987, a small group of Crested Butte locals recognized how far lending a hand could go when they founded the Crested Butte Physically Challenged Ski Program. That year, they provided ski equipment and lessons to 33 people with disabilities. The following year, President Jimmy Carter and his wife, who spent a lot of time in Crested Butte fishing, gave the nonprofit seed money to expand the program, now called the Adaptive Sports Center (ASC). These days, ASC offers adaptive activities ranging from skiing and snowboarding to mountain biking, ice climbing and kayaking for nearly 800 individuals annually.
NEW SUMMITS
In 2012, Bedwell was one of those individuals. He entered Ride the Rockies with ASC, which provided support, including a pilot who happened to be an Armed Forces national champion rider.
“Just one of his legs was bigger than my waist,” Bedwell says, recalling how, as they reached 72 mph, the pilot told Bedwell to wave to a passing car, then said, “You outta see the look on their faces.”
That five-day, 442-mile ride didn’t just top out at various summits; it led Bedwell to participate in other ASC programs like rock climbing, mountaineering and skiing, which ultimately forged such a close relationship with the organization that he co-founded — the Blind Adaptive Skiing Heroes (BASH) program. This winter will be his fifth year teaching skiing to veterans who are visually impaired. He also co-created a summer program for people who are blind to canoe, climb and tandem cycle, and now he and the ASC team are talking about starting a program for kids who are blind.
“I’ve seen people go from not wanting to leave their homes to thriving,” Bedwell says. “One mother said to me, ‘I don’t know what, who or how you did it, but what you’ve done for my son is just huge.’ I said, ‘I didn’t make a difference in his life. I was just blessed to be a part of it.’”
Photo courtesy of Adaptive Sports Center Crested Butte
PEAK EXPERIENCES
In a 2015-16 ASC survey, 100 percent of participants reported the highest possible satisfaction level with ASC’s programs. ASC states that its participants have experienced immediate benefits, including better sleep, new skill development and a sense of empowerment.
A 2009 Brigham Young University clinical study found that adaptive sports improves overall health, quality of life, self-confidence, activity levels and satisfaction with life. Chris Read, ASC program director, says Colorado is a hotbed for adaptive programs. The first, National Sports Center for the Disabled, began in 1970 with ski instruction at Winter Park Resort. Read says all adaptive professionals collaborate and trade notes about equipment, teaching techniques and more, but that each program has its unique personality and culture.
“We’re a fun group of people who are very knowledgeable and very skilled, and we practice what we preach,” Read explains.
ASC has built a reputation for its adaptive sports experts. Of its 22 winter instructors and seven administrators, most are certified therapeutic recreation specialists or hold degrees in outdoor education, psychology, sociology, physiology or adaptive physical education, in addition to certifications from professional organizations governing skiing, river guiding, ropes courses, wilderness experiences and more. ASC relies on about 130 volunteers and six interns to assist with its approximately 1,100 participants and 16,000 hours of programming annually.
While adaptive organizations along the Front Range and Breckenridge are larger and deliver more instruction days, ASC affords longer stays — an average of five days, versus one to three — due to its more remote location. This allows participants to bond with both peers and instructors. The longer programs extend well beyond sports lessons; they involve group dinners, trips to town and lodging.
“Meeting six or nine or 12 people in a similar situation as yours is a huge resource. We see a lot of returns,” Read says. “The main thing we hear is, ‘It’s like coming back to family.’”
“It’s just so powerful to simply have someone believe in you, and they believe in us,” Bedwell adds. “They are so good at what they do. There are other programs out there that are as good, but I guarantee there’s nobody that’s better, and that’s why I consistently go back to them. Not only do they put a door through these walls, but they lead us to a life that we thought no longer existed.”
ADAPTIVE OPPORTUNITIES
ASC operates out of the new Kelsey Wright Building, which opened in July 2019 at the base of Crested Butte Mountain Resort. The building provides more space for lockers, state-of-the-art adaptive equipment, physical therapy, client housing, classrooms, meeting areas, assessment spaces and administrative offices. Outdoors, ASC has permit access to miles of wilderness, hiking and biking trails, like Lake Irwin, Blue Mesa Reservoir, the Gunnison River and Hartman Rocks Recreation Area.
“Being blind has truly afforded me the opportunity to experience the best part of humanity, and the (ASC) community is just that. It’s made me realize that I’ve lost my eyesight, but I didn’t lose my vision.
— Lonnie Bedwell”
In addition to all of ASC’s adaptive sports instruction, Ride the Rockies support and the Adaptive Mountain Biking World Championships; it offers specialty camps for families, teenage burn survivors, veterans and women. Three-day family camps engage siblings and even provide a date night for parents. The Roger Pepper Adventure Camp teaches young burn survivors new life skills and self-confidence; Allison Massari established it in 1999 and named it after a selfless onlooker, Pepper, who rescued her from a fiery auto accident. Operation Rise and Conquer provides adventures for military personnel and first responders with a disability. Ladies’ summer and winter camps encourage girls and adult women with physical and orthopedic disabilities to try new activities and incorporate more self-care into their routines.
“When I think of the word ‘adapt,’ (ASC) truly embodies that,” Bedwell explains. “They find a way to make it work.”
ASC also provides a Community Kids Program, in partnership with the Gunnison Watershed School District. The program allows kids and their families to get to know each other well.
“The kids do better in classes and friendship improves every January when the program starts,” Read adds. “It builds local bonds.”
ADAPTING TO THE PANDEMIC
Of course, COVID-19 has impacted ASC’s programs.
“We’re offering a handful of activities, with tight restrictions,” Read says. “Count is not the goal. Wellbeing and health are the goals.”
ASC works closely with state and county health departments, as well as physicians. It adheres to a minimum 10-foot distance between people, along with mask wearing, sanitizing and symptom screening. It also has cancelled main fundraising events. However, the restrictions have resulted in more families traveling to ASC together, which Read sees as a “huge benefit” and an opportunity to strengthen family units.
OPENING DOORS
“We’re ultimately on a health and wellbeing human services mission to encourage people to get out whether they’re disabled or not,” he says. “We open doors for people, and hopefully they find their way and stop in to say, ‘Hi, we don’t need your services anymore.’ Others need us longer, or for life, and that’s okay too.”
Participants like Bedwell go on to accomplish amazing feats. While he has kayaked some of the most challenging whitewater in the world, climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro, summited several of North America’s highest mountains and Mt. Aconcagua (the highest peak in the Southern hemisphere), he is best known for making the first descent of the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon blind. In 2013, a team of veterans with disabilities guided him down by voice. He wrote 226, a book about his Grand Canyon adventure, is a motivational speaker and has appeared on “The Today Show” and “The Steve Harvey Show.”
“Being blind has truly afforded me the opportunity to experience the best part of humanity, and the (ASC) community is just that,” Bedwell says. “It’s made my life humbling and surreal and just amazing. It’s made me realize that I’ve lost my eyesight, but I didn’t lose my vision. I truly believe that I see more now than I did before I lost my sight. There’s no greater feeling than to give to others, and (ASC) helped me to do that.”
Bedwell believes people have two choices in life: to live in fear and pity and go nowhere, or to actively live.
“I just want people to live life and enjoy it,” he says. “When your feet hit the floor, it’s up to you whether it’s going to be a good day. So, what’s it going to be? If you think you can, then you probably can.”
He also encourages people “sitting on the sidelines” to volunteer or donate to ASC.
“You cannot deny the impact of this on people’s lives,” he says. “By volunteering or donating, you will make a difference in somebody’s life.”