Local handcycle team is on a mission to participate in adaptive sports
NEW YORK - Brooklyn is home to an inspiring handcycling team, whose members are all athletes with disabilities.
You can hear the joy in Maurice Evans' voice as he sails through the hills and trails of Prospect Park.
"You gotta have guts to do this, you really do. You think doing the marathon on feet is hard, do it on a handcycle!" Evans says.
The East New York native survived multiple gunshot wounds which left him in a wheelchair 30 years ago. He is now part of a handcycle team called Prevailers Sports, a non-profit founded in 2018 out of a love for adaptive sports.
At 55 years old, Evans is hoping to win 12 medals by his 60th birthday.
"When I cross that finish line, I feel like I really accomplished something very few people can do," he tells CBS 2's Hannah Kliger.
All of the team members are people with disabilities, who have spinal cord injuries or cerebral palsy. Peneliope Richards is the captain.
"There's not a team like us that exists here in Brooklyn," she says. "We wanted to make sure that handcycling was present in the community that we love, and people get to know more about us just by zooming past them in the park."
The Prevailers participate in a variety of races, and most have been accepted to the New York City Marathon. Now, the team is training for the upcoming RBC Brooklyn Half Marathon on May 20th.
"Being active in general really affects the quality of life of people with disabilities," Richards, who has Cerebral Palsy, explains.
"It's like a family, we get along, we support each other. Some of us make it in some races, some of us don't but we still cheer each other on," says Trisa Harris.
One of the biggest challenges, team members say, is finding a place to store their handcycles and getting them to the locations they need.
That's when a local company stepped in to help. Roadway Moving, founded in the Bronx, is sponsoring the storage and transportation of the equipment to make training and racing possible.
"So many people that are living with disabilities and spinal cord injuries have limited resources. So we saw this as an opportunity to really give back to them," says Roadway Account Manager Steven Bailey.
Their other difficulty is finding able-bodied volunteers to help on the big days. Still, despite the obstacles, the aptly-named team is doing what it was created to do - growing and thriving, training, and yes, prevailing.
"I think everyone should get out and run a marathon, do a marathon, walk a marathon, crawl a marathon," says Evans with a smile. "Just get your marathon on!"
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