Redefining Disability

Lindsey Zurbrugg was unsure of what a future in sports would look like for her when she became disabled at the age of 13. But then she found wheelchair basketball. She now plays for the USA Women's Wheelchair Basketball National Team and won a bronze medal at the Tokyo Paralympic Games. What is really cool is that was recently selected to be the first female athlete to appear on special-edition Cracker Jill packaging in 2024 with a partnership between Cracker Jack and the Women's Sports Foundation.

On October 23, 2005, Army Sergeant Bryan Anderson was nine months into his second deployment to Iraq when his vehicle went over an Improvised Explosive Device (IED). The Purple Heart recipient and triple amputee has always been an athlete, but after his rehabilitation at Walter Reed he got away from sports a bit, doing stunt work, acting, writing a book, and other activities. But wheelchair rugby spoke to him, and now he is actively playing that game.

After studying occupational therapy in college, Dawn Hameline went to work with the VA and is still involved with summer and winter adaptive sports clinics for disabled veterans. She is now a Clinical Education and Outreach Specialist with Mobius Mobility. So we chat with her about the iBOT, a unique and versatile mobility device.

SFC Jay Martin was medically retired from the Army after a bicycle accident left him paralyzed. As an adaptive athlete, he has picked up air rifle as a sport and competes in Move United’s Adaptive Shooting League. His goal is to make the national para shooting team and is also a volunteer and coach for other military veterans and individuals with disabilities getting into the sport.

Barbi Baum competed in swimming and track and field at the international level in the 1980’s and graduated from the University of Illinois in 1982. She was president of their Disabled Sports Organization and a Paralympic athlete. She has been a disabled athlete most of her life and has shared her time and talents endlessly encouraging those with disabilities to participate. She was one of the founding members of Three Rivers Adaptive Sports in 1989 and was recently inducted into the Adaptive Sports Hall of Fame for her contributions.

Darian Haynes is an adaptive athlete who competes in para snowboarding, surfing, and skateboarding. Growing up surfing in Hawaii, she was a fixture on Team Hawaii and then Team USA, earning 8 individual & team World Championship medals. She has competed locally and internationally at over 30 surfing events. After moving to the mainland in 2021, she relocated to Silverthorn Colorado and began training in para snowboard for the 2026 Paralympics with Adaptive Action Sports. She is currently a member of the USA Para Snowboard Team has been ranked third in the world. And through AAS she also expanded into the competitive world of Para Skateboarding.

At age 17, Noah Elliott had his left leg amputated above the knee. He would learn about Paralympic snowboarding through attending a camp for children with cancer. Although the Paralympic gold medalist is known for his success on the snow, we chat with him about his passion for skateboarding as well.

Natalie Grazian has a congenital limb difference, meaning her right arm did not fully develop before birth. Exercising has always been a passion and that prompted her to find modifications to help her do the activities she cares about. But when it came to some yoga positions and weight-bearing exercises, her limb difference presented a unique challenge. So the University of Washington graduate student worked with a prosthetic company to design a new type of prosthetic arm that will benefit fellow yoga fans across the world.

Pete Peterson, aka Pickleball Pete as he is known at GLASA, is a certified pickleball instructor and helps lead the adaptive pickleball program at Great Lakes Adaptive Sports Association, a Move United member organization in the Chicago area. So we chat with him about the sport.

Daniel Gale is a founder and current executive director of Adaptive Action Sports, a Move United member organization based in Colorado. He has been a sports organizer for ESPN and the Summer X Games, the Adaptive Skateboard Park Jam, Adaptive Sno-Cross, and more. He also serves as the general manager for para skateboarding with USA Skateboarding.