Women in Sports
Terri Cecil-Ramsey: The summer before her senior year, at age seventeen, Terri Cecil-Ramsey was in an automobile accident that left her paralyzed. From day one neither she nor the rest of her family treated the accident like a tragedy. “When you grow up on a farm, everything is a challenge,” she observed, “so my accident was just another challenge.”
Giving up her dream to play college basketball was the hardest thing she ever did, but Cecil-Ramsey never gave up her love of sports. When someone mentioned wheelchair fencing, she went to watch the famous fencing coach in Louisville, Leszek Stawicki, whohad added a wheelchair fencing division to his already popular fencing program. The two eventually became fast friends. After 18 months of intense training, Cecil-Ramsey entered the 1996 Paralympics in Atlanta, Georgia. Although she did not win the gold, she did become a national champion.
Her message: the only difference between a person using a wheelchair and an able-bodied person IS the wheelchair.
Learn about the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Find out more about the Paralympics from the International Paralympics Committee and the US Paralympics Committee.
Click here to get informations in german!