WARRIOR GAMES | HERO STORIES
This week a team of wounded, injured and sick Veterans represent the UK Armed Forces in Tampa, Florida to compete as part of this years Warrior Games.
The team will go head-to-head in 14 adaptive sports including: archery, cycling, time trial cycling, shooting, sitting volleyball, swimming, track, field, wheelchair basketball, indoor rowing, powerlifting, and for the first time in Warrior Games history, golf, wheelchair tennis and wheelchair rugby.
The team is made up of active military service members and Veterans with upper-body, lower-body, and spinal cord injuries; traumatic brain juries; visual impairment; serious illnesses; and post-traumatic stress.
The Department of Defence (DoD) Warrior Games were created in 2010 and were designed to introduce wounded, injured and sick service members and Veterans to competitive sports.
We caught up with a few members of the team to hear their stories and how injury isn't holding them back.
GORDON CLARKE:
Gordon served as a Royal Navy steward for 26 years on board ships and submarines before leaving military service in 2003 due to a serious ankle injury which meant the removal of part of his right leg.
Despite this life-changing operation, Gordon says he's in a better place, ''Going from taking about 30 different pain killers and anti-inflammatory tablets every day, to just taking two on days that I need them. That was the biggest thing. Just being off the meds has changed me''.
Thanks to his fiancé Abbi, he found Help for Heroes, joining the Plymouth Recovery Centre's wheelchair rugby team, Endeavour. He says thanks to the support and the camaraderie he found there, he hasn't looked back.''I'm back doing wheelchair rugby and triathlon - it's all there. The world's opened up again. It's given me back what I wanted to do''.
On representing Team UK in Tampa, he says ''It has given me a new lease of life 100%. I found the old me again''.
ALLAN Mc SWEEN:
Allan has been a Band of Brother since 2015 when he was medically discharged. Being supported by Help for Heroes has ''helped me tremendously'' he says. He had no intention of competing, but being involved with the Invictus programme and the Warrior Games has given him a chance to ''comeback and train with no pressure''.
He says ''Regardless of your injury, disability or fears, look for what other people have done with limitations and go out there and try it and see where it takes you''.
SIMON FLORES:
Simon served for 12 years, 7 years with the Green Jackets, 5 with Three Rifles.
Help for Heroes supported him after an injury led to the amputation of his leg below the knee.
He says ''Being part of Warrior Games is fantastic. It's an honour. The kids are so happy and proud. It is great to prove to others that anything is possible when you put your mind to it, despite the injury I've got''.
To the great British public supporting people in the same situation as him he says their support has ''given ex-servicemen with physical disabilities something else to focus on, so they can push forward with their lives''.
PAUL METCALFE:
''I started going to Help for Heroes 2 years ago when I hit rock bottom. My sister found out about Phoenix House (Recovery Centre). When I first went there I was 18 stone and would not come out of my room. But they got me involved with sport''.
Being involved with Help for Heroes has ''opened up loads of doors'' for Paul. As well as sport and now being in the Warrior Games team he is also a volunteer for a modelling group at Phoneix House. He had stopped model making when he got ill but it has really helped him in his recovery - having a laugh with friends and being completely focused on modelling and not thinking about other things.
Being in Warrior Games has made Paul feel ''absolutely brilliant. everyone has gelled together. I am back being part of a team. It is a real sense of achievement to have got to this point''. It has made him feel a lot better and given him a lot of drive to go for it with this big chance.
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