A Positive Approach to Sports : Similarly Afflicted Camp Instructors Relate Easily to Handicapped Youths

Miguel Munoz grips the pneumatic rubber tires with his large hands and pushes the wheels forward, sending his wheelchair rolling along the oval track at Cal State Northridge.

Munoz closes the gap on another wheelchair and speeds into the lead in the half-mile relay race.

Munoz, 16, did not negotiate the makeshift obstacle course as easily, however. When the front wheels of his modified sports wheelchair caught the lip of an overturned table, he fell forward and struggled to maintain his balance on a pair of shaky legs that have been afflicted with spina bifida since birth.

Ray Stewart, watching Munoz through a pair of sunglasses, encourages him to try again. While Stewart can empathize with Munoz, he continues cajoling him not to give up.

“The challenge here is to get them to do things that they normally couldn’t do,” said Stewart, who coaches track and field at the wheelchair sports camp under way this week at CSUN. “I’ve had kids tell me they couldn’t get over the table. But once they tried it, they did it.”

Stewart, 34, motivates the eight wheelchair-bound youths in the relay race with encouragement and a stopwatch.

He also serves as an inspiration for the 40 youths aged 8 to 18 at the camp: Stewart is confined to a wheelchair himself.

Tanned and lean, Stewart looks like an athlete. The Downey resident has competed in more than 25 marathons and recently finished the Los Angeles Marathon in a time of 2 hours, 6 minutes. Stewart also coaches athletes in distance wheelchair racing.

Stewart is one of 15 counselors and instructors at the third annual camp, which is coordinated by Nick Breit, a CSUN physical education and kinesiology professor. Like the participants, all of the instructors and counselors are handicapped.

“We talk to the kids about all the things they can do in life, not the things they can’t,” said Breit, who is not handicapped.

Their camp consists of clinics in basketball, archery, tennis, track and field, swimming and weight training and a session of aquatic instruction at Castaic Lake. In addition, actor Billy Barty and a team of “Hollywood shorties” provided entertainment by playing the Matador football team Wednesday in a wheelchair basketball game.

Camp instructors such as Lou Cicciari, a Granada Hills High junior varsity basketball coach, do more than teach fundamentals. They are role models.

“Each kid offers a different challenge,” Cicciari said. “Not all of them have the same skills so I have to come up with different drills for them.”

Cicciari, 28, had both legs amputated at age 7 because of complications from a rare blood disease. The disability has not deterred him from coaching, however. He assists the Granada Hills varsity and coaches the junior varsity and hopes to become a college coach.

In addition to teaching basketball skills, Cicciari tries to educate the public about the needs of the handicapped.

“I hope that the public is becoming a little more aware that handicapped people can do things for themselves,” Cicciari said.

Counselor Joe LaSalle, 26, of Simi Valley is a startling example of what the handicapped can accomplish. LaSalle has been in a wheelchair since his legs were damaged because of complications after knee surgery seven years ago. Yet he has readily adapted.

Despite suffering a torn wrist muscle and broken finger, LaSalle rolled through the L. A. Marathon this year in 2:43. When not racing in marathons, LaSalle conducts break dancing demonstrations at dance clubs throughout the Valley.

He motivates youths at the camp by example.

“I like to participate myself and get them motivated by demonstration,” LaSalle said.

The only requirement is that participants have good mobility in their arms. It is up to the counselors and instructors to adapt activities to accommodate each athlete’s needs. That may require strapping a tennis racket to an athlete’s arm or lowering a basketball hoop.

Camp participants are encouraged to help each other as well. Interaction and teamwork is encouraged in basketball games and relay races.

The camp is sponsored in conjunction with CSUN, the Los Angeles City Recreation and Parks Department and the National Foundation for Wheelchair Tennis. As part of the closing ceremonies today, the youths will compete with their parents in the stands.

As in previous years, Breit, the camp coordinator, uses one criterion for determining the success of the camp.

“The first year we had the camp, a mother came up to say that her daughter was 13 and that this experience was the single most important thing that had ever happened to her,” Breit said. “That’s how I determine if the camp is a success, comments like that.”