Instructor for disabled

Waimarino Bulletin, Volume 2, Issue 8, 24 July 1984, Page 12

Instructor for disabled

A familiar face at Turoa this year will be that of Michele Laing, the resident instructor for disabled skiers. Michele, from Christchurch, is working with the New Zealand Association for Disabled Skiers to run a full time skiing programme. She returned to Ohakune last week after touring IHC and Crippled Children Society branches in the North Island encouraging disabled people to learn to ski this winter. Skiing is now seen as an ideal physical and psychological therapy, says Michele. "It's so positive. Disabled people' can keep up with others and have a very high achievement level." Able bodied people are continually surprised by the 'skill disabled people gain. And that's another plus for the programme, she says. In skiing there's an integration between the disabled and others not found in most other recreation or rehabilitation exercises. Most people have probably never seen someone disabled, so skiing helps break down any false impressions they may have, Michele says. Michele teaches one-to-one, a lot more intensive than the normal schools. Each disabled skier brings a

helper for the course and then skis in a 'buddy' system. She takes groups of up to six skiers, aged from four to sixty and emphasises the need to improve fitness before attending the course. The new sit-sled, introduced to New Zealand two years ago, opens skiing up to paraplegics. Amputees, cerebral palsy victims, and people with neurological and psychiatric disorders all get a lot out of skiing, she says.

Other sports may be an uphill battle, but with skiing it's downhill all the way. " "There's a lot to be said for gravity," says Michele. Michele spent two years working with the Mount Hutt disabled skiers programme and returned from the States in April after a four month stint instructing there. She is based in Ohakune and can be contacted through the AHI Information Centre.