The Rocket

Issue date: 11/16/07 Section: Focus

Media Credit: Chad Leader [Click to enlarge]

Arms pump, wheels spin, and there's a loud clatter of metal as wheelchairs collide.

A whistle blows, and the action stops so a wounded player can get a bandage. This isn't an everyday sport: This is Quad Rugby.

On Nov. 10 and 11, the Steel City Slam Quad Rugby tournament was held at the Aebersold Recreation Center in Gym A courts 1-4.

Eight teams played in elimination rounds until the Michigan Storm finally won.

According to the United States Quad Rugby Association, quad rugby is a sport played mostly by men and women who have sustained cervical spinal cord injuries resulting in quadriplegia, but anyone with a combination of upper and lower extremity impairment is eligible to play.

Players huddle as close as their wheelchairs will allow before the game, breaking in a loud chant of their team name.

Mike Berwick of Pittsburgh is a quad rugby referee and said he got into the sport when his brother began playing for the Steel Wheelers.

Berwick said that the players' chairs, which have wheels that are angled out for speed and maneuverability, have various features for offense and defense.

"The defensive chair has a picker on the front, like a cow catcher, that they use to try to pick at another player's wheel to try to get positioning on him," Berwick said. "And offensive chairs don't have anything on the front, so they can just slide through."

The basketball court partitions were removed so that all the courts were one huge, action-packed room. Each game took up one whole court, with the goals taped out on either side on the floor under the basketball hoops.

The court in the center was used for practice between games, and the court on the farthest side had seats and tables for the non-players that accompanied the traveling teams, including mechanics for the special wheelchairs and friends and family who came to cheer and help the players stretch.

Dave Zacks, 35, was one who got his chair worked on by a volunteer mechanic in the far court.

Continued...

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