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Rachael, a 24-year-old wheelchair tennis player from Cornwall, shares her deeply personal journey with Caudwell Children and her passion for the sport in celebration of Summer of Sport.
Tell us a little bit about yourself
I currently work within my local council in the Children’s Rights team, and will be training to become a primary school teacher in September. I play wheelchair tennis for my local tennis club, and love to travel around to different competitions and meet other tennis players from all over the country. I love music, video games, reading, and my pet cats!
How did your love for sport start?
From a young age I’ve always loved sport. I started playing football as a toddler and through school I played for teams all around the area I grew up. I also loved Cross Country running, and alongside football competed at a high level. When I was 14, I had my first serious Sports injury, breaking a vertebra in my spine. My recovery was long but, in the meantime, I took up coaching for the first time. After my recovery, I played football for another three years before having a functional stroke when I was 18.
The stroke left me with slurred and incomprehensible speech, my ability to read and write was severely impacted, and my legs have never recovered their full range of movement or strength, leaving me reliant on a wheelchair for the first time in my life. Sport formed a massive part of my life and without it, I didn’t know who I was.
I didn’t explore parasports for a long time but with a lot of encouragement from my family, I tried wheelchair basketball for the first time. Basketball wasn’t for me, but this opened the door for me to feel confident in trying other sports until I found one that was right for me.
I also tried fencing, powerchair football, and different water sports, but I didn’t feel comfortable doing them, something was missing. I decided to take a break from sport and give it some time. Then covid happened and after the pandemic, I made a promise to myself to find a different sport, something which I wanted to take further and pursue to as high a level as I could, giving me my sense of identity back.
Why did you choose to pursue tennis?
I saw an advert for a tennis club local, and they had a disability session running. I showed up, and it turned out it was an old advert that hadn’t been taken down, but the club let me try wheelchair tennis anyway. From that first practice, I was hooked! I knew nothing about tennis, and at my first competition, I couldn’t even keep score properly, which I’m sure frustrated many people, but I kept going and have since been to and succeeded at several competitions. I feel that sport was always such a major part of my life, and having that void where football once was had a bigger impact on me than I even realised. Although the football shaped hole in my life may never go away, I’ve crammed as many tennis balls in there as possible and finally feel like I am changing my life for the better.
What challenges in Sport have you faced?
I think my biggest challenge initially was allowing myself into the parasports space. There was a lot internally that I struggled with when first identifying within the disabled community, and looking back I was really hard on myself during my recovery. I needed to let myself feel comfortable as a newly disabled person and ask for help, particularly in navigating the sports world, and I wish I did this sooner. Also, I find many parasports opportunities are not geared toward my age range, and are either cut off at 18 or are only for older adults. Being a young adult, particularly in Cornwall, can be quite isolating at the best of times, but adding that layer of complexity with disability can limit many of my opportunities both within sports and wider. Unfortunately, I haven’t found a solid way of overcoming this barrier, aside from travelling which although I love to do it can be expensive and very time consuming. I do wish there were more sporting opportunities and competitions further down south, particularly in tennis.
How has Caudwell Children supported you?
Having the assistance from Caudwell Children has meant that I can replace my broken tennis wheelchair. My current chair is a children’s chair, and quickly broke as I began to play more frequently. I have been unable to practice and play as much as I would like to because of this, as well as my competitions being very limited due to not being able to move around the court nearly as well as I have the potential to. Replacing this chair will mean I can play more, compete more, coach more, and raise the profile of disabled athletes in areas where there aren’t as many opportunities to show off how amazing we all are!
What role do you think para-sports play in changing perceptions around disability in sports?
Personally, I think the overall perception has changed to be much more positive and inclusive around disabled athletes and parasports as a whole, but equally I think it’s important to recognise some of the negative side effects. There’s a danger of promoting disabled athletes, particularly around events such as the Paralympics, as people to be pitied or in awe of. There have been many times I’ve been told that I’m doing really well ‘considering what non-disabled people can do’. I think it’s a slippery slope from genuine compliments and amazement to unintentionally painting disability as less than their non-disabled counterparts. There is also contention around the word ‘inspirational’, which can sometimes cause divide whether or not a disabled athlete wants to be labelled as inspirational, and it can have negative connotations. This comes from disabled people being called inspirational for simple things that everyday people do. However, some people like to know they are inspirational, especially for athletes reaching levels that they want to be role models for, so it really is an individual’s preference, and I personally don’t have a problem with it as I think the positive effects outweigh the negative. I think that people accessing information about disabilities from places around social media and less than trustworthy sources can definitely have a negative impact on the image of parasports as there is a fundamental lack of understanding around the experience of disabled people. While it shouldn’t always be left to disabled people to educate others on disability, personally I find by sharing my story that this has a positive impact on others. I’ve noticed a shift in the parasport community just in the few years I’ve been involved, where it has grown immensely. New initiatives starting within sports to recruit more people to try different activities and events, as well as having non-disabled people try parasports has been really positive, and I hope that continues. I have been doing some work in Cornwall and through universities to try and widen participation in parasports, particularly in communities where disabled people are still not as visible, to show that not only can disabled people access these sports, but actually we can be competitive and put up a fight as well, which I think is missing in a lot of peoples’ perceptions around disability.
How important do you think campaigns like Summer of Sport are?
Campaigns like Summer of Sport are important because financial pressures are such a huge barrier for most people at the minute. Many people, myself included, wouldn’t be able to participate in parasport due to the cost of specialist equipment. This is a huge financial burden that non-disabled athletes often don’t even realise is an issue, and I have had several conversations over the last year about the cost of equipment to which the response is usually along the lines of ‘wow, I had no idea a wheelchair costs that much’, when referring to just my day chair let alone a specialist sport chair. Caudwell Children funding equipment is a fantastic way to allow more children and young people to access sport, but also for parents and carers to access another safe space for their child to have another opportunity at success.
What advice would you give to disabled children who dream of becoming a professional athlete?
Be brave enough to try what’s out there, even if it’s a sport you know nothing about! It sounds cliché, but sometimes having a completely new thing to learn, like a new sport, can help in other areas of your life. For parents, I think my biggest piece of advice is to trust your child. Often, I see that parents are incredibly worried about the health and safety of their child trying a new sport or activity, which I completely understand! However, children need that space to explore the limits of their disability, especially children who are that little bit older, as this helps them to understand their body and the signs of when they need a break.
What are your biggest achievements?
I first picked up a tennis racket around 2 years ago, and last spring was my first full competition season. I won women’s doubles twice, was runner up twice, as well as runner up in three women’s singles tournaments. I qualified for the first ever Play Your Way to Wimbledon tournament after coming runner up in women’s singles at the Grantham Regional Wheelchair tournament last June. Wimbledon, which took place last August, was such an amazing experience. I was playing in a broken wheelchair, and had just been discharged from hospital 2 days prior to the tournament, but still managed a 3rd place finish, something I am immensely proud of. I enjoyed meeting all of the other competitors, and we were able to sit in the players’ lounge and use the locker rooms, we had a tour of the grounds and got to see centre court! Our matches took place on the grass practice courts, where the actual wheelchair tournament takes place, and I was just in awe of everything the whole time. Since Wimbledon, I have played in a few smaller tournaments, winning runner up in women’s singles. I have also earned my Level 1 coaching certification and am currently working on Level 2, where I have helped coach several children’s sessions over the last year. I have also won an award at my county club for my achievements in wheelchair tennis, and I have won awards at my university for my commitment to bettering student life and opportunities through sport. I was also the postgraduate student of the year for my efforts around student life, achievement in sport, and giving back to my community.
What are your aspirations for the future?
I plan to play tennis as much as possible! I want to earn my place back at the Play Your Way to Wimbledon tournament and win. I plan on competing in every tournament I can get to once my new chair is here, and I want to set the target for myself to win women’s singles this year. I also want to keep up with my coaching certifications, with the hope to earn up to a Level 3 in the next year.
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