Quadriplegic races cross country

Jarrod Blackman with his specially
adapted off road racer.

Cross country racer Jarrod Blackman (24) from Hilton in KwaZulu-Natal can be excused for wearing a tiny superman logo around his neck. 

Paralysed from the chest down, this former factory motorbike racer has achieved what many considered to be superhuman feats since he broke his back on a rock in a “slow crash” in 2010.

Blackman and co-driver Matthew English (26) will be racing in the
opening leg of the Donaldson Cross Country Championship near Harrismith in the Free State on 21 to 22 March. 

They race in a specially adapted pipe car imported from Canada. The roll cage of the 1 000 cc vehicle has a "door" through which Blackman can be lifted in before he straps himself to the car. In his case, the straps go around his feet, legs and both hands.

His left hand gets strapped to a special grip on the steering wheel, while his right arm gets tied to a sliding lever with which he works the accelerator.

"My arms are knackered after each race," he said.

He has only 70% use of the muscles in his arms, but this hasn’t lessened his need for speed.  

“It’s dangerous to go slow,” Blackman laughed as he described his near fatal fall back in 2010 when he was entering a wet corner at only 35 km/h on a new KTM.

“A disability is never something that should hold you back from your dreams. You take safety for granted as you look at the risks of a race as academic. I decided long ago that I was never going to stop racing and that’s where recovery begins — in the mind,” Blackman said.

About the grim years of rehab, he said: “My goal was never to walk, it was to race.

“During rehab, my psychologist asked me to write out a list of six goals. My first goal was getting back on a bike and my second goal was to race. Only my sixth goal was to walk,” he said.

It took him almost a year just to roll over on his side unassisted and four years to regain most of his independence. Despite the little superman logo on the chain around his neck, he does not consider his achievements to date superhuman. Single-minded maybe and mad about racing definitely, but compared to other paralysed athletes, he is about par for the course. 

For his many followers on YouTube, however, even Blackman's poetry has been a quiet force that showed them the way out of depression and into fierce determination to not only live, but be fully alive.

Having faced the same set of problems all disabled people have to cope with, Blackman said he was inspired by Mahatma Gandhi’s: “You must be the change you want to see in the world”. 

He decided to help meet disabled people's common need for expert rehabilitation and physical activities to stay healthy and had started a own wellness centre in Hilton,KZN. 

Called the Sci-Motion gym, Blackman offers rehab exercises on the right equipment for people who suffered a stroke or paralysis at a cost that is affordable to most. Exercises for paralysis from trauma and strokes are the same, he said.

And why still take risks racing? "I will get depressed just sitting in the office," he said. 

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