No arms? No legs?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
No excuses \u2014 at least, not at Team Some Assembly Required, an Ohio-based nonprofit organization for athletes with physical disabilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cNo matter what the injury or adaptation is, we can still compete at a high level,\u201d said Dale King, one of two Army veterans who co-founded the organization. \u201cWe want to show Americans that there\u2019s no excuse. There\u2019s no limitations to what the human body can do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Named for the process of putting on prosthetics, Team SAR is made up of adaptive athletes who are wheelchair-bound or missing limbs. They train to compete \u2014 and win \u2014 in CrossFit and other sporting events across the country against other adaptive or able-bodied contestants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The nonprofit got its start in 2014, after King\u2019s co-founder and friend, Derick Carver, lost his left leg in combat and went on to compete in one of the toughest CrossFit competitions against contestants who had all four limbs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHe definitely represented,\u201d said King, a 36-year-old serial entrepreneur whom fans of the ABC show \u201cShark Tank\u201d may recognize as the Ranger Panties-wearing contestant from season 8.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Team SAR\u2019s co-founders met at Capital University in Ohio when King was a senior and Carver was a freshman, King said. They both played football, participated in ROTC and were paired as mentor and mentee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Marcus Hayward, a Team SAR amputee and Army veteran who has known the friends for three years, describes them as polar opposites. While both are encouragers, King is the more soft-spoken, rational one, while Carver, he said affectionately, is the \u201cloud mouth.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThey\u2019re really good guys,\u201d he said. \u201cDale is just kind of low key, and Derick is just in your face, straight to the point.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The whole team inspires one another to be better athletes as they suffer through workouts together, Hayward said. \u201cWe\u2019re really like a big family when it comes down to it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That\u2019s how King, who owns a CrossFit gym and helps run two e-commerce companies in Portsmouth, Ohio, that both financially and physically support Team SAR, feels about all of his undertakings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe biggest thing with myself and with other veterans when you get out of the military \u2014 especially when you\u2019ve deployed downrange \u2014 you lose that sense of tribe. You lose that sense of brotherhood,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When King separated from the military in 2007 and took a government job, he felt like he had no connection to his coworkers. Now, he has 15 employees he met through his gym that now work for his two other companies and also volunteer with the nonprofit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe work together, we work out together, we go drink together, we have fun,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re there to have each other\u2019s back. So, basically, it\u2019s like being in a unit again.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The same is true for members of Team SAR. Outside of events, the group\u2019s members have opportunities to connect with others who have similar injuries or adaptations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cFor these guys, they\u2019re not on an island anymore,\u201d King said. \u201cThey get categorized as adaptive athletes, but it\u2019s the same thing with anybody. They\u2019re looking for a community to get involved with and they\u2019re looking for a community that will support them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Hayward said within the Team SAR community, athletes are often able to connect with others who have similar injuries or adaptations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And while some on Team SAR who bench 500 pounds or run marathons have a history of participating in sports, others are new to competitive athletics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe\u2019re taking people that have a really good attitude, that may have lost their leg in a car accident, that may have lost their hand due to some sort of issue,\u201d King said. \u201cThey weren\u2019t already competing at a high level before their injury, but now they don\u2019t want their injury to define them as who they are, so that\u2019s they\u2019re driving force.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And being around them has changed his perspective.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAs able-bodied civilians, it\u2019s real easy to start bitching about quote, unquote \u2018first world problems,\u2019\u201d he said. \u201cThere\u2019s guys who would love to be what I\u2019m doing right now, and I owe it to them to get the job done.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A Ranger Panties-wearing veteran entrepreneur from Ohio has found a new mission through his nonprofit, Team Some Assembly Required.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":103786,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":9,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"coauthors":[3414],"class_list":["post-116900","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-education-transition"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"DD7N4CPSV5DFTHG4EVX2PZDXJ4","arc_canonical_url":"\/news\/entrepreneurship\/2018\/02\/17\/vets-nonprofit-trains-amputees-in-athletic-competitions\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n