Sports leaders making a difference in communities

Inspirational athletes who are making their sports inclusive have been nominated for an award.

A rower, a boxer, a dancer and an athlete are changing sporting perceptions and participants.

They are inspiring disabled children, adults with visual impairments, Invictus athletes and people living with Parkinson's or with cancer.

Sophie Conbeer, Maryam Pourian, Gemma Rous and Gavin Lane are finalists in this year's BBC Radio Devon Make A Difference Active Award.

Adaptive equipment is being used to welcome new participants into rowing and running, but those involved say the biggest change is coming through a more inclusive attitude to sport.

"There isn't anything you can't do and we're definitely able to prove that. Well, I'm able to prove that," said Conbeer, the captain of the Mayflower Offshore Rowing Club in Plymouth.

She is also an amputee who took up rowing six weeks before her surgery and continued afterwards thanks to a rowing prosthesis.

With funding from the charity Love Rowing the club now has adaptive seating, which enables anyone to get involved.

She said: "I feel it's important we can accommodate everybody and be diverse and adaptive, and ultimately inclusive."

She has supported British Blind Sport, members of the military through the Invictus Games and spent two years with the Para Development squad for British Rowing.

Pourian is a dance teacher with Dance for Life and one of her classes, Move to Nurture, is specifically designed for people living with cancer.

She said: "We could see the positive benefit of movement, as could they, their doctors and oncologists."

The focus of the sessions is on the moving – and the artistry and creativity that dancing can bring with adaptions made to allow participants to be seated throughout if needed.

She said she could notice changes in the dancers - they can reach further, bend better and they have more stamina and energy.

"They become themselves again," Pourian said.

Rous, a paediatric physiotherapist, founded Penguin Sports Foundation in north Devon after noticing children she was working with did not have the sports activities and opportunities they needed or wanted.

Her charity now offers rebound therapy (trampolining), hydrotherapy and frame running.

"All of the children we work with have some kind of movement disorder, or difficulty accessing their movement," Rous said.

Her sessions allow children and young people with cerebral palsy, brain injuries and certain genetic conditions to take part in sport.

"I do a lot of sport myself. I love sport and I've always found it really helpful for emotions, for fitness, making friends and just finding a belonging," Rous added.

Also in north Devon, Lane runs Barum Boxing in Barnstaple.

He now runs two classes a week for people living with Parkinson's and said boxing helps them physically, mentally and socially.

Lane said: "I love it. I love seeing everyone develop and get something out of boxing because it is the best sport. Your motor skills, your thought processes, the reactions.

"It's helping them in life once the sessions are done. It will help them with movement, co-ordination, their memory, strength.

"Seeing people grow, develop – it's what I live for really."

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