One Big Family: Special Olympics athletes train together in the pool and on the track

Local Special Olympics athletes and their team, the Sharks, prepare for the Summer Games, which are as much about camaraderie as they area bout competition

Photos by Dave Hansen

It is a storybook April morning on the outdoor track at Gaudet Middle School in Middletown, and harbingers of spring are in the air. Along the perimeter, a group of students is milling about, recess-style, relaxing on the benches and soaking up the sun. In contrast, the two young men and their coach in the far corner of the field are all business.

Ian Shepherd and Shaun Perez, two Rhode Island Special Olympics athletes, are practicing the long jump. They are competing in the upcoming Summer Games — not the ones in Paris at the end of July, but the Rhode Island Special Olympics that will run from May 31 to June 2 at the University of Rhode Island.

Shaun covers a respectable 2.5 meters — a little more than 8 feet — on his final leap. At 22 he is an adaptable competitor who excels at volleyball and basketball, says Coach Mike Shepherd, Ian’s father. Neither sport will be featured at Special Olympics Rhode Island’s Summer Games, where athletes will compete in bowling, powerlifting, swimming, soccer skills, Unified soccer and track and field. But Shaun says “track and field is really interesting,” and therefore an acceptable Plan B.

“I’ve been competing in track events my whole life,” Shaun explains. He’s been involved with the Sharks since he was 16 and made his long jump debut at the games last summer. “I was nervous the first time,” he recalls, but “as soon as I did it two or three times,” it was all good. So good, in fact, Shaun adds modestly, that he won a gold medal.

Like Shaun, Ian takes to the kinetics of the long jump with all the poise of a seasoned athlete. For all his enthusiasm for the summer games, however, Ian’s sweet spot is skiing. He brought home a bronze medal from South Korea in 2013 and won a gold medal in Alpine skiing in Japan in 2005.

“I’ll never forget that. I feel pretty good about that,” Ian says. He recently was selected as a member of the U.S. downhill team that will compete next winter at the Special Olympics World Games in Turin, Italy. Ian was in Salt Lake City training with the team in April.

Shaun is from Portsmouth; Ian grew up in Newport. They will be among more than 4,000 athletes from around Rhode Island when the state’s Special Olympics 2024 Summer Games get underway. The two will attend the opening ceremonies with the Sharks, the team of about 20 Special Olympics athletes from
the Newport County YMCA.

The Newport County Y has been home to these athletes, their families, their dreams, aspirations and triumphs since 2008. Each Shark possesses all the qualities one looks for in a winner: focus, determination, humility, a sense of fair play and a willingness to take one for the team. All while striving to be masters at their game.

They also are courageous. As the Special Olympics athletes’ oath declares: “Let me win, but if I cannot win, let me be brave in the attempt.”

‘These are my people’

Ten-year-old Bennett Reilly is a strong swimmer with three Special Olympics gold medals from last summer’s games to prove it. “It was the best day of my life,” he will tell anyone and everyone he meets, according to his mother Kelley.

Bennett, who has autism, is a member of the Sharks. His mother has images on her phone of him and his teammates crowding together, all smiles, flashing victory signs. One image of note is of Bennett solo, striking a muscleman pose, with the garland of medals around his neck.

“Bennett refuses to let me take [that photo] off the fridge,” Kelley says.

For Bennett, that day last June also marked a medal-worthy milestone. His meet was early, the pool was busy and noisy, and there was a “big gap” of time to kill between his final race and the presentation of medals.

“Autism and waiting do not mix,” Kelley explained. She and her husband asked Bennett if he wanted to go outside, take a walk — anything to escape from the noise. “I want to sit in the stands with my team,” he told them. It was the first time, Kelley said, that he had chosen to remain in such a loud and chaotic environment.

“These are my people,” he explained.

Kay Haslam, 10, is a lifelong friend of Bennett’s as well as a fellow Shark. The two have been “connected at the hip” since they were babies, according to Kay’s mother Kate. (Kay was born with 9p Minus syndrome, which means she is missing part of her ninth chromosome.) It was just over a year ago that Kate heard about the Special Olympics athletes — and the Sharks — from Kelley.

Kay won a silver medal at the 2023 games. She was part of a team, and one suspects her infectious, exuberant enthusiasm might have been a Shark secret weapon. And then there was the award ceremony.

“The kids love the medals and the formality,” Kate Haslam says. Rhode Island State Police troopers, wearing full dress uniform, present the awards. The pageantry of it all is the icing on the cake.

‘Absolute joy’

Parents of Special Olympics athletes have many lenses through which they observe their children’s lives. They share the experience of receiving a diagnosis that forces them to make an unplanned pivot toward an uncertain future. What emerges from their stories is that it takes hard work and a mountain of determination and bravery to raise a child with disabilities. But there can also be great joy. The joy of seeing your son or daughter make friends and fit in. The joy of knowing how brave they are just being out there. And the joy of seeing them proudly wear an Olympic medal around their neck.

After years of executive positions in higher education, Ed Pacheco was ready for a career switch and looking for something more family oriented. “Special Olympics found me,” is how he puts it. He has been president and CEO at Special Olympics Rhode Island since 2022. His first month on the job coincided with the 2022 summer games.

“I was standing there, witnessing the opening ceremonies with absolute awe and amazement,” Pacheco recalls. “There was absolute joy on the faces of the families participating. I knew I wanted to be a part of all of that.

“Our parents think back to that moment when their son or daughter was born,” he says. “That first step, that first word, is all you are waiting for, and then to have the moment when you are told you have a child with intellectual challenges,” that can be one of the hardest things a parent has to experience.

“It doesn’t have to be that way,” Pacheco says, noting that part of SORI’s mission is to help families challenge bias and stigma. “It is incredible to see where and how these families began their journey and where they end up,” he adds.

For Gail and Mike Shepherd, Special Olympics “changed everything.”

Their son was born with Down syndrome, and according to Mike is a little autistic. As a child, Ian was a natural athlete. He loved Little League and basketball. But then he grew to the level of play where tryouts were required. “I was not good enough,” Ian will tell you.

A family friend told Mike about the Special Olympics program at the North Kingstown YMCA. Ian joined in 2001 and made North Kingstown his turf for 20 years. He switched to the Newport County Y in 2021 and joined the Sharks.

Making the break was hard, especially when it came time to say goodbye to a beloved coach. “I told her not to worry,” Ian said with an impish smile, “that I was like Tom Brady — I’m not going anywhere!”

The Shepherds are a portrait of the Special Olympics family. Gail served as SORI board secretary for 13 years, and there is no event that Mike won’t — or can’t — coach. Ian, at 38, is a true Renaissance man. He was a SORI board member for six years and currently serves on the board of Looking Upwards. The local nonprofit offers services to adults with developmental disabilities and children with special healthcare needs.

In addition, Ian is a backyard beekeeper. He sells his brand, Ryan’s Honey, to raise money for the Sharks as well as Looking Upwards. He is completing the one-year Special Olympics University program, which will qualify him to serve as an ambassador for the organization.

“Between SORI and Looking Upwards, it has made Ian’s life,” Gail says. “Special Olympics opened up a world to Ian, and the family.”

It also enables parents “to talk about everything” unique to their families, she adds, from how to find an apartment for an adult son or daughter to weighing the pros and cons of a group home.

Dan and Jo Glenning of Newport are another SORI volunteer power couple. He is the head coach for the Sharks, and she chairs the Sharks’ booster club. Their son Danny, a swimmer, was born with Down syndrome and is non-verbal. The planets aligned for the Glennings in 2008 when Dan saw an opportunity to introduce a Special Olympics program at the Newport County YMCA. Danny, now 31, was its first athlete — the first Shark — and literally tested the waters.

“Danny learned to swim before he could walk,” his father says. “He grew up at the Y.”

Like Ian, Danny had attended the program in North Kingstown, which was the nearest facility for families living on Aquidneck Island. His father was eager to volunteer, but the commute prevented Dan from becoming as involved as he would have liked. Until, in 2008, he received a membership email from Mike Miller (now executive director and at the time the assistant director) about the Newport County YMCA’s plans to expand its programs — and make a push for greater inclusivity for a broader range of athletes.

Dan called Mike and told him he was willing to help. By June 2010, the Newport County YMCA Sharks made their first appearance at the Special Olympics Summer Games in the swim and the track and field divisions.

Dan tells a remarkable story about his family’s path to SORI. Danny’s pediatrician, Keivan Ettefagh, was a strong and compassionate advocate for inclusion. “He had a vacation coming up after Danny was born. But before he left, Dr. Ettefagh hunted us down. He told us, ‘Don’t let anyone tell you to put him in an institution.’” The Glennings followed his advice.

They enrolled their infant son in the Newport County Y’s swimming program when he was six months old. His younger sister Jordan was born three years later. Both, according to their father, grew up in the pool. Today, Jordan is a physical therapist on staff at Newport Hospital. She has been a coach for the Y’s Wahoos, and currently is the swim team coach for the Sharks.

Dan was prompted to investigate the North Kingstown SORI program when someone “put a bug in my ear about unified softball,” he says. (Unified Sports is a program that has athletes of all abilities playing on the same team.) Somewhat skeptical, he went for a look. “When I went to the first practice and saw the joy on the athletes’ faces, I thought, ‘That’s where I want to be,’” Dan says.

Raising awareness of this path to joy has become the Glennings’ mission. “[It] is part of our work,” Dan says. “We are creating a community by not segregating the athletes.”

‘Much more independent’

It takes more than 2,000 volunteers to help ensure everything runs smoothly during the four days of SORI’s Summer Games. The work doesn’t end after the closing ceremonies. Ask anyone involved, from Ed Pacheco to the Glennings and the Shepherds, and you’ll be convinced that Special Olympics is a 365-day-ayear way of life.

On any given Sunday afternoon, the YMCA pool belongs to the Sharks, their parents and Jordan Glenning, who has coached both SORI and traditional — the term used for any non-challenged athlete — swimmers. She can interpret body language and knows what her swimmers are capable of.

After a few pool sessions, when the athletes have gotten their sea legs, she asks them to do what’s called a developmental swim. “All of a sudden, they are swimming from one end of the pool to the other,” says Jordan, who currently has 43 Sharks under her tutelage. While the parents worry their kids might not be ready, they almost always are. “It is hard in any situation not to hover, even just a little,” she acknowledges.

Ruth Faria, 36, is a graceful swimmer, with a stroke that hints at summers spent along the shore of Island Park in Portsmouth. “I live by the water,” she explains, “and I’m always perfecting my skills.”

She first competed in Special Olympics in 2020, when the games — like almost everything during the early months of COVID-19 — were held virtually. While she plays volleyball, bocce and cornhole, Ruth is a true Shark and prefers swimming. She is also a Zumba instructor at the Common Fence Point Recreation Center (an affiliate of SORI) and an assistant in the kitchen at the Y’s Developmental Life Skills program. She says the Special Olympics program has been transformational.

“I’m much more independent,” Ruth says. “It has changed my life so much. It’s all so incredible.”

‘The next generation’

Rhode Island Special Olympics athletes have been competing at the Summer Games since 1968. That’s the same year Eunice Kennedy Shriver founded the organization to honor her older sister Rosemary, who was born with intellectual challenges and was institutionalized at the age of 23. Rosemary loved sports as a child and relished competition; she was robbed of the opportunity to thrive in an inclusive environment, her younger sister maintained.

“Winning at anything always brought a marvelous smile to her face,” Shriver wrote in a piece for the Saturday Evening Post in 1962. That same year she opened Camp Shriver in the backyard of her Maryland home, where a group of children with intellectual disabilities played and engaged in sports competitions with camp counselors from the local high school.

Rosemary Kennedy died in 2005 at the age of 86. She “left a legacy that was long and deep,” Eunice Kennedy Shriver said during her eulogy. Nearly 20 years later, that legacy has evolved into a global village of 1.4 million athletes from 150 countries.

“We want to encourage the next generation,” local athlete Shaun Perez says. To that effort, his teammate Ian Shepherd brings his medals when he speaks to groups about the benefits of participating in the Special Olympics. “If you join the Newport Y Sharks, you’ll be part of a special team. And you will be part of one big family.”

There is no guile in the delivery by these Special Olympians, nothing sly in their approach. Their joy is genuine and authentic. They are the real deal.