Even before her amputation, Katie Ladlie just wanted to be like everyone else. Since her decision to amputate her leg just above the knee when she was 12, Katie has continued to be a regular kid and found a passion for athletics.
Three years later and now a sophomore at Troy, Katie races in a wheelchair in track and field. She also participates as a member of the swim team and plays sled hockey through Disabled Athlete Sports Association (DASA).
“Before the amputation I was very shy,” Katie said. “Afterward I opened up. There were not a lot of kids who had a limp like me, but there are kind of a lot of people with a prosthetic like me now. I became more confident in myself.”
Katie was born with a vascular malformation that destroyed her knee cartilage. After spending her seventh grade year in a wheelchair, Katie was faced with either fusing the knee together so that it would never bend or to have it amputated. She chose amputation, in part because she decided that it would ultimately provide her more mobility, and she was right.
Katie’s father, Jim, said he never expected his daughter to embrace athletics given the battle she faced prior to the amputation.
“She tried to play softball but the knee pain was excruciating, and then in seventh grade when she was in a wheelchair, she was on so much pain medicine she was zoned out,” Jim said. “I think the thing we underestimated was she never had the opportunity before. The amputation was like she removed an anchor. Now she has no problem putting herself out there and doing these events.”
As part of Troy’s track team, Katie races when she can in the 100-meter and 200-meter dashes. When there is a lane available, Katie will line up next to the able-bodied runners, although she is not competing directly against them. She is racing against her own time, but she is hoping the opportunities continue to grow so that she can race against other para-athletes and score points for her school’s team.
Katie’s foray into athletics began almost immediately after her amputation. She was put on a hand-crank bike a month after surgery when DASA stepped in and began working with her. Founded by physical therapist Kelly Behlmann, DASA has been providing opportunities for disabled kids and veterans to compete for years. Some of their alumni have gone on to have great success as para-athletes, including Steve Cash’s two gold medals as part of Team USA’s sled hockey team.
DASA will host its Gateway Games this Saturday and Sunday with athletes competing in swimming, archery and track and field at St. Charles West high school and the St. Peters Rec Plex. Behlmann thinks the number of school-aged athletes can grow as more opportunities are made available.
“We don’t have the numbers now because the students haven’t been considered potential athletes before,” Behlmann said. “If they practice with their track team, they should participate like a member of that team.”
There are no allowances in Missouri for disabled athletes to compete in track at this time other than a few case-by-case instances where MSHSAA has approved certain accommodations to allow blind athletes to compete.
Fort Zumwalt North sophomore Ashley Foley, who is legally blind, has competed in cross country, swimming and track for the Panthers. North AD Ted Hickey said MSHSAA gave them clearance for Foley to run tethered to a guide at the start of the season. There are currently no allowances for a blind athlete to compete at the district level or beyond in the sprints because of lane limitations, but Foley and other blind runners can run in longer races where lanes are not an issue or compete in field events like the long jump.
Foley is a sprinter and has competed in the long jump, but she has been sidelined most of this season following an early spring car accident that left her with a concussion.
“Ashley has had every opportunity every other kid has had,” Hickey said. “There are certain guidelines. For tethers, we have to let the starter know she’s going to be tethered, and in the jumps the coach stands behind the pits. At this point, Ashley is not at the qualifying standard and has not been entered into districts.”
Harvey Richards, the MSHSAA Associate Executive Director in charge of track, said that following the conclusion of the season the MSHSAA advisory committee will meet and review any changes and proposals that could enhance track and field for the member schools. One item on the agenda already is the addition of events for disabled athletes, specifically para-athletes who use wheelchairs in competition. As technology has improved and stigmas are being removed, more and more disabled athletes are finding ways to compete and challenge themselves.
Currently, there are nine states that have added para-athlete events to their state series, and six of them allow those events to be scored and count toward the team totals. Katie is hoping that Missouri soon joins their ranks.
“I would like to think that I’m plowing the way for other kids to join their track teams, and I’d like to compete in the next two years, too,” Katie said. “I always like to push myself and see my times get better, but I’d also like to push toward that cause.”