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Professional Wheelchair Basketball Player Visits CREC Montessori Magnet School
(Hartford, CT) On June 10 and June 17, upper elementary students at CREC’s Montessori Magnet School enjoyed visits from Ryan Martin, a Connecticut native and international professional wheelchair basketball player.
A 33-year-old from Somers, CT, Ryan Martin’s career has led him halfway across the world to Spain where he has played for the last six years for the CID Casa Murcia Getafe team. Martin was born with Spina Bifida and had his legs amputated when he was two years old. Several years ago, he founded the Ryan Martin Foundation, a nonprofit group that assists individuals with disabilities. Because of the positive impact adaptive sports have had on his life, Martin shares his passion for sports and life with others in the offseason by running basketball camps for children with disabilities and speaking to students of all ages about adaptive sports and facing life’s obstacles in order to succeed.
At the CREC Montessori Magnet School, Martin enjoyed lunch with sixth grade students in the courtyard and then met with all of the upper elementary students in the gymnasium. He captivated the students with his presentation, which included stories of his childhood challenges and current career successes, encouraging the students to persevere toward their goals.
On June 17, Martin returned to the school to referee a student-staff basketball game organized by students Benicio Calderon, Yadiel Febres, Chace Petgrave, and Quashan Stanford. Martin was accompanied by fellow adaptive sports athlete Carlos Quiles, captain of the Connecticut Spokebenders wheelchair basketball team, which is based at the Hospital for Special Care in New Britain.
“Organizing the game was difficult because we had to go around and talk to teachers and students to ask them to play,” said Yadiel Febres, a sixth grade student at the CREC Montessori Magnet School. Yet, the enthusiasm of the CREC Montessori Magnet School students was remarkable to Martin, who he said, “played with as much enthusiasm as the members of my professional team!”
