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Emilee Shevers is a Paracycling, Track Racing Shred Girl IRL
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18-year-old Emilee Shevers is one of the coolest Shred Girls I’ve met: when it comes to tackling scary stuff, she’s got to be one of the bravest girls I know. She was born with Cone dystrophy, a genetic retinal condition that causes her cones to be larger than they should be, which causes her to be light sensitive and be color blind. Essentially, she explains, she has about 10% remaining vision. And now, she’s racing on the track… when she’s not running Tru Faces with her sister, playing goalball or prepping for college!
It sounds like you always been super active—what’s your athletic background?
Really early on I actually hated exercise. And not because it was exercise, mostly because I think a lot of it came from the fact that in gym classes, they teach you the basic sports of volleyball and soccer and other flying objects, which, being visually impaired, I can’t see. So I always hated it. But then I had a great teacher who didn’t do generic gym, we actually did workouts. And I took an interest in that. He even purchase a set of goalball equipment, which is a blind sport, and taught it to the entire class and made me feel so included. And I was over the moon about it. And that’s kind of really when I was like, Yes, I can do athletics. And then I also started doing gymnastics because it doesn’t have flying objects! It was me being in control of my own body. So I did that for a few years, not competitively, but like an advanced recreational kind of situation. Basically to learn the skills and keep moving.
And can you explain what goalball is?
It’s a blind sport. And basically, there are two teams that play against each other, and it’s a three on three game. It’s kind of like bowling where you’re rolling a ball back and forth, and a ball has a bell in it. The net is basically the whole back wall, and you’re trying to get the ball in between the players, while they try to stop it. It’s played really close to the ground. So you like, slide out on your side to stop the ball and things like that.
And then how did you how did you end up cycling on the track?
So just this year, actually, so last year, I was I played goalball competitively at Nationals. I got scouted at provincials. And that led to that and a lot of the sports are based out of W Ross MacDonald School, which is the blind school in Branford, which is now the school that I go to this year. They run a course on biking on the track. One of the teachers takes a group of students, four or five of us, and every other week we would go to the track and practice. We also practice on stationary bikes at the gym, where we would get workouts done.
How terrifying was getting on a track back for the first time?
I’ll be honest, the clip on shoots freaked me out. It took me forever to get them. And going up to the top of the track for the very first time. I was like, ‘This is crazy. Like, how am I doing this right now?’ And also I remember just how windy it was. I think all of it was it was so amazing though. I actually remember my coach saying I was smiling the whole time. Like, I don’t think there was a moment where I wasn’t smiling.
Had you ridden before that much?
In the last year actually, we have. So I’m from Peterborough, and we have the club called Tandem Eyes. They have 11 tandem bikes, and then they have volunteer pilots, so we would ride the trails every Monday and Wednesday. That was kind of like my first real exposure to biking and I loved that, and that’s why when I was asked this year if I wanted to try bikes on a track I was like, first of all, you can get a bike on a track? And then second of all, yeah, of course.
Riding on a tandem, how was that first experience?
Well, actually, kind of what we did before we even got on the bike is just sit down and get to know our pilots because it’s definitely easier to o trust somebody that you can connect with as opposed to a complete stranger. Definitely like sitting down and talking with my pilot helped—he was probably 60 years old and he was great, super sweet. He’d been doing it for five years and I felt really safe. We even broke down one time, and I felt so safe because he was just fixing the bike, and I knew that we weren’t gonna have a problem.
And how do you how do you figure out how to do all of the stuff on the bike, pedaling in sync?
The pedals are actually like synchronized. So you both have to pedal at the same time. But it’s definitely definitely a communication thing where you have to go like, ‘Okay, we’re starting in three two one’ and then both start pedaling at the same time.
Did you expect to be really speedy on the track?
The times (in each event) that I rode at provincials as opposed to all my other races was crazy. I was not expecting that at all. I took five seconds off one race and eight seconds off another. I think a lot of it was just motivation getting hyped up for it.
So do you do you plan to continue with the track racing?
Yeah, I do. So part of the, when I was picking where I was going for post secondary next year was where do I get to continue what I’m doing… So it was between Hamilton, Mohawk and Algonquin in Ottawa for a while because main goalball training is out of Algonquin. But I did ultimately choose Mohawk because I knew that I would still have that cycling opportunity to keep going to practice and my pilot lives like a kilometer away from Mohawk. So she will get on the track with me more.
Are you be thinking Paralympics?
Honestly it has been a dream of mine to go the Paralympics ever since I had the opportunity to compete in sports. So I mean, if it if somebody out there believes me enough to think that it’s a possibility, then yeah.
Tell me about Tru Faces and this initiative you have going on with your sister?
Yeah, so one of the things about Peterborough is that there is no blind youth, anywhere. So when I was first introduced to the school for the blind, that was the first time that I had ever met people with even similar conditions to mine. And that connection for me was so special. Then, one day I literally went to my sister, I was like, we need to create a better community like this. And it needs to be online so that anybody can access it even in remote places where they’re not going to find anybody who’s visually impaired or with a similar disability. So that’s when we came up with this idea. And originally it was actually supposed to be specifically for the facial difference community, but for our platform to be successful, we kind of realized we needed to expand it to all different disabilities. And that’s what we did. Through our features, we allow any individual who would like to to share kind of their story, their their triumphs and failures and whatever they would like other people to hopefully create those connections.
What is your plan for next year? Are you going to school?
I’m going to Mohawk College for early childhood education. That can be kindergarten or working in daycares, or even there’s a few like, pathways that lead to other things like early childhood interventionists, and several pathways to that too. I’ve just always kind of loved working with kids. And I’ve been told that kids are naturally attracted to me. So I was gymnastics coach for four years and literally worked with every age from toddlers to 12 year olds and I loved all of it, but I did especially love the little ones.
Okay, how are you doing all of these things?
I have been told I keep a very busy schedule. I’m definitely crazy busy. I actually struggle to sit still. So it works. Um, but yeah, I mean, there’s school, there’s the workouts that are happening. There’s working on social media and volunteer activities. I used to tell my parents that they were my taxi drivers when I was at home, because that’s all they did. They just took me places so that I could do things.
I’d love to hear just like your advice for other other girls who are visually impaired or have some other disability that’s keeping them from thinking that they can do something like cycling … What’s what’s your advice for them?
Literally, that you can do, anything that you put your mind to. If you want to do something, figure out how to get involved in it, and I think once you get your foot in the door, it’s easier. Take the first practice that I went to at the track: I met all these other people, I met the coaches that work there and I created those connections. So now, even though I’m not necessarily at the school, I have the connection to continue. A lot of my self motivation just comes from my positive attitude and telling myself that I can do this and asking, what’s holding me back?
