Brain Injury Survivors Win Sailing Races

A team of local men had the best times in all three sailing races in their division to win the 2011 U.S. Disabled Championships in the Ideal 18 class on Long Island Sound earlier this fall. Dr. Ted King, 65, of Brentwood, and Atkinson native Jim Scott, 29, of Portsmouth, are both brain injury survivors who met at the Krempels Center, a nonprofit organization in Portsmouth dedicated to improving the lives of people with brain injury from trauma, tumor or stroke. The two competed at, and topped the field of the U.S. Disabled Championships at the Larchmont Yacht Club on Long Island Sound in the Ideal 18 class from Sept. 22 to 25 along with King’s friend Bill Sandberg. Sandberg served as the required able bodied sailor who was on hand to take over in case of emergency. King, an orthopaedic and hand surgeon, practiced at the Exeter Hospital and later Access Sports Medicine, with Dr. Kenneth C. Spengler, Robert H. Bear, and later Joshua A. Siegel from his arrival to the area in 1978, until he experienced a stroke at home in March of 2003. The right cerebral stroke left his left side hemiplegic, numb, weak and spastic. King was an accomplished sailboat racer in his youth, topping the field in a regional junior sailing championship and ultimately placing fifth in a national championship. After his stroke, King tried sailing again through an adaptive sailing program at Piers Park Sailing Center in East Boston. From there, he began working toward the U.S. Disabled Championships in sailing. He approached Scott and asked the former standout high school and college athlete if he would like to take part in the Robie Pierce Regatta in June of 2010. “I wanted to encourage him in his life,” King said. Scott, who sustained a traumatic brain injury five years ago as the result of a drunk driving accident, was nervous about the proposition at first. He had never sailed before his accident and was not sure he was up for the challenge. However, after a conversation with Sandberg, he decided to give it a try. “It is natural when you face new challenges to feel like you cannot accomplish something, but you cannot let that limit you,” Scott said. “You do not know what you can achieve unless you give it a shot.” The pair placed fourth at that first competition and continued to hone their skills as a team leading up to the championships this fall. “It was exciting when we won the first race,” Scott said. “It was a real sense of accomplishment and teamwork, of being part of a team.” Scott is looking forward to future sailing outings with King and is currently working on obtaining his master’s degree in social work at the University of New Hampshire. He also travels to schools to talk with students about his experience as a traumatic brain injury survivor. For King, sailing is one of a number of activities he took part in before his stroke that he has since re-learned such as riding a bike and downhill skiing. Another, driving a car and getting his driver’s license, was made possible through his participation in the DriveAbility program in Exeter. He credits his family’s quick phone call to 911 and early treatment at Exeter Hospital’s emergency department with his remarkable recovery. The team at Exeter Hospital was able to administer a life-saving clot-busting drug called TPA within three hours of the stroke’s onset. “Miraculously, within five minutes of that injection, I regained some motion of my previously numb left arm and leg,” said King who added that education about stroke symptoms is key to successful outcomes. “Symptoms include sudden weakness, numbness, dizziness, confusion, difficulty speaking or understanding speech, and extreme unexplained headache, and/or vision change. Time is a paramount factor if any of these are the early symptoms of a stroke. The life you save might be your own, or that of a loved one.”