Getting up

The leap carried him two meters through the air before he landed with one foot and one prosthetic leg planted in the pit of sand. His arms pinwheeled.

To fall back would shorten the measurement of Desmond Jackson’s long jump effort.

“Fall forward! Fall forward! Fall forward!” his mother shouted.

Jackson teetered, took a short step back, then pushed forward and out of the sand pit as clapping and cheering burst from his supporters: fellow athletes from the Mid-Atlantic Wheelchair Games, coaches, event officials, his mother and his cousin.

Deborah Jackson brought her son Desmond, 9, from Durham, N.C., to Woodrow Wilson Rehabilitation Center in Fishersville over the weekend for the wheelchair sports competition, now in its 37th year, and inclusive to an ever-growing group of “junior” disabled athletes, under age 21.

On the line was qualification for national competition in St. Louis in July.

That chance for nationals enticed the Jacksons to what would become a day of firsts for Desmond. Less than an hour before the long jump, he ran his longest ever race, 400 meters, a race he didn’t think he could finish.

“I was tired from the other races,” Desmond said.

Partway through the race, which took him one lap around the track, Desmond fell.

“But you got back up,” Deborah told her son after the race, with tears still trickling beneath her sunglasses.

“These are tears of joy,” she said.

Support also came from older racers around the youngster, whose left leg was amputated when he was 9-months-old due to a birth defect.

“You finished,” one wheelchair racer said, repeating: “You finished.”

“Keep your head up,” said Winchaus Hayes, 39, extending a fist bump.

“I told him ... the best part of the race was when he fell. He got back up,” Hayes, of Chesapeake, said about his fist bump exchange with Desmond. “In life ... he’ll be counted on how many times he gets back up.”

Hayes, who broke his back in a car wreck on Thanksgiving in 2007 (“I didn’t get to eat the turkey,” he joked), marked his first year competing as well. Like Desmond, he didn’t begin tepidly. Hayes launched into running and swimming events, plus shotput, javelin and discus.

“I had a ball,” he said, chatting with other competitors and sharing some tips about wheelchair racing.

“Start low, with quick strokes,” Hayes said, showing some cuts and scrapes on his hands. “When you get over the long stretch, you need to stretch out long strokes ... get into a rhythm.”

Also finding his rhythm was Joseph Martin, 11, of Waynesboro, who wobbled doing a “wheelie” while talking about learning wheelchair tennis.

“I love it,” Martin said, showing his lightweight racket. “My big sister and I are going to be playing.”

His mother, Mary Martin, said her son is at an age where competition is important. The Wheelchair Games makes for a perfect outlet.

“He’s in a group of folks he can really relate to,” she said.

Competitors came from as far as Pennsylvania, the Carolinas, and West Virginia, said Joe Fangman, physical therapist at WWRC and Mid-Atlantic Wheelchair Athletic Association vice president.

Fangman said wheelchair competition has been infused with junior athletes. Of 30 registered for the weekend events, only about a half-dozen were adults.

And with youthful competitors came youthful enthusiasm for one another. Many trekked to the far side of the track to watch Desmond make his long jumps.

“Get down and dirty, baby,” one supporter called.

“Stretch out, sweetie,” his mother called after Desmond’s second of six attempts.

She made diving motions to show Desmond to fall forward into the sand pit to extend his measurement.

“Come to Mama,” she said from the far end of the sand pit.

“Go in and fall forward, we’ll clean you up,” called a track and field coach.

And jump Desmond did, extending beyond two meters, which could get him to St. Louis.

Then, jumps finished, Desmond wiped sand from his prosthetic running leg, took a swig from his favorite Gatorade — blue Frost Glacier Freeze — and jogged to catch up with his cousin.