Born to a San Diego family, Ryan Porteous was fortunate to grow up in the coastal community of Pacific Beach in a time when P.B. was booming.  His father an environmental consultant and mom a grade school science teacher, Ryan was oriented toward getting an advanced education from an early age.  Beginning at Mission Bay High School, after graduation Ryan matriculated to UC Santa Barbara.

 

Ryan was introduced to water sports at a young age, firmly rooting his destiny in boating. At Mission Bay Yacht Club, he attended the Junior Summer Sailing Program from age seven to ten. It was there at MBYC that Ryan learned to sail and then eventually race.  “I started out in sabots, progressing from C3 to A fleet, then on to 420s, lasers, and other sailboats, racing at junior regattas and other types of fleet racing.”  Being the ace that he has become Ryan humbly explains, “I have won multiple local regattas in these boats and done well in national regattas, as well.”  Some notable achievements were winning the 2007 Mark Reynolds Perpetual Trophy in the 420 class, and placing third then second in the 2008, then 2009 ISAF (International Sailing Federation) Youth World Qualifiers in Multihulls. 

 

Things were going well for Ryan when he headed off on a camping trip in October of 2011.  Regrettably, while walking on a dock he slipped and changed his life forever.  “I have a C-6 spinal cord injury which caused almost total paralysis.  I broke my neck in a freak accident in which I slipped and fell to the ground, clipping my head on the end of the dock.  I lost control of my body from the neck down.”

 

The rehabilitation process has been long and arduous.  But Ryan is young, has the will, the fight, and the right mind set.  Due to his tenacity, he has regained most of his upper body strength and is slowly rebuilding movement in his lower extremities.  With concerted effort, he can now walk short distances with a walker.  Ryan points out, “This has been a life changing experience. I strive to stay positive and feel fortunate that I can still do a lot of things, one being sailing.”

At the age of 20, Ryan is currently living at home with the folks and attending full time classes at Mira Costa College.  With his eyes on the future, next fall Ryan plans on taking his pursuit of a physics degree to either Stanford or UC Santa Barbara.

 

Ryan’s passion for sailing has made him a champion sailor and helped him rebound physically and mentally, post-injury. Due to the water connection, he heard about the Challenged America (CA) program from a therapist at Sharp rehab who had worked with another CA sailor, Eric Berkey.  Receiving the contact information and website address for the sailing nonprofit, Ryan got in touch and has been a regular sailing participant in CA’s Martin 16’s at weekend regattas.

 

“Thanks to Challenged America, as I was recovering from my injury I was able to return to sailing.  About a year and a half after falling I competed at the US Sailing Team qualifier in the Skud 18, one of the Paralympic class boats. This was in the summer of 2013 in Newport, Rhode Island. My crew, Cindy Walker and I took first place, making and becoming the number one team. Our goal now is to represent the United States and medal at the 2016 Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.  Making the team this year was a good start, and we hope to continue to do well competing in the various ISAF World Cup and World Championship regattas leading up to the games. We are looking forward to future competitions and achieving our goal to medal at the Paralympics.” If you’d like to help Ryan and Cindy in their quest for Olympic Gold check out their website at teamporteouswalker.org.

 

In May of this year, Ryan and Cindy, an east coast sailor, met at a regatta training camp in Florida, became fast friends and then teammates.  Together, they are wowing the competition with their first place finish in the Scuds and their first place overall standing in the nation.

 

Turning his thoughts toward Challenged America, Ryan states, “I think Challenged America is awesome, and I really appreciate all the volunteers’ work. I would like to see all eight boats on the water for the races. That would be great.”  

 

Not satisfied with just being a recipient of Challenged America’s sailing program, Ryan would like to join our volunteer corps by sharing his hard won expertise with others.  Ryan offers, “If anyone’s interested, I could hold a racing clinic for sailors wanting to learn more about sail trim, tactics, etc.  I would love to pass on what I know and continue to learn from racing.”  That is a very generous offer that the staff at CA is bound to pounce on.  I would surely like to attend that clinic.

 

I asked the talented sailor if he had any words of wisdom that he would like to pass on to others: “Much of what we see depends largely on what we look for. Look for the good stuff, accentuate the positive and press on.Go sailing!!!”  See you on the water!

-          Marshall Lubin (www.fromboys2men.com/)