Brock Ingram aiming for Paralympic glory in mixed fours rowing

BROCK Ingram has learnt to write with his opposite hand. “It’s still neater than the doctors’ handwriting, anyway,” he grins.

Brock Ingram (left) with mixed fours teammates (l-r) Jeremy McGrath, Davinia Lefroy, Kathleen Murdoch and coxswain Jo Burnand.

BROCK Ingram has learnt to write with his opposite hand.

“It’s still neater than the doctors’ handwriting, anyway,” he grins.

And Ingram has seen a few docs in his time, too, ever since the November day nine years ago when this Perth blast-hole digger went to work in a WA Goldfields mine with 10 fingers and came home with six.

“I got three of the four back though, with about 50 per cent use,” he says.

“I was operating a drill rig, digging holes about 10m deep and six inches wide — so you can imagine the size of it. Doesn’t really ask you to get out of the way first.

“So I was changing a drill bit and had to reach underneath the rod to remove it. Right at the crucial moment, the rod dropped off the top of the drill. Amputated four fingers and half my palm.

“That’s why, when I’m rowing, you’ll see I’m wearing what looks like a black glove. It pretty much velcroes me to the oar.”

Brock Ingram (left) with mixed fours teammates (l-r) Jeremy McGrath, Davinia Lefroy, Kathleen Murdoch and coxswain Jo Burnand.

On Friday Ingram makes his Paralympics debut as one member of the first Australian crew to qualify for the Games in the Legs, Trunk and Arms Mixed Coxed Four boat class.

The 37-year-old is joined by fellow Western Australian Davinia Lefroy and New South Wales pair Jeremy McGrath and Kathleen Murdoch.

The start at Ipanema’s Lagoa Stadium on Friday night caps a whirlwind journey for the crew, who only qualified for Rio in April and had to wait more than two months for official confirmation of their place.

Yet for Ingram, it’s been an even bigger series of unexpected turns.

He had rowed during his youth, but a move to mining soon after high school put a hold on his sporting pursuits.

“I started out a lightweight in schoolboys and then I went out to the mines, you’re eating three cooked meals a day — I was never a lightweight again,” he said.

Ingram took up kayaking shortly before his accident, and after his rehabilitation held his place Australia for four years in its para-canoe program.

But his dreams of reaching the Paralympics appeared dashed 18 months ago when a regulation change eliminated his classification from Games competition.

The LTA mixed fours rowing was the sole remaining class that would allow Ingram to compete in Rio, and a switch back to his childhood passion has opened the door to his Paralympics debut.

“This time last year none of us even looked like getting to Rio, so just being here is an amazing achievement for us,” he said.

“We’re confident in ourselves that we’re competitive and we’ll push some of the better teams.

“It would be amazing to be on the podium but if we fall short of that, it won’t be far short. We’ll still be walking around pretty proud.”

Originally published as Brock Ingram aiming for Paralympic glory in mixed fours rowing