Article two: hand cycle

Name of article:

Inclusive Leisure Services: Results of a National Survey of Park and Recreation Departments


Name of journal:
Park and Recreation Administration

Name of author(s):

Mary Ann Devine and Linda Kotowski


When and how did you locate this article?
Murphy data base, at home, December 9 2012

Two paragraph synopsis of what you learned in this article:
The hand cycle is relatively new, and it is the combination of a traditional wheelchair and a hand operated bicycle crank. The hand cycle is used to increase distance by improving the mechanical efficiency in long term endurance. This article uses a person who happens to have had a spinal cord injury. The point of this article is to analyzed the workload, speed, cadence and heart rate parameters during a race.

As persons in wheelchairs are using the hand cycle more and more, their performance is reaching higher and higher capacities each year. Overall, this article proves that hand cycling is possible not only for able bodied people, but also for persons who have had spinal cord injuries. The article goes into great detail on the medical and nutritional preparedness that is required to insure a successful race.

How will you apply this knowledge to your professional development?
This article helped me understand that even though something may not be possible for a particular person at a given time, medical and nutritional preparedness will help them get them to their goal; similar to how I had to train to earn a position on the varsity softball team in high school.

Would you recommend this article for other TR students?  Why or why not?
I think that I would steer someone to another article with this topic with more relevant material to therapeutic recreation; there wasn't much informative details in this article.