WEEK #21: FAYE BLACKWOOD

Please tell us a little bit about yourself. 

Faye Blackwood has worked as Sport and Recreation Consultant for the Government of Ontario since 2003.

Prior to working with the Ontario government, Faye worked for Athletics Canada for 3 years as Manager of Paralympic Programs and Sport for Disabled – Ontario (now ParaSport Ontario) for 10 years as the Technical Director.

Faye has a Technical Classifier for Athletes with a physical disability since 2012.

Faye was a member of the National Track and Field, from 1983-1987 and member of the 1986 Commonwealth Games Team. Faye was the indoors and outdoors National Hurdles Champion in 1986.

From 1989 to the present Faye has been coaching athletes with a disability, including being a staff coach at 4 Paralympic Games (Barcelona, Atlanta, Sydney and Athens) and several World Championships.

Faye was inducted into the University of Waterloo Hall of Fame in 2000 as an athlete. She was inducted into the Canadian Cerebral Palsy Sport Association’s Hall of Fame as a Coach in 2011, inducted into the Variety Village Wall of Fame as a Coach in 2011 and received for 2012 King Clancy Award for her work with Paralympic Athletes.   Faye was recently inducted into the Toronto Hall of Honour (April 4th, 2019).

Faye is a University of Waterloo graduate, with an Honours Bachelor of Science Degree in Kinesiology.

Please share a story about an internal or external barrier you have faced.

I was trying to make the 1984 Olympic Team. At the trials in Winnipeg, I broke my left wrist, did not finish the race and did not make the team. Needless to say, I was devasted.

How did you overcome that barrier?  

I got a fiberglass cast and was back on the track a week later, cast on all.

And in 1986 I made the Commonwealth Team that completed in Edinburgh, Scotland

What skills did you develop in sport to help you overcome your barrier?

Perseverance, patience, believing in yourself and never giving up!!

If you had one word to describe your character, experiences or philosophy what would it be? Why?

Imagine

Believing and imagining that anything is possible, if you want it bad enough!

Because if you imagine yourself doing something, never give up and believe…it will happen!!

If you wanted to motivate a young female athlete to #BuildHerUp, what quote would you use? Why?

“Sport is a way of Life, for life!”

Sport can prepare you for anything, the highs and the low that happen in sport, also happen in life. It is how you deal with these things that builds character, and will put on the right path, to so that will know who you are!!