HEAD TO HEAD Karen Darke - Cyclist
“ a journey with an unknown
Since falling from a cliff and breaking her back aged 21, Karen Darke has gone on to become a member of the British Cycling GB squad and 2012 Paralympic silver medallist. Along the way she has cycled the length of Japan by handbike, skied across Greenland, climbed El Capitan and been crowned the 2012 Paratriathlon Champion. Luke Bradshaw spoke to Karen about the incredible adventures and challenges she’s undertaken, as well as what’s planned for the future.
outcome…”
oing back to before your accident, as a student, what were your plans career-wise – would it still have involved the outdoors? I started out as a medical student, but didn’t enjoy
chopping bodies open! When I left the medical school at Leeds Uni, I’d always walk past the Earth Science department and that was it. I began a degree in Geology and Chemistry, and was looking to a career working with water or hydrogeology. Jobs seemed hard to fi nd at the time, and I was offered a postgrad doing geology study in the Andes – it seemed interesting and a great excuse to go there and climb. Unfortunately a week before the fi rst fi eldtrip out there I fell off the cliff and broke my back.
And how long after the accident did you decide that this was going to be the life you wanted to pursue? Well I’m not sure I ever took that decision consciously. I like sport and I like the outdoors, so that never really changed. Even when I was in hospital I was escaping most days to go and push around the woods, or along a canal bank, or to go sailing on a nearby lake. There was only a short moment immediately afterwards when I wondered if I had to trade it all in for a world of concrete and tarmac…but that didn’t last long!
And is there any part of you that thinks you have been more determined, maybe set out to achieve more sooner, as a result of being paralysed?
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www.activinstinct.com
IMAGERY COURTESY OF MARTE LUNDBY REKAA
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