Warriors in Motion Return to Windham Mountain

Above photo: Bob Stubbs Warriors in Motion Winter Sports Weekend took place last weekend, hosted by the Adaptive Sports Foundation and Windham Mountain Club with a team of volunteers helping honor the service and sacrifice of American veterans and their families.

Army veteran Anthony Radetic is suited up and ready to hit the slopes on his monoski, having served in Irag and Afghanistan.

Stars and Stripes are carried downhill by Lee Guzofski, son-in-law of the late Bob Stubbs who created a home for the Warriors in Motion program (formerly Wounded Warriors) at the Adaptive Sports Foundation.

Making wounded veterans feel at home are Gwen Allard Adaptive Sports Center staffers (left to right) executive director John Iannelli, program/reservations manager Ginny Scahill and longtime volunteers Denise Meehan and retired Army Colonel Kevin Hicks.

WINDHAM - It was hot and muggy, this past Saturday, when Anthony Radetic headed out the door of the Adaptive Sports Foundation at Windham Mountain Club.

No it wasn’t. 

It was February frigid and the wind was roaring like rocketing winged buffaloes but Radetic felt internally warmed against the weather.

He was one of thirteen military veterans being honored during the return of the Bob Stubbs Warriors in Motion Winter Sports Weekend.

The three-day event, originally given a home by Stubbs, is annually hosted by the local Foundation and ski slope in conjunction with the Wounded Warriors Project, forming a strong and singular purpose.

“This is our 20th year here. Our mission is still the same,” says Foundation executive director John Iannelli. “We take injured men and women and teach them a sport, to show them they have tons of abilities.”

There are multi-dimensional benefits. “We and our donors and volunteers provide these amazing individuals with whatever they need, clothing and skis, food and lodging, so there are no physical barriers,” Iannelli says.

“And our instructors give them a Bob Stubbs Challenge Coin, so they can remember that when they came here, they didn’t think they could do this.

“But they did it. That has deep, lasting emotional value. They can also bring a family member, helping unite families,” Iannelli says.

Radetic, an Army helicopter pilot, was joined by his daughter. He grew up in Florida and was stationed in Alabama so his first snow outing was, “very different, for sure,” he said, smiling, well-bundled in the Catskills cold.

He showed “raw talent” on his specifically-adapted mono-ski, Iannelli said, an unexpected experience - especially for a southerner - that has been shared by hundreds of veterans over the past two decades.

The weekend included a Friday luncheon and traditional appearances by elementary school students from Windham-Ashland-Jewett, singing patriotic songs, always to a rousing ovation. 

Members of the local Patchworkers Club donated quilts to each veteran and town officials welcomed them, describing what they and the Foundation mean to the whole community.

The latest gathering marked the upcoming retirement of Ginny Scahill who has been an intimate part of the Gwen Allard Adaptive Sports Center and its workings for a quarter-century.

“None of this was here when we started,” Scahill said, noting she and some others, such as Denise Meehan, were initially based in the town hall, evolving into a nationally and internationally respected beacon.

Scahill will be on board through the ski season, saying, “everyone here is passionate about giving back to these veterans and their families.

“Our [volunteer] instructors are wonderful. They are so kind to everyone who comes here. They make them know that what they did means something,” Scahill said.

The roots of the Adaptive Sports Center date to 1981 when local resident Bill Haltermann (an amputee three-track skier) founded a disabled ski program at what was then Ski Windham, their website states

Haltermann volunteered with Karen Frank, Dee Dee Sheridan, Anita Buyers, Joan Morales, Kathy Koegel, Janice Loftus, Barbara Tait, Leila Brown, Walter and Rosemary Lipman, and Kathy and Bob Kelly, among others, to conduct adaptive ski lessons on weekends. 

This group of individuals along with Dan Frank, general manager of Ski Windham and Gwen Allard, Executive Director of EPSIA-EF, planted the seeds for what would become the Adaptive Sports Foundation.