Interview: Billy Bridges, Canadian Sledge Hockey Legend, Gold Medalist and 6x Paralympian

Burn It All Down

Sports

4.5 • 729 Ratings

🗓️ 24 February 2022

⏱️ 38 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In this episode Shireen Ahmed talks with Billy Bridges, Canadian sledge hockey legend who will soon compete at the 2022 Beijing Paralympic Games, which marks his sixth Paralympic appearance. They talk about his serendipitous discovery of para sport, joining the Canadian sledge hockey national team at only 14 and his over two decade career as an ultra para athlete in both sledge hockey and wheelchair basketball. They also discuss how he met his wife, the indominable goal tender Sami Jo Small, and how family support has gotten him where he is today. This episode was produced by Tressa Versteeg. Shelby Weldon is our social media and website specialist. Burn It All Down is part of the Blue Wire podcast network. For show notes, transcripts, and more info about BIAD, check out our website: www.burnitalldownpod.com To help support the Burn It All Down podcast, please consider becoming a patron: www.patreon.com/burnitalldown For BIAD merchandise: https://www.bonfire.com/store/burn-it-all-down/ Find us on Twitter: twitter.com/BurnItDownPod; Facebook: www.facebook.com/BurnItAllDownPod/; and Instagram: www.instagram.com/burnitalldownpod/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello, flame growers. I'm so excited about. I'm thrilled for many different reasons. You may
0:17.0	hear a little bit of that unfettered nationalism come out.
0:21.4	But with me today is Billy Bridges.
0:24.7	Billy is not only a Paralympical medalist in Sledgehockey.
0:29.7	He is internationally known for his contributions to parisport
0:33.2	and was the youngest recruit in Sledgeedge hockey at the age of 14.
0:40.1	Billy is the centerman in sledge hockey and has been a scoring threat since its first
0:44.4	Paralympic games in 2002.
0:47.2	Beijing will be his sixth Paralympics.
0:50.2	He has gold medals, world championships.
0:53.8	He is a wheelchair tennis player. He has played professional wheelchair basketball overseas. He happens to be a music connoisseur, Tragically Hip, specifically, and loves all kinds of food, is currently in school and happens to be married to a former burn it all down guest sammy joe small
1:13.7	formerly of the canadian women's national hockey team and my favorite thing about him is that
1:19.3	he is from the most beautiful place on the face of the earth prince edward island hello billy
1:24.6	thank you for having me thank you for for being here. I'm very excited
1:28.7	to have you here, as you know, but I wanted to talk a little bit about your journey in sledge hockey.
1:35.3	Like, how did you find it and fall in love with it? Because you were so apt in sports. And I also
1:42.0	hear you're a killer table tennis player. So how did you fall in love
1:47.0	with sledge hockey? Honestly, this is my favorite story. I didn't really know about a lot of
1:54.8	sports growing up that I could play. I grew up with a disability called Spina Bifta, so it's from
1:59.5	birth. And in terms of the disability, I'm extremely lucky.
2:05.0	I have full feeling in my legs, and considering my legs were shaped like question marks when I was born,
2:11.0	I'm actually able to walk on crutches and do so many things.
	...

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