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Meet the bungee wheelchair girl

Mar 25 01:00

There's a viral video right now of a "pretty blond woman in a wheelchair" who made news going bungee jumping off a bridge in her wheelchair. It's a little over 1 minute long and it'll completely blow your mind (watch here). What you don't know however is the who - the woman in the wheelchair who had the balls to pull off the crazy stunt. She's Christi "Lynx" Rougoor, a T4 paraplegic from Whistler, British Columbia.

I had to know who she after watching the video…blond hair flying as her rigid manual chair was surprisingly effective in the 150 foot plunge. I didn't think it was safe to bungee jump in your wheelchair. You'd think the wheelchair would fly apart or something (they must use some kind of special wheelchair to make sure that doesn't happen). But Christi seemed to love every second of it. A badass spirit? Oh yeah.

Christi is a 25 year old college student studying at Brock University in Ontario, Canada and was injured in 2008 while motocrossing Florida. In the crash, she also broke all the bones in her face (you'd never know by looking at her!). Christi, who grew up on a farm, has been four-wheeling and motorcrossing her whole life. A girl like me would call a girl like her an "outdoors girl," but I think that'd be a gross understatement. Within months of her injury, she was already out there on the slopes, at events, checking out adapted sports and everything she could still do.

What’s really cool about the bungee jump thing is that it wasn’t what Christi initially set out to do. 9 Lives, an adapted sport adventure group in Canada, put on a contest looking for someone with a disability to go snowmobiling with X-Games champ Chris brown. She submitted a video, showing them all of the cool things she still does, like shooting, wheelchair tennis, four-wheeling, kayaking (and touching on what she still dreams of doing ). Her video worked so good they must have been like, “Let’s take her bungee crazy instead!”

However Christi's bungee experience came to pass, her taking the plunge did more than just give her body an adrenaline rush, it helped show the world that people with disabilities can be just be just as crazy as anyone else. Christi, you've done your part. Bravo, girl....bravo.

- Watch Christi’s 9Lives entry video

- 9 Lives Adventures on Facebook

- Official site: www.9LivesAdventures.com

Would you try this?

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1. wire.paladin | Sep 06 03:50

Nothing new! about 20 yr.ago i remember seeing a para ex-navy seal do the same thing. These people are rush-junkies but it's not my thing.

Spin 2.0

By Tiffiny Carlson

Tiffiny Carlson Disability buzz, travel, fashion and dating — fun things to amp up everyday wheeling life.

Tiffiny Carlson is freelance writer and writes the “SCI Life” column for New Mobility. She's also a C6 quad from a diving accident that occurred when she was 14 years old. A lifelong resident of Minneapolis, Tiffiny has been a writer in the disability community for over 10 years and writes for several publications and blogs, as well as her personal blog BeautyAbility. Her work has also appeared in mainstream publications such as Nerve.com and Playgirl.