A Brief History About GRWSA
Wheelchair tennis in the Grand Rapids area began in 1979. Luanne Westenbroek, a tennis enthusiast herself, had heard about wheelchair tennis being played in California and wanted to get a group of local wheelchair athletes interested.
With Luanne’s enthusiasm, she managed to recruit Bob O’Connell who volunteered to teach tennis to wheelchair users at Ada Park, a wheelchair accessible park. Bob started out with three very curious athletes – Tom Kelderhouse and Lee Montgomery, both who had never played tennis before, and Tom Partanen, who played tennis prior to his spinal cord injury.
Because this group had grown and their tennis skills had improved, Luanne founded the Grand Rapids Wheelchair Tennis Foundation in 1980 and began to raise funds to send the rapidly growing group of tennis players to various tournaments throughout the United States. Grand Rapids hosted the first USTA Indoor National tournament in 1991.
In 1986 the foundation started a junior wheelchair sports camp which began with the help of Beverly Nickels. This camp is still a free five day camp experience with over 60 campers and overnight housing available on the campus of Grand Valley State University. Physically challenged youths, between the ages of 7 and 18, learn basketball, archery, tennis, swimming, track events, aerobics, weight lifting, sled hockey and more. Many of the instructors are adult athletes who use a wheelchair themselves and play on the adult teams.
As the foundation grew, it was decided to change the name to the Grand Rapids Wheelchair Sports Association to meet more of the growing recreational needs of the Grand Rapids area community and to offer more of an opportunity for other sports.
The mission statement of GRWSA is: To provide and promote competitive and recreational wheelchair sports for persons with physical disabilities.
The year 2009, marks the 29th anniversary of the organization and the Grand Rapids Wheelchair Sports Association is proud to offer adult and junior basketball programs, adult and junior tennis programs, road racing, hand cycling, a five day sports camp, and host adapted water ski clinics.