“I just zone out, and I look at the finish line, and I just keep running.”
Janelle Evrart, of Springfield, plans to compete in bocce during the Special Olympics in Greece this summer.Two young women from Western Massachusetts embark on the trip of a lifetime today.
Alyssa Neil, of Holyoke, and Janelle Evrard, of Springfield, are departing on the first leg of a journey to Athens, Greece, where they will compete for Team USA in the Special Olympics Summer Games running June 25 through July 4.
Special Olympics was founded in 1968 for athletes with intellectual disabilities. Like the regular Olympics, it meets internationally every four years for Summer Games, with Winter Games staggered in between.
About 7,000 special athletes from around the world will be competing in 21 sports this summer. Among the members of Team USA will be Neil and Evrard, who first met at the team’s training track in San Diego in March.
The women were notified in the fall that they were on the team. “I’m very excited,” said Evrard, 36, who will be competing in bocce.
Neil, 20, is a runner with over 50 medals in track and field events.
She said she has been dreaming of going Greece ever since she saw the animated movie “Hercules” at age 5. “I can’t wait to see everything Greece has to offer,” she said.
She’s been running since age 11. It all started when she participated in a Special Olympics meet ( “just for fun”), but impressed others with her speed.
“We couldn’t believe it,” said her mother, Connie Neil.
“I just zone out, and I look at the finish line, and I just keep running,” said Neil.
Her coach is her cousin Kyle Robert, of Holyoke. “He works me really hard,” she said.
“He tells me to run a lot more on my toes, because I can get more traction. And to bring my knees up and forward.”
Neil and her sister Courtney were cheerleaders in high school. They compete together in Unified Games, which pair able and disabled athletes.
“Kyle has been her coach since she started,” said Courtney Neil, who will join her sister in Greece. “I’m just her cheerleader.”
Timothy Neil loves what athletics has done for his daughters. “From day one,” he said, “they grew in self-esteem and in the courage to get out there and try things,” he said.
Evrard said bocce, though not very common in this country, is her favorite sport among several she has tried.
“You’ve got to have just the right strength to roll the ball to hit the pallina,” she explains. (“Pallina” means “little ball” in Italian.)
“If you use too much strength, it would roll right past, and you wouldn’t be anywhere near it. With too little strength, it wouldn’t go far enough.”
Being involved in sports has helped Evrard shed 115 pounds. “She’s in training mode now,” said her mother, Caron Evrard, of Springfield.
Evrard joined Special Olympics 10 years ago, but didn’t start losing weight until she began playing volleyball five years ago.
Encouraged, she kept on exercising. “I go to the gym a lot,” she said, “and I like to take a nice walk with my dad at Forest Park.” Her father is Alain Evrard.
“Janelle is a warm and loving person, and she’s going to try her best to win the gold,” said her mother.
Massachusetts Special Olympians will gather tonight for the Torch Run at Boston University’s arena before eventually heading to Greece.