British - Athlete | February 4, 1974 -
I feel lucky that I found my talent, not unlucky that I was born with a disability. When I'm on a horse, I'm more worried about what the riding hat is doing to my hair than what my bent legs and arms are doing. What riding has given me is respect.
Lee Pearson
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When I pull my white Range Rover into disabled parking bays, the abuse that I get until I actually get out on my crutches is phenomenal, because people presume that you couldn't possibly be disabled and reverse a white Range Rover into that parking space.
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I'm just a genetic freak, but it has never stopped me from doing whatever I want to.
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The Paralympic Games actually turned my whole mentality around about disability. When you're in the Paralympic athletes' village and there are 4,000 disabled people, you stop seeing disability. Totally.
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My motivation is paying the mortgage. No joke. Honestly. I still suffer with nerves and think, 'Why am I putting myself through this torture?' It's not actually the love of winning - it's that building of a partnership with a horse. Just riding horses every day keeps me going. And that threat of losing the mortgage.
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Paralympics has always had to push the media into it being about sport and not focusing on the disability.
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I joke that the Olympics is the warm-up to the Paralympics.
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If you don't like something, change it. My parents expected me to stay in my office job as an administrator at the Co-op because I'm disabled, but I said no and changed my whole life.
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I think it's phenomenal and expected that Paralympians will take on able bodied people more and more. In dressage, it happens all the time. But there are very few adaptions, and they are never allowed to give you an advantage.
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When people chat to me about my childhood and getting into horses, they're like, 'Was it like the birds sang and the sun came out? Was it an amazing experience?' I'm like, 'No, it was rubbish. I was frightened. I was pretty unbalanced, and most ponies took advantage of me.'
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I always say I'm one of the most normal abnormal people you'll ever meet. I get embarrassed about how many medals I've won, and I get angry when people presume that because you're gay you've got to wear pink and stilettos and camp it up, or that if you're disabled you should act like a victim and not have a life.
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I don't just love riding; I love horses. I was in the field at my yard watching them gallop around and play the other day. That's what keeps me going, and sometimes it has to be something more than just winning.
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