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Andy is one of Great Britain’s most prominent wheelchair rugby stars, having captained the GB team at the Beijing 2008 Paralympic Games, where the team agonisingly finished 4th for the second Games in a row. Andy took up wheelchair rugby as part of his rehabilitation after having broken his neck in a rugby scrum in 1997. As well as having competed in two Paralympic Games, Andy has represented GB at World and European Championship level (winning European Gold in 2003, 2005 and 2007), and played for San Diego in the 02/03 US season.
Andy Barrow »
A Testing Event
Posted on 3:56pm Tuesday 8th May 2012
I could see the Basketball Arena from the window of my hotel room along with the rest of Olympic Park with the London skyline in the background. My house is just seven miles away in Greenwich, so I drive past the site most days on my way to training, but being inside the complex felt different.
Andy Barrow »
Heating Up
Posted on 4:58pm Monday 16th April 2012
As the Paralympics draw closer, it’s no surprise that my blogs are getting fewer and farther between. If you’ve read my posts before, you’ll know that this is always a tough time in terms of training volume. Right now we’re laying down the base work to give us the durability to complete the training programme that will see us peak in September. It’s a heavy workload without many breaks in the monotony. Fortunately, it’s not all dull and I do have a couple of things worth sharing… After a very intense training block throughout February, the squad played host to Poland in a six match series at Stoke Mandeville. There was a lot of good rugby played and some exciting new lines proved their worth with the coach looking on. Five wins out of a possible six confirmed that GB are definitely on the right track in 2012.
Andy Barrow »
Royal Ramblings
Posted on 3:08pm Monday 6th February 2012
I last posted in mid December, so I’ll give a quick summary of my Christmas and New Year before moving on to things more current. My holiday season kicked off with a spectacular black tie party hosted by my sponsors, Chaucer. I had a great evening in London catching up with all my friends from the company and I’m genuinely touched that so many people have taken such a keen interest and follow the blog.
Andy Barrow »
Winter Update
Posted on 3:47pm Monday 19th December 2011
Firstly, apologies to everyone for such a lengthy absence, it’s traditional for me to have a break from blogging at the end of the season, but I didn’t mean to leave it quite this long. Looking back, it’s been two months since my last post and that definitely wasn’t the plan!
Andy Barrow »
2011 European Championship Diary (Part Two)
Posted on 12:49pm Thursday 13th October 2011
Sat 8th Oct; The team had a relatively free day ahead of the semi-final with Belgium. The morning started badly with England crashing out of the Rugby World Cup but soon improved when I met up with my fiancée, Alison. She had caught the “red-eye” out on Thursday and spent an extortionate amount of money on taxis to be the only GB fan in the hall for the Poland game. It was great to have her there and made me think about how the players are really the visible part of a far greater team that’s also working hard and making sacrifices for us to be as good as we can be.
Andy Barrow »
2011 European Championship Diary (Part One)
Posted on 10:49am Saturday 8th October 2011
Fri 30th Sep; Got all my packing done this morning, checked and double checked, then set off for Heathrow T5. We’re not the only Paralympic team going places today; GB shooting are off to Atlanta for a competition… Good luck guys, all the best! Touch down at sunset in Zurich and make the ninety-minute transfer to Nottwil (near Lucerne). It’s pitch black so no idea what this place is like, more to follow. Grab a late dinner, have a quick team meeting and get our heads down.
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