Qian Hongyan - The Basketball Girl

This is truly an inspirational story of how you should not give up hope The Amazing Story of Qian Hongyan – The Basketball Girl Presentation by : www.the-amazing-one.blogspot.com Source of story : bbc news, woman of china, and various source

Qian Hongyan lost both her legs in an accident at only three years old in 2000.

Qian Hongyan had to have her legs removed after a car accident, but has managed to find a new way of moving around.

Her family in China are poor and couldn't afford false legs, so she uses a basketball to help her move.

Hongyan used brushes as low-level crutches. She was able to travel to and from home and school by bouncing on the basketball.

Eight-year-old Qian doesn't always need her basketball to get around though, as her dad helps her sometimes.

Qian uses two wooden props to drag herself, and never complains, even though she has worn through six basketballs.

She has even been dragging herself to school every day, but all that may be about to change...

Doctors in China have promised to make her some artificial limbs, and she's going to be given a wheelchair until then.

Five years later, doctors were finally been able to give her prosthetic legs.

Qian Hongyan instructor help her to walk with prostetic legs

The seventh national special sports-meeting was held in Kunming in May 2007. Qian Hongyan went to watch the games every day and seeing the handicapped players struggle in the matches deeply moved her.

After the sports meeting, Qian Hongyan was determined to join in the special swimming club. She and her parents went to consult the opportunity with Zhang Honghu, a well known coach who has trained many handicapped swimming champions.

Then, Qian Hongyan began her life in the swimming club and did professional swimming training. "Qian Hongyan studies hard. She never grouches in training although she was confronted with many difficulties at the beginning, " her coach said.

At first, Zhang didn't pay much attention to Qian Hongyan. "The individual's capability is important in choosing a player," he said.

"Qian Hongyan doesn't have legs. It seems that a ship has no a helm, then the ship could work well for lack of a sense of direction."

In order to solve the problem, zhang made a special training plan for Qian Hongyan to help balance the shoulders.

Qian Hongyan swims for about 2000 meters in a day. She always does the exercises and sit-ups, dumbbells and so on carefully.

After a short period, to Zhang's surprise, he found that Hongyan was gifted in swimming. Zhang said, "Hongyan is a very good swimmer but it would be boring and take a long time to train her and repeat the exercises every day.

I couldn't ensure she would be a world champion. However, I can tell that she is definitely a promising swimmer. Our biggest wish is to train her to have a positive attitude to life."

Qian Hongyan, whose plight touched millions of people around the globe, has joined a swimming club and begun training to fulfil her dream of competing in the 2012 Paralympics in London.

She may have been forced to use a basketball as a prosthetic but that has not stopped her ambition to compete on the sporting world's biggest stage.