Maia Lewis: National Manager of Achillies NZ discusses the Auckland Marathon

This Sunday the Auckland marathon is happening which brings thousands of people from across the country to Auckland for the pinnacle running event.

Achilles NZ is an organisation that is working to making all running events accessible for disabled people across the country. They organise regular training for their athletes with a number of them signing up for the marathon this weekend.

Maia Lewis is the National Manager of Achilles NZ and she caught up with D'Arcy to discuss the event and how Achilles NZ is getting involved. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the All Sport Breakfast podcast with Darcy
Waldgrave from News Talk SEDB.

Speaker 2 (00:11):
Tomorrow au from marathons happening, thousands of people getting in
the way of traffic. I'm sorry they're having the time
of their life, but you know it just avoided it
like the plague if you're in your car and your bike.
Achilles in Z an organization that is working to make
all running events accessible for disabled people right across the Matsu.

(00:33):
They organize regular training for their athletes. A number of
them have signed up for the marathon. Mike Lewis joins
us now former White Fern skipper now the national manager
of Achilles en Z. She joins us to discuss tomorrow's
event and how Achilles New Zealand is getting involved with
this pinnacle event for them right across Auckland over the weekend.

(00:56):
Morning Maya, how are you.

Speaker 3 (00:59):
Nice to hear from you again? Long time no here?

Speaker 1 (01:02):
All right?

Speaker 2 (01:02):
I know, well you're no longer representing New Zealand and
I don't know how many sport's mine which you've done.
You're now you've got a real job, haven't you. And
you're looking after the Achilles in Z which is an
incredible organization and it's part of what's happening in the
Auckland Marathon over the weekend too. See you're more than busy,

(01:24):
aren't you.

Speaker 3 (01:26):
Yeah, very busy and always been involved in sport as
a career as well and disability sport work for Halberg
Foundation for a few years. So love the disability sport
and that's what Achilley's New Zealand is all about. I'm
the national manager. I'm grateful for that. And we basically
get disabled people. Our vision is running every running event

(01:48):
and been accessible to disabled people, and our mission is
to enable disabled people to participate in races, access safe
and inclusive training and connect with communities. So the are
the three things. Really We are a pan national disability
sport organization that means all disabilities the word PAN and

(02:08):
basically we just help disabled people whatever their finish line
looks like, to run, walk, wheel and also connect community.
We have coffee, you know, coffees after our little regular
trainings and stuff like that, and then some of them
enter big events like the Aukland Marathon coming up and
couldn't be done without the assistance of volunteer guides across

(02:28):
the country. So if you see yellow hivers vests or
T shirts sort of wandering around the streets, that's our kellyes,
New Zealand.

Speaker 2 (02:38):
So the Auckland Marathon, you've got one hundred and thirty
odd members involved running wheeling. I'm not entirely sure which
transport they use, but it's a big event, one of
your pinnacle events for Achilles Enzen.

Speaker 3 (02:52):
It definitely is. We have a couple of pinnacle events
we have. The New York Marathon is our only international
event at the moment. We've got two going across the
It's exactly the same day as the Auckland Marathon, which
is crazy. So people our sort of members, if they
want to go international Auckland they have to pick, but
some have done both. But we've got a record one

(03:13):
hundred and thirty five members. That's including athletes and guides
attending anything from the five k to the full marathon,
including twelve wheelchair athletes as well. They're in three categories.
So it's push rim which is like racing chair pushing,
and then hand cycles or hand cycles with a power assist,

(03:36):
which is like an electric hand cycle basically, and you
can wind it round like an electric bike. So a
few different categories and we started actually the advocates see
with Auckland Marathon in two thousand and eighteen with Peter Loft,
our co founder and actually Dave mcculman, who was part
of Halberg advocating get Wellies into the full marathon, and

(04:00):
that happened since twenty eighteen and it's been happening ever since.
And this year we've been also advocated to get Whell
He's into the half marathon as well, so we've got
a few in that too. So it's an ongoing growing
relationship with iron Man, the event organizers, which is fantastic
to get everyone involved.

Speaker 2 (04:18):
There's always good stories wrapped around this. And I look
at a couple of your participants, I mean you look
to Mike Lloyd and what he's achieved to Lee Walk.
These guys have got a history in New York as well.

Speaker 3 (04:29):
You know it. Yeah, so are some real characters within
our membership. And that's a cool thing about it is
just really real people and they just strive, striving for
personal achievement. But like you say, Mike Lloyd, he's blind
and also has Parkinson's. He's done eleven New York marathons.
But this is actually his first Auckland Marathon because as

(04:51):
I said, it was at the same time. And he's
got a fantastic with his relationships. So Mike lives in
Toting and his guy John lives up here in Auckland,
and they tuned for a lot just to train together,
and they did the New York Marathon last year. So
and I like blood brothers those two. And then you've
got the likes of Lee Warn who some people know,

(05:11):
but every time Lee is a wheelchair push room assistant
athlete sorry, and people see him dressed up, so you
probably see him in a squirrel suit. He has been
known to wear a Batman suit as well, so he
wore the squirrel suit last year in the New York Marathon.
And his aim is to do I think it's called

(05:34):
the Abbots seven, so he's doing sort of all the
International Archilles marathons across the world. His next one after this,
I think is Tokyo next year. So he provides fun
for everyone and all he wants to do is put
a smile on everyone's face at the same time as
doing a full marathon. So he's a crazy man, which
is fantastic. And he's also a board member of Achilles,

(05:56):
which is even better.

Speaker 1 (05:57):
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