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Fall & Winter Indoor Soccer www.oakvillesoccer.ca (905) 849-4436 Limited space remains for Fall 2011. Registration deadline for Winter is December 11, 2011. Leagues are available for all ages and skill level Improve your skills with year round play at the state of the art Pine Glen Soccer Centre Age groups may fill prior to the deadline with no guarantee of placement if put on a waitlist Register now for 2011/2012 Fall and Winter indoor! Fall registration ends Sunday, September 11. Proud sponsor of Oakville Soccer Club Sports SPORTS EDITOR: JON KUIPERIJ Phone 905-845-3824 (ext. 432) Fax 905-337-5571 email sports@oakvillebeaver.com THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 8, 2011 25 Sledge hockey star hoping to put own world record on ice By Herb Garbutt OAKVILLE BEAVER STAFF Greg Westlake has had his share of cool sporting moments. The captain of the Canadian sledge hock- ey team once scored the winning goal with just eight seconds to play in the gold-medal game at the world championships. He won a gold medal at the Paralympics in 2006. On the golf course, Westlake has a hole-in-one. And then there is his world record. It is probably the least likely of all his accomplishments, simply because the oppor- tunity came out of the blue. In the summer of 2009, Westlake was focused on sledge hockey. It was less than a year away from Canada defending its Paralympic gold in front of a home Vancouver crowd when Westlake got a call from Ivan Samila and Mike Sova. Samila designed and built mobility equip- ment for the disabled while Sova was an avid cyclist who built and designed artificial limbs. The duo had been working on a three- wheeled, hand-powered bike for three years that it was going to take to the World Human Powered Speed Challenge. However, with the competition just over two months away, Samila and Sova had lost their rider. Not wanting to shelve their work, they began their search for a new rider and Sovas co-worker suggested a member of the Canadian sledge hockey team. Westlake was intrigued. I thought it would be fun, the 25-year- old said. Im a pretty competitive guy and I get so consumed in hockey. This was some- thing that was completely different. And Id still be doing cardio that would help with hockey. As they prepared for a test of the bike at the Ford Michigan Proving Ground, Westlake started to wonder what he got himself into. Ive never been much of a gear head, Westlake said. They were talking about gear ratios and when to gear up. It was going right over my head. But after a successful test in Michigan, and just three months after Westlake first rode the bike, they headed to the Arizona desert looking to break the record for an arm-powered vehicle. The competition is run on a flat, straight eight-mile stretch of road. Westlake sits NEED FOR SPEED: Canadian sledge hockey captain Greg Westlake sits in the three-wheeled hand-powered bike designed by Ivan Samila and Mike Sova. Westlake steered the bike to a world record for arm-powered vehicle several years ago, reaching a speed of 70.285 km/h, and will try to break that record next week in Arizona. See Westlake, page 28