Triathlete beats depression,and booze with one leg

Tracey Moore, who became an amputee after a failed suicide attempt, competes to inspire others.

The human spirit is a magnificent thing. Like all life on this planet add the right amount of sunshine, correct watering and life flourishes. Again here I see sport taking a role in the wonderful story of Tracy taking control of her life.
Sport has the ability to be so much more than smelly shoes and expensive supplements.

Most of the details of that day are fuzzy, but there is one image Tracey Moore has permanently ingrained in her memory.
The date was Feb. 26, 2000. The emergency room physician at Long Beach Memorial Hospital dangled a leg by its big toe in front of her face.
It was her leg.
The muscles and tendons were severed, the bones crushed.
Hours earlier, Tracey, then 38, purposely stepped onto the train tracks at the Wardlow Station in Long Beach in an attempt to end her “pathetic” life, as she refers to it. It was a life ravaged by alcoholism and the human wreckage left in its wake.
Tracey’s right leg was amputated below the knee that day. She received a craniotomy the next day to mend a depressed section on the back of her skull. She has a steel plate in her head.
SELF DESTRUCTION
Tracey recalls dabbling with alcohol in junior high. The drinking increased in high school.
“It got to be more than the Friday night football games,” Tracey said.
Attractive and extraverted, Moore immersed herself in what she calls “the Hollywood thing.” In her late teens and 20′s, the party girl earned small parts in movies, did some modeling and was in a few beauty contests. Drinking went hand-in-hand with all of it.
From age 30 to 40, there were several futile attempts at sobriety.
“Life would get good and I would sabotage it, taking a drink and thinking I can,” said Tracey, who was downing about two quarts of vodka daily during the worst of her drinking. “At 6:15 in the morning when the liquor stores opened, I would be there.”
Even the failed suicide attempt wasn’t enough to rattle her into sobriety The day she had the staples removed from the top part of her leg and her head, Moore hobbled to the liquor store on crutches and was off on another binge.
In the fall of 2002, Tracey got booted out of a sober living home. She wound up in a trashy motel. One day she woke up beaten up and bruised. She had no recollection of what happened.
Finally, on Oct. 5, 2002, looking unkempt with dried vomit on her dress, Tracey checked herself into the rehabilitation program at the Salvation Army in Anaheim. She was done killing herself.
SELF REALIZATION
At about 90 days of sobriety, the man who designed Moore’s prosthetic leg (who she endearingly refers to as her “leg man”) encouraged his client to train for the 1 1/2 mile swimming segment of the San Diego Triathlon Challenge, an event which serves as a fundraiser for the Challenged Athletes Foundation (CAF).
Moore, who had not been physically active since high school, took on the challenge, and trained for the event by swimming laps in the pool at the Salvation Army.
She also began jogging, sporting a prosthetic leg not intended for physical activity.
Tracey’s future husband, Robert Moore, who became acquainted with his future wife at 12-Step meetings, was driving past Tracey as she was jogging one day and was drawn to her doggedness.
“When I saw her running that day, there was no quit in her,” said Robert, a former power lifter and avid cyclist. “You don’t see that tenacity in people.”
The couple began dating and Robert offered to train Tracey for the swim. He also set a clear boundary between their personal relationship and their coach-athlete relationship.
“When we are at the gym, I am the coach,” he said. “You do what I say or we leave.”
Today, Tracey describes the coaching part of her husband with curse words.
“He is strict and forceful and he gets the job done,” Tracey said.
On Oct. 31, 2003, she completed the 1 1/2-mile swim.
“After I did it, I got the bug,” she said.
Tracey drew attention from the CAF, which gave her a $1,600 grant for a bicycle. She could now compete in all three segments of a triathlon-swimming, running and cycling.
The CAF also gave Tracey a $5,000 racing leg called a Cheetah (one of four legs Moore owns).
To date, Tracey has participated in 18 triathlons and is often the only amputee competing.
She says her greatest triumph was completing the 2006 Great Escape from Alcatraz, an adventure race starting with 1 1/2-mile swim in frigid water with a swift current, then a two-mile run followed by an 18-mile cycling segment and finally a 6 1/2 mile run over rugged terrain.
Tracey finished dead last, but received a medal for finishing first in the female physically challenged athlete division. She was told she was the only female amputee to have completed the 26-year history of the race.
“I cried,” said Moore, upon crossing the finish line with only Robert and her children waiting and cheering.
On Jan. 6, Moore completed the O.C. Half-marathon and is currently training for the Ironman in Hawaii, which takes place Oct. 11. She typically trains about two to three hours per day, four days per week. She swims about 150 laps in a pool and cycles about 45 miles at a clip. Those distances will be bumped up soon, says her husband, who still serves as Moore’s coach.
A LIFE WORTH LIVING
Tracey is now sober for five years, Robert for 10. They’ve been married since January, 2004.
Between them, the couple raises four teenage boys. They refer to their life as “Robert and Tracey’s excellent adventure.”
They attend 12-step meetings and run a ministry for recovering addicts and alcoholics on Friday evenings at a church in Anaheim.
Comparing her days as a “legless drunk” to her present life as a mother, wife, mentor and athlete, Moore is sometimes mystified. Her source of strength, however, is clear.
“Who would have thought I’d be thinking about doing the Ironman in Kona, Hawaii,” she said. For me, it was getting sober and getting God. After every race, I get to give the glory to God for letting me do it.
“I’ve heard of a lot of people who lose limbs who sit around feeling sorry for themselves,” Moore said. “I am doing more with one leg than I ever did with two.”
By LOU PONSI
THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

http://www.ocregister.com/

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