Keeping the Focus

From the rear seat on a two-man racing bicycle, Casey Cook should be able to capture life’s streaking images and frame them in his mind.

While pedaling arduously over country roads, he should be able to absorb nature’s tapestry during workouts and competitions.

Most cyclists do.

But not Cook, 26, who is blind and deaf.

“I’ve been an athlete all of my life,” Cook said. “Cycling is a new frontier for me.”

Cook, a Ventura resident, is expanding the frontier to Colorado Springs, Colo., where he and tandem partner Jim Carothers are competing this week in the World Cycling Championships for the Disabled.

The championships are the latest challenge for Cook, who has faced and overcome countless obstacles through years of darkness and silence.

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Cook’s world faded to black overnight.

“It was a little strange waking up one morning and not being able to see,” he said. “I had a brother who was blind and [my parents] already knew I would be blind.”

Cook was 9, the youngest of Ron and Kathleen Cook’s four children and the second afflicted with Voight-Carnegie Syndrome, a genetic disorder that targeted only the boys.

Cook’s vision was extremely poor in childhood, and he learned Braille in elementary school. Then, in a flash, what little eyesight he had was gone.

For Cook, it was the beginning of an existence predicated on adaptability, the growing pains intensified by his condition and move to a school far from home.

Until transferring to Rio Mesa High for his sophomore year, Cook attended and lived at the California School for the Blind in Fremont, near San Francisco. He later was mainstreamed to Kennedy High in Fremont, where he became president of the freshman class.

“It’s real difficult to find a program that meets the needs of the blind,” said Ron Cook, a teacher at Hueneme High and Oxnard College. “That’s why he was sent there. We did what we thought was best.

“He got to do so many positive things because of the program up there and then at Rio Mesa, which copied the program at CSB.”

Cook, who lives with his father, acknowledges he benefited from the school. It helped him develop in ways his brother, Chris, who lives with their mother in Ventura, never has. Yet, Cook said he resented the experience.

“It was difficult being away from my family,” Cook said. “I had a lot of bitterness about it. The last few years, I’ve decided . . . to put it behind me.”

Cook’s hearing, for a time his rudder, deteriorated gradually and vanished by the time he entered Rio Mesa. He was fitted later with an electronic device implanted behind his right ear, allowing him to hear and boosting his confidence.

“Becoming deaf was much more dramatic than going blind,” Cook said. “When you’re blind, you rely on your other senses. When you’re both, it’s a whole different dimension.

“I managed to emerge from the emotionalism by becoming a studyholic. I dealt with it by throwing myself into my schoolwork.”

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By all accounts, Cook is a remarkable student.

He recently graduated from UC Santa Barbara after attending the school’s Ventura campus. He soon expects to start graduate work in vocational rehabilitation at Cal State Los Angeles.

Cook also took courses at Ventura College and impressed math professor Tom Bertolino.

“The class I had him in was trigonometry,” Bertolino said. “It was a very unusual class in which to have a blind person in, because it’s a very visual class.

“It was amazing what he could do . . . He did it all by feeling the hands of an interpreter. I think they had translated the textbook into Braille.”

Cook’s sister, Carey, said her brother’s intelligence and competitive drive makes him nearly unbeatable in most games.

“He’s a vicious Scrabble player,” said Carey, a fisheries biologist in Olympia, Wash. “He comes up with wacky words. Every game I’ve ever played him, he’s come up with a seven-letter word.”

Cook, 6 feet 1 1/2 and 192 pounds, also has done well in several sports. He wrestled and swam at Rio Mesa, and competed in 10 events at the 1988 Paralympics in Seoul, winning a bronze medal as a member of the U.S. 400-meter freestyle relay team.

About three years later, Cook tired of swimming and left sports to concentrate on academics. But he couldn’t stay away and in 1996 started thinking about cycling.

“One of the things I’ve realized is that I’ve been much happier since I recommitted myself to sports. I’m one of those people who have to have goals in their lives. They keep me focused and going forward.”

For Ron Cook, who played baseball for USC, the value of sports in his son’s life is immeasurable.

“It’s a real pride builder for him,” Ron Cook said. “He looks forward to getting up in the mornings and has a smile on his face. He has quite a wonderful spirit.

“If there’s one person on this Earth who’s my hero, it’s my son.”

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For the last few weeks, Cook has been at the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, preparing to race with Carothers at the world championships.

Cook met Carothers, a triathlete from Boulder, Colo., through a mutual acquaintance. Carothers is the driver, or pilot, who will guide the two-man team in a 75-mile road race, a 25-mile road time trial, a one-kilometer track race and a track pursuit.

The road races are scheduled for the Air Force Academy, 7,000 feet above sea level.

Cook qualified for the championships by teaming with Peter Beckton to place second in two U.S. Assn. of Blind Athletes events at the Tandem Cycling Road Nationals in July in Tallahassee, Fla.

The two won silver medals in the 40-kilometer time trial and the 75 1/2-kilometer road race in hot and humid conditions.

Cook and Beckton first rode together on Easter, ignoring rain-soaked and muddied roads.

“The water was gushing in the Ojai trail,” Beckton said. “It was interesting.”

Until Beckton came along, Cook searched vainly for a partner. He posted fliers around town, placed notices on the Internet and tried word of mouth. Nothing worked and Cook nearly gave up.

“Before I met Peter, I was getting a little frustrated,” Cook said. “Around March, I had put up my [tandem] bike for sale . . . It’s kind of weird. [Five] months ago I was trying to get rid of my bike and here I am [at] the world championships.”

Beckton stepped aside after Tallahassee to give Cook a chance at challenging for a medal at the championships, where European and Australian teams are expected to dominate.

“He’s upgrading in pilots,” said Beckton, 42, a Rio Mesa parainstructor and Camarillo resident. “He’s going to get a Category 1 pilot instead of a Cat 5 pilot, like me.”

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The longer Cook talks, the more his outlook and frankness captivates the listener.

When someone recently called him visually and hearing impaired, Cook quickly did away with political correctness.

“You can call it deaf and blind,” Cook said.

He doesn’t curse his circumstances, but sometimes struggles with his emotions.

“It gets a little lonely at times. I’ve done a lot of soul searching the last couple of years,” Cook said. “In a lot of ways, my life is a paradox. In many ways I’m very capable, and in many ways I’m very dependent. It’s a daily battle navigating between the two.”

Through his intended career, Cook hopes to help make those journeys easier for others. He wants to make a difference in their lives, much like others have influenced him.

As his father said, “The kid doesn’t sit in a room and let the world go by.”

“I’m a product of the system and I can offer something back,” Cook said.

“One of my ex-girlfriends said to me once, ‘Your life seems to revolve around proving to the world that you’re capable.’ I like to think I do things because I enjoy them and that my life amounts to more than a colossal head trip.”