More Than a Race: Shepherd & The Peachtree

Every July 4, Shepherd Center patients, families, and staff wake up early to encourage athletes in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution Peachtree Road Race. Patients display handmade posters to support the athletes as they run and wheel up Cardiac Hill, the stretch of uphill road that passes by Shepherd Center. Staff members wear branded t-shirts and throw out sweat wristbands. For Becky Washburn, MS, the wellness manager for Shepherd Center’s Beyond Therapy® and ProMotion Fitness Center, passing by Shepherd is a highlight of the race. 

“I’m in the pace car, and when I go by Shepherd and see everybody there, I always get teary-eyed. The support is amazing,” says Washburn, who serves as coordinator for the wheelchair division of the race. 

The Peachtree Road Race, a 10K winding down one of Atlanta’s main thoroughfares, attracts 60,000 participants and boasts a rich history and impact on the sport. Since 1984, Shepherd Center has sponsored the race's Wheelchair Division, partnering with the Atlanta Track Club to promote excellence, equity, and inclusion in racing. 

The Starting Line 

Shepherd Center has a long-standing history of empowering people with disabilities through recreation therapy. Shepherd’s Recreation Therapy Program began when David Apple, M.D., the hospital’s first medical director, felt the program was so necessary that he paid the salary for Shepherd’s first recreation therapist, Barb Trader, out of his own pocket. 

“When I started my career at Shepherd in 1978, the disability movement had really started to gain steam,” says Barb Trader, a lifelong disability rights advocate who worked at Shepherd Center as director of recreation therapy for 15 years. “You had to be willing to invent and create a vision for how things could be, whether that was in recreation therapy or in disability rights.” 

And invent she did. Trader, now retired after a 40+-year career, championed the development of a robust adaptive sports program at the hospital, which has grown to become the Alias Family Sports Teams Program — 10 teams ranging from track to rugby. 

She also served as the first coordinator of the AJC Peachtree Road Race Wheelchair Division and helped shape Shepherd’s involvement in the race. The wheelchair division grew quickly. In the first year, the race had four participants. By Trader’s eighth year organizing the race, it had 120 athletes from around the world. And the number of participants wasn’t the only thing setting the Peachtree apart, she says. 

“When Shepherd Center began sponsoring the wheelchair division in 1984, it changed everything,” Trader says. “With its connections, Shepherd could help locate sponsors and add prize money for the winners. The Peachtree set the stage for professionalizing wheelchair road racing with the way it seriously considered prize money.” 

Trader left Shepherd in 1993 to work on the Atlanta Paralympic Organizing Committee for the 1996 Paralympic Games, an event she says she’s not sure would have taken place in Atlanta without the impact of Shepherd’s involvement in the Peachtree Road Race. 

Continuing a Legacy of Inclusion and Hope 

Washburn says the race’s legacy and the possibilities it shows to Shepherd patients make it unique. 

“The history and tradition make this race so special. It’s a chance for Shepherd to show our patients what is possible as they cheer on the athletes. It's like an aha moment,” she says. 

Susannah Scaroni knows how impactful representation in sports is. The American Paralympic athlete and four-time AJC Peachtree Road Race Wheelchair Division winner began attending the Peachtree when she was 10. 

“It hugely influenced me growing up,” she reflects. “The older athletes showed us what a future could be as a professional athlete and an adult with a disability. They were high-functioning, fun, and independent.” 

Now, Scaroni carries on that sportsmanship by supporting the next generation of athletes. 

“My favorite tradition of the Peachtree is going to brunch at Shepherd after the race and mingling with patients. That’s the beauty of the sport — showing others what’s possible,” she says.

Through the years, other races across the country have followed the Peachtree’s lead by including wheelchair divisions and thinking about equity in the prize purses for all athletes. 

“Treating our wheelchair athletes as equal partners to the footrace has raised awareness and shown that whether you have a disability or not, there should be inclusion,” Washburn says. “We continue to try to grow the sport of racing and people attending. Peachtree is near and dear to my heart. It level sets what races should look like.”

Written by Damjana Alverson