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BANFF, Scotland (Oct. 11) — Two years after losing both legs in a car crash, Adam Golebiewski is chasing a new kind of finish line. The 19-year-old former soccer goalkeeper from Banff, in northeast Scotland, now trains as a Para Nordic skier and biathlete, aiming at the World Championships and a future on the British Paralympic pathway.
The crash happened in the early hours in nearby Macduff, after a night out, with three other people in the car. Golebiewski’s injuries were severe enough that doctors had to amputate both legs below the knee. Intensive rehabilitation followed, and he eventually learned to walk again on prosthetic legs.
Before the crash, soccer was close to everything for Golebiewski. He played in goal, and the sport had given him the team identity he loved. Giving that up was one of the hardest parts of recovery. He still helps out at Deveronside, where the coaches have supported him through his return to an active life.
Everything changed when he said in a TV interview that he would try any new sport. The Para skiing community responded quickly.
“The Para skiing people were one of the first to get in touch with me,” Golebiewski said. “They reached out and asked me if I was wanting to give it a shot and I said yes.”
He had never skied in his life. The first sessions at Huntly Nordic Centre were enough to keep him interested. He started out on and off, testing the sport for a few months. Once he got his own rig for home use, he trained alone on the running and cycling tracks at Banff Academy. Every return visit to Huntly brought a small improvement.
His first race came in Fife, and it almost did not happen. Golebiewski had not done hard physical exercise since playing soccer, and he was uncertain whether he was ready. He entered anyway.
“I was blown by the end of it but I got the bug for it then,” he said.
The reaction from strangers stayed with him. “The people didn’t know who I was but they were so supportive,” he said. “They were cheering me on helping me get through the race.”
Britain’s Paralympic Nordic skier Scott Meenagh also helped Golebiewski take his first tentative steps in the sport, offering early guidance that made the new world feel less intimidating.
Para Nordic skiing is a long way from the soccer pitch. Golebiewski removes his prosthetic legs, straps into a custom-built sit-ski, clips two skis into the rig and drives with poles. Coaches Simon Bates and Kieran Jones design his training programs, which now mix technique work, longer-distance sessions, gym work and intervals.
After the Fife race, he increased his workload. At a Huntly race, he was the only Para skier in a mixed field. Rather than feeling out of place, he felt progress.
“It was really good and I could feel I was improving because of the training I had been doing,” he said.
The next step was an American training camp in Colorado, organized through a British pathway program. Golebiewski was nervous because he did not know anyone. The 10-day camp went well, but bad snow cut the on-snow time to just four days.
“They said once in every 15 years they get a bad patch of snow and it happened to be the year I went,” he said.
At the end of the camp, coaches asked who wanted to take the sport more seriously now that they had tasted real snow. Golebiewski said yes.
Back home, he followed a structured training plan. Then came a week-long camp in Italy over the summer, where he trained on his rig at an Olympic and Paralympic venue.
“It was a really good experience and I met people from all over the world,” he said. “It can be quite difficult on your own, especially as I was so used to being in a team through football.”
He is now preparing for both cross-country and biathlon. In biathlon, athletes ski a set distance, stop to shoot, then ski again. It suits his natural competitiveness.
“I was so competitive in football, so that side came out in me in the training,” he said. When he returned home from Italy, he was put on an eight-week training block that was more intense than anything he had done before.
Germany is the immediate focus. A week in a snow tunnel will end with a race, and Golebiewski will receive the official classification a Para skier needs to compete in major championships.
“I am going to try both cross-country and biathlon and see how it goes,” he said. “The aim is to get to the World Championships. It is giving me something I can aim towards. It gives you a goal and a purpose.”
His latest set of prosthetic legs is also more advanced than the previous pair, with the goal of helping him walk as naturally as possible.
On Sunday, Oct. 11, Banff Castle will host a showcase of everything Golebiewski has done since the crash. The event will feature the soccer clubs that backed him — Deveronside, Deveronvale, Cove Rangers, Buckie Ladies, Celtic, Aberdeen and Dundee — along with the projects he has been involved with since leaving hospital, including a drink-driving awareness campaign, inspirational talks and an exhibition called “The Eagle and the Unicorn.”
Guest speakers will include Andrew Simpson, the Lord-Lieutenant of Banffshire; coaches Kieran Jones and Simon Bates; MP Seamus Logan; and Councillor Glen Reynolds. There will also be guests from Woodend Hospital and the emergency services. Local band Gerry and His Pacemaker have written a song for Golebiewski titled “A Song for the Survivor, a Song for the Brave.”
The event will also act as a push for sponsorship. Businesses can support Golebiewski through Ski Scotland or the British biathlon team, helping cover the cost of equipment, travel and training camps.
Classification matters in Para Nordic skiing because it ensures fair competition between athletes with different impairments. Without it, skiers cannot enter sanctioned international championships. For Golebiewski, Germany is another training camp — but also the key that opens the calendar.
