IN Brentwood-Baldwin-Whitehall Summer 2019 | Page 15

C
all it kismet—Joe Jelinski and
Chris Engler do. More than
15 years ago, as high schoolers
from Philadelphia, they were on
a beach in Australia with friends when a
group of young kids walked up to them
and said, “We know you…we train with
you...we will see you guys around!”
Confused and a little befuddled, Jelinski
and Engler didn’t know what to make of it.
But as the kids walked away, they noticed
all of them were wearing Special Olympics
jackets.
“It was wild,” says Jelinski. “We just
thought they were kids having fun on the
beach, joking around and saying hello to
people. Little did we know, seven years
later, it would turn out to be the impetus
to the development of our Eruption
Athletics (EA) pilot program.”
EA is a company that designs exercise
programs specifically for people with
intellectual development disorders (IDD).
And, as with most brilliant ideas, there is
a combination of events and passions that
collided to form the EA epicenter.
Jelinski, who has always been an
athlete and played professional soccer
after college, knows how to train for peak
performance. “There’s a formula—80
percent training and preparation, 10
percent practice, 5 percent competition
and 5 percent rest,” he says. Engler, who
also has an athletic background in rowing,
has a brother named Andrew who has
special needs. This encompassed the other
part of the idea.
“When Chris’ brother was training for
the Special Olympics, we wanted to help,”
recalls Jelinski. “When we learned there
was no physical training program for these
athletes, we were shocked and concerned.
People with IDD are prone to different
physical issues, including obesity, which
may be due, in part, to body composition,
lack of physical activity, side effects
of medications, or parents/caregivers
who may be overly permissive or overly
Eruption Athletics founders
Chris Engler (left) and Joe
Jelinski.
restrictive with food and exercise. We
knew we needed to do something to
help. That was the beginning of Eruption
Athletics.”
Since the pilot program took off in
2009, EA has grown substantially. It
offers multiple programs to the IDD
community, like the “Grow with the Flow”
group and “Magma Chamber” 1-on-1
training sessions. The company also
reaches participants through its “Road
Show” off-site and “Field Trip” on-site
training programs, in addition to helping
the parents of children with IDD practice
what they preach through “EA-dult”
training classes.
EA has patented the Volcano P.A.D.D.,
a mat with colorful numbers serving as
visual cues, which helps support proper
body placement, spatial awareness, and
movement lines. And, the “EA-xercise
for Everyone” inclusive and adaptive
program license model consists of
adaptive equipment, adaptive progressive
curriculum, trainer certifications, ongoing
support, and data analysis. The program
is being implemented by schools and
organizations to provide the exercise
programming IDD students need to live
happier, healthier lives.
“Everyone involved in our participants’
lives outside of our training, like doctors,
teachers, parents, and caregivers, see
the difference,” says Jelinski. “Our
clients have increased endurance, focus,
musculoskeletal functioning, muscular
strength, flexibility, balance, stability,
coordination and increased intellectual
and cognitive skills from attending at least
two classes per week and following the
‘EA-volutionary Development System’ on
the Volcano P.A.D.D.”
Continued on next page >
BRENTWOOD-BALDWIN-WHITEHALL
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SUMMER 2019
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