Team Hoyt inspires next generation that ‘yes you can’

If distance running is an addictive drug, then Dick Hoyt and his son Rick are the ultimate pushers.

This father and son team, hailed as “inspirational” by US president Barrack Obama, hit Irish shores, the Wild Atlantic Way, and the boreens of West Cork over the weekend, encouraging hundreds of other runners in a Saturday series of races in Courtmacsherry to see past handicaps and their limits, whether self-imposed or otherwise.

Dick Hoyt, now aged in his 70s and retired from the US military, forms a dynamic and driven double act with his son Rick, who’s in his early 50s, has spastic quadraplegia cerebral palsy, and communicates and jokes via a computer-aided voicer.