“If I don’t fight this, then what about the next disabled kid?” -Jacky

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 Jacqueline (Jacky) Horschel is a Senior at Auburn High School who races in the JV1 category in the Alabama Cycling Association (ACA). The ACA is the only youth league in the state of Alabama.

Jacky has been competing on her mountain bike in Alabama for over 5 years even though she has had to overcome numerous hurdles. Jacqueline has a genetic disorder that has caused several disabilities, the main one being a retinal detachment in her right eye. After fighting to save her eye from 2018 to now, her eye was removed in October 2023.

 Jacky has visibility challenges such as loss of depth perception, inability to read the terrain, observe obstacles and cannot see riders approaching on her right side. One of the ways to manage her loss of depth perception is to have her ride the race course with multiple repetitions prior to each race to commit enough of it to memory to feel safe, understand how the trail ascends/descends or may provide obstacles. High School races are held on Sunday.

 During the last 2 races Jacky has been allowed to pre-ride the race course Friday evening, Saturday morning and Saturday evening. The Saturday morning pre-ride is usually held only for middle school however, an exception was made by a league official for Jacky so that she could ride the high school course with a coach during the time the middle schoolers are on their own course. This has caused no negative consequences to any participant and does not fundamentally change anything for the conduct of the races.

 Jacky also rides an electric bike for some of her prerides so that she can focus solely on understanding the trail system. This pedal assist e-bike does not go faster than an acoustic bike. After the Blakely race our head coach at Auburn was notified that the league official who gave permission was not authorized to do so. Our head coach then filed a formal written request for Jacky to ride on Saturday morning and to ride an ebike citing her depth perception difficulties and the necessity to see the course several times. This request was denied with no reason given for the denial. The league only has one type of disability accommodation in their rule book and this accommodation does not actually help in Jacky's limited vision situation.

 Last season of the ACA, Jacky had more preride opportunities due to the now nonexistent GRACE program. She also occasionally rode an ebike for prerides. At no point was a concern ever raised or a petition required. At this point the action of the ACA appears discriminatory against a disabled athlete.

 The only accommodations we are asking for is to allow an additional pre-ride of the race course on Saturday morning and to allow her to conduct a couple extra prerides with the assistance of an electric bike. I believe that this is a fair accommodation to ask for and does not fundamentally change the sport. The precedent has already been set, by allowing this action in the first 2 races.

 Even with the accommodations that we are asking for, Jacky is at a disadvantage to other riders. Now that these accommodations have been revoked this has severely limited her ability to feel safe and compete as fairly as possible.

 I am asking for you to show the ACA that you support these accommodations, which we believe to be in line with Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act “Student athletes are entitled to reasonable accommodations in sports, unless the accommodation would cause a fundamental alteration of the activity or would constitute an undue burden.”