The racer trained for years to earn a spot on Team USA. Photos provided

When Team USA takes the field at the 2016 Paralympic Games in Rio next week, Brian Sheridan of Clarkston will be there.
Sheridan, 40, is a champion cyclist who has been training for the past four years, about 30-40 miles a day.
“The training is pretty intense,” he said. “I decided to see how far I could take it, how much I could achieve – four years ago, I didn’t think I’d be going to Rio. It was baby steps.”
Several catalysts led to his decision to buckle down and train, including a diagnosis with atrial fibrillation.
“My heart was a little whacky. It was a scare. I want to keep my heart strong for my family,” he said. “And once an athlete, always an athlete. I was inspired by the challenge to compete.”
He’s preparing for both the time trials and road races at the international games.
“Time trials are shorter and more intense, you versus the clock,” he said. “Road races are longer and more strategic.”
Sheridan injured his spine when he was 18 years old, 22 years ago. He was training in a gymnastics club at Central Michigan University when he landed a back hand spring wrong, fracturing two vertebrae in his neck.
“After the accident, I gravitated back towards sports – I played basketball, football, and other sports when I was very young,” he said. “I found a therapeutic benefit in the power of sports. It proved success is possible at many different levels.”
He played rugby for 10 years, competing all over North America and South America, before he decided to switch solely to cycling.
He discovered hand cycles about a year after his accident at an adaptive sports expo at Saginaw Valley State University in 1995.
“I saw this contraption with three wheels and asked to try it,” he said. “After two laps around the track, my mother saw my face and she bought one. She knew.”

His racing career started at a Fifth Third River Bank Run in Grand Rapids.
“My goal was to finish in a certain time. I was able to do it – I exceeded my expectations,” he said. “It started the snowball rolling.”
It led to national competition, including the 2014 USA Cycling Road National Championships, where he won four silver medals; 2014 UCI Para-cycling Road World Championships, fourth in time trial and road race; and the 2015 Parapan American Games, where he won gold in the time trial and silver in the road race.
He also enjoys scuba diving, kayaking, water and snow skiing, and other sports, earned a degree in Occupational Therapy from Saginaw Valley State University in 1999, started businesses, and is raising a family, with his wife Ana Sheridan, children Laken and Livia Sheridan, and a baby on the way.
“I’ve lived a very full life since the accident. I have no complaints,” he said.
After the games, he plans to focus on family as well as his businesses. He’s the founder of Fusion Medical and Level Eleven Physical Therapy, and a non-profit group, Michigan Sports Unlimited.
Level Eleven, which he founded 10 years ago, provides resources for people with disabilities.
They’ll be working to bring the companies together under one roof, at Dixie Lodge in Grand Blanc Township.
It will offer high intensity rehabilitation, counseling, peer mentoring, and other services in a 90 day residency program on three acres, with 12 full suites for people from all over the world, he said.
“It’s designed to be pure Michigan, to feel like a lodge,” he said.
He is from Lake Angeles, the son of John and Carlyn Sheridan, and has lived in Clarkston about seven years.