Schultz Joins Buffalo Journalist and Co-Author Matt Higgins
What: From Injury to Paralympics Champion: Meet Athlete and Author Mike Schultz
- Paralympic Silver Medalist Mike Schultz and Author of “Driven to Ride: The True Story of an Elite Athlete Who Rebuilt His Leg, His Life, and His Career” returns from the 2022 Beijing Paralympic Games with first book event to be held in Buffalo, NY, hosted by People Inc. 
- Matt Higgins, Buffalo journalist and co-author of “Driven to Ride” to present
- People Inc. will host a free author event to celebrate the newly-launched book on the inspiring story of an athlete, entrepreneur, father and Paralympic champion. Healthcare professionals are encouraged to attend.

When: Tuesday, March 29, 2022, from 7 to 9 p.m.
Advance In-Person Media Interviews: 6:15 p.m.  / Program with Speakers: 7:10 p.m. approximately 

Where: People Inc. Rehabilitative Health Services Building, 800 Hertel Avenue, Buffalo, NY 
Rehabilitative Services, Suite 101
(Corner of Hertel and Elmwood Avenues. Parking on-site. Enter from Hertel Avenue, parking available in lot). 

Who: Mike Schultz, 40, is a three-time Paralympic medalist, an X Games Champion ten times over in three different sports, an entrepreneur, an accomplished adaptive athlete in horseback riding, mountain biking, motocross, snocross, snow bike, snowboarding, wakeboarding and author to his newly-released book, “Driven to Ride: The True Story of an Elite Athlete Who Rebuilt His Leg, His Life, and His Career.” Learn more: monstermikeschultz.com

“Driven to Ride” is co-authored by Matt Higgins, a Western New York native and an award-winning journalist, who has written about sports and adventure for two decades. He has written for the New York Times, The Village Voice, Popular Mechanics, Outside and ESPN.com. Higgins is a graduate of St. Joseph’s Collegiate Institute and Buffalo State College. Learn more: matt-higgins.com

Why: “Monster” Mike Schultz is an athlete, innovator, speaker, author and Paralympic gold and two-time silver medalist. Schultz just finished competing in the Beijing 2022 Paralympics. Schultz is the founder of BioDapt, Inc., engineering durable and versatile prostheses for athletes and military veterans around the world. Schultz is not one to give up and let an injury be the end of his competitive career. When a life-changing event happened, he set out to design and build prosthetic equipment that could withstand the rigors of his sports. Little did he know then, he would be helping others do the same. For the Beijing Paralympic Games, 26 athletes from 11 countries wore equipment that Schultz built, including the athlete who won gold. Schultz will share his story with event attendees.

Books will be for sale during the presentation, with an opportunity for autographs. Registration is required, as space is limited. To RSVP, contact Lois Crane at lcrane@people-inc.org or call 716.817.7411.

In 2008, Mike suffered a life-changing knee injury during a snowmobile competition resulting in the amputation of his left leg above the knee. Seven months later, Schultz was competing again and realized that the regular prosthetics could not handle the competitive, rigorous sports his body at one time could handle. He not only engineered a durable and versatile mechanical knee that utilizes a patented linkage system and a FOX mountain bike shock, he realized the need for advancements in high-impact adaptive sports prosthetics. Creating high-impact adaptive sports prosthetics became BioDapt, Inc. – the company Schultz founded in 2010 to help wounded soldiers, action sports athletes and amputees wanting to return to an active lifestyle. In 2018, Schultz was named to the U.S. Paralympic team. He competed in Snowboard Boardercross and Banked Slalom, where he finished the 2018 Snowboard season as the overall champion in both disciplines and the gold and silver medalist from Pyeongchang, Korea. An even more remarkable accomplishment, Schultz provided 15 athletes from six different countries with his prosthetic equipment – 11 medals were earned from athletes wearing BioDapt equipment at the 2018 Games. The U.S. team voted Schultz as the U.S. flag bearer for the 2018 Paralympic Opening Ceremony. In July 2018, Schultz won the ESPY Award for Best Male with a Disability. 

Matt Higgins is an award-winning journalist and author who has written about sports and adventure for two decades. He is a veteran contributor to The New York Times, where his byline has appeared hundreds of times, including six stories published on page one. A longtime contributor to Outside, and a former correspondent for ESPN.com, his writing has also appeared in Men’s Journal; Popular Mechanics; The Village Voice; Sports Illustrated for Kids and The Buffalo News, where he began his journalism career in the Sports Department. He received a Knight-Wallace Fellowship in Journalism at the University of Michigan in 2017-18. Higgins is also the author of “The Insider’s Guide to Action Sports” (Scholastic, 2006) and “Bird Dream” (Penguin Press, 2014), which was longlisted for the 2015 PEN/ESPN Award for Literary Sports Writing. He is a former mentor in the PEN/AMERICA Prison Writing Program, and a founder of the beloved and defunct author series, Buffalo, Books & Beer, held in taverns around his hometown of Buffalo, NY, where he lives with his wife and their sons.

Driven to Ride chronicles Schultz's improbable journey following a life-saving amputation. From a place of debilitating pain and depression, he tapped into the same sense of adventure that had once taken him to the top of competitive snowmobile racing and followed it to the pinnacle of an entirely new sport: adaptive snowboarding. As he launched himself into the world of adaptive sports, Schultz’s ambition was only tempered by his need for better equipment – prostheses that could withstand the vibrations of a moto-cross bike or the impact of rough terrain. Without any formal engineering background, his obsessive tinkering has presented yet another new path designing innovative prostheses for athletes and wounded military veterans. The book was released in January, prior to Mike earning a silver medal at the 2022 Winter Beijing Paralympic Games.

People Inc. Rehabilitative Health Services provides a comprehensive team approach to address various needs, including specializing in plans for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. The team of experienced clinicians assist patients by addressing strength, movement, balance and coordination to help lessen pain and enhance lives, along with providing mental health services. Supports include: Occupational and Physical Therapy; Speech and Language Services; Social Work, Adaptive Equipment Assessments and Tableside Swallow-Function Evaluations, as well as a Wheelchair Clinic and Pressure Mapping Technology.

People Inc., a multispecialty non-profit health and human services agency, provides programs and services to thousands of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, special needs, families and older adults throughout Western New York and the Greater Rochester region. Since 1970, People Inc. has assisted people to achieve greater degrees of independence and productivity. With nearly 4,000 employees, People Inc. is one of the region’s largest employers. To learn more, visit people-inc.org, follow People Inc. on Facebook and Twitter @PeopleIncNews.