Amputees Show How to Get Back in the Running : Being able to walk again wasn’t enough for them; they all wanted to run competitively--and they’re doing it.

Not quite two seconds--1.8, to be precise--separate Dennis Oehler from Olympic gold medalist Carl Lewis in the 100-meter sprint. For Todd Schaffhausser, the difference is a little longer: 5.75 seconds. That may seem like a significant amount of time, until you consider that Lewis has two legs while Oehler and Schaffhausser each only have one.

Schaffhausser, then only 15 years old, had his leg amputated above the knee in 1984 while being treated for bone cancer. At about the same time, Oehler, then a 24-year-old soccer player, had his leg amputated below the knee after an automobile accident.

They didn’t know each other then, but while they were going through the painful, frustrating process of rehabilitation and learning to walk again on prosthetic limbs, both made the same decision. Being able to walk wasn’t going to be enough. They wanted to run.

Now, seven years later, the two Paralympic gold medalists and founders of the American Disability Fund work together full time, spreading the word not only to amputees and people with other disabilities, but to everyone they meet. “Fitness is accessible to everybody, in one way or another,” Oehler says. “You just have to be willing to do the work.”

They brought their message to Fullerton last Wednesday, where they capped off their motivational presentation by sprinting across the parking lot at Sunny Hills Orthopedic Services in 100-degree plus heat, under a blazing sun filtered through brownish, sulfur-scented air. Joining them was an impromptu guest, Paralympic gold medal skier Greg Mannino, 29, of Yorba Linda, who lost his leg 12 years ago when an aluminum ladder he was standing touched power lines and sending near-fatal doses of electricity through his body.

“I feel guilty,” confessed one member of the audience as the runners flashed past. “I’m not even missing any parts, and I don’t do anything to stay fit.”

Later, as he stood in the shade and cooled off, sipping a bottle of fruit juice, Oehler said, “Not everybody is going to be a world champion, but we want people to realize that if we can run, they can probably do something.”

According to statistics compiled by Sunny Hills Orthopedic Services, the number of amputees in the United States is growing, thanks in part to the medical advances that have led to improved survival rates for both cancer patients and trauma victims. The primary cause of amputation is vascular and circulatory disease.

There are now about 3 million amputees nationwide, with about 3,000 new amputees each week, according to the National Center for Health Statistics.

All of them, Oehler said, go through the same adjustments. After his accident, “I thought I was never going to be able to walk again. That’s what everybody thinks at first. But two months after I lost my leg, I went to watch the 1984 Paralympics not far from my home on Long Island and saw an amputee do a 6’10” high jump, and another guy run the quarter-mile in 62 seconds. That’s when I made up my mind to run.”

Schaffhausser, who also lives on Long Island, said he was inspired by the story of Terry Fox, who also lost his leg to cancer. Fox’s inspirational run across Canada convinced Schaffhausser to try running as well.

But while Fox used the slow and somewhat awkward hop-skip method of running, Schaffhausser and Oehler run leg over leg, just as runners who aren’t amputees do. They use special, high-performance prosthetic legs made just for sprinting by Flex-Foot Inc., of Laguna Hills.

In addition to skiing and a little running, Mannino also cycles. “You can cover a lot more ground that way,” he said.

The athletes admit they owe a great deal to the technological advancements of the past few years. “Ten years ago, even five years ago, we just couldn’t do this,” Schaffhausser said. But they and other amputee athletes have done their best to return the favor, testing equipment and working with researchers to bring about improvements.

“In 1987, I blew out 13 hydraulic knee units,” Schaffhausser said. “But now they’ve changed to a higher viscosity oil, so they last longer. And they’ve made a lower-resistance unit for the older person, too.”

When Oehler began running, he kept breaking his prostheses until he found one sturdy enough.

The legs they use now are lightweight black metal appliances that make no attempt to resemble human flesh. Their works are visible and accessible, so that when their user wants to change the setting on his hydraulic knee, he simply reaches down and turns a knob.

In some ways, Oehler, Schaffhausser and Mannino say their replacement legs function better than those some people were born with. “All that science fiction stuff about bionic parts is happening right now,” Oehler said.

Despite their high-tech prostheses, amputees run on the same driving force all runners do: muscle power. They must build up the muscles in their residual limbs to compensate for the muscles they’ve lost.

Gait analyses of amputees have found that to walk, a below-the-knee amputee must expend 20% more energy than a non-amputee, while an above-the-knee amputee uses 40% more energy, Schaffhausser said. For running, amputees need even more energy, although comparable controlled studies have not been done.

Amputee Ken Anthony, 46, of La Puente said the demonstration had him wondering whether he could start running himself. “But I don’t know. It’s a mental thing. I feel like it’s going to fall out from under me. I guess it’s similar to getting on a roller coaster. The first ride is the worst.”

Schaffhausser said he understood. “I was scared, too. But you have to get over that fear of failure.”

Oehler said, “One of the things that helps us is that we’ve come so close to death. That helps you realize that everybody’s mortal and we’re all going to make mistakes. When you understand that, you can overcome the fear.”

After they participate in the 1992 Paralympics in Barcelona, Schaffhausser and Oehler say their next goal is to run from Los Angeles to New York to promote their new organization, the American Disability Fund, which will provide financial assistance to physically challenged people who have exhausted both private insurance and government assistance.