Shooting for success
Kevin Polish Jr., owner of KJ’s Pro Archery Shop in Carmichaels, has won numerous honors, awards and medals over the years. Polish, who is paralyzed, also sponsors events to help wounded veterans and is expanding his shop to provide more services to other area archers.
Kevin Polish Jr. aims an arrow toward a target during a recent shoot. The avid archer has been shooting a bow and arrow since he was three years old.
CARMICHAELS – Kevin Polish Jr. of Carmichaels has been shooting a bow and arrow since the age of three and became so proficient at the sport that he won numerous world class cub and youth archery tournaments.
The young archer’s life took a dramatic downturn in 1999, however, when driving with a friend to go deer hunting in Greene County. Just 300 yards from where he intended to park his car, a flock of wild turkeys flew across the road. As he tried to avoid the birds, he lost control of the vehicle, drove over the embankment and slammed into a tree.
Polish ended up with a broken back that left him paralyzed from the waist down. The prognosis was that he’d never again be able to sit upright, but after six months of rehabilitation he defied all predictions and managed to get into a sitting position.
Ten months after his accident, his father, Kevin Polish, Sr., built him a special safety restraint for his wheelchair that enabled him to again shoot with a bow and arrow. As he practiced, he gained his strength and regained his prowess at archery. Two and a half years after his accident, he came in second in the Pro Class at the 2002 World Archery Festival in Las Vegas, Nevada, competing from a wheelchair against standing archers.
“My son never gives up,” Kevin’s father said. “He gets a lot of inspiration from his mother, Christina. After his accident, he tried to make a comeback in 3-D archery but couldn’t do it because he wasn’t able to negotiate the outdoor terrain. Since then, he’s focused on indoor spot archery more suitable for his situation.”
Never giving up helped KJ, as his friends like to call him, take home the National Archery Association’s gold medal in 2005, and according to his father, KJ has gone on to win over 40 top ten awards in the Pro class. For the past eight years, the Field International Target Archery (FITA) has ranked him in the top four in the Pro class.
“The U.S. Olympic Committee sent him a letter saying he is one of only two disabled people ever to win a gold medal in the able class,” said Kevin Sr.
Last year, Kevin Sr. sponsored a Wounded Warrior shoot in Grand Blanc, Michigan that raised $45,000 for the veterans’ organization that seeks to raise awareness and enlist the public’s aid for the needs of injured service members, to help injured service members aid and assist each other and to provide unique, direct programs and services to meet the needs of injured service members.
Currently, KJ is the owner of KJ’s Pro Archery Shop, located at 134 Old Route 21 in Carmichaels. His father started the business in 1987, and KJ took over as proprietor in 2002.
“The shop is open seven days a week and you’ll usually find KJ there, except when he’s out fishing,” said Kevin Sr.
In addition to giving archery lessons, KJ supervises target practice and sells an extensive line of archery equipment.
Currently, the archery shop has 140 people involved in leagues for youth and adults that shoot facsimile bear and deer targets. Starting in May, the shop plans to start up a 3-D league with ten lifelike targets set up outside.
In the early planning stage is a proposed project to add on a second story to provide more showroom in the busy fall season as well as a 30-yard indoor range.
“Despite the fact that my son has been in the hospital a total of 180 days in the last three years, he fishes and hunts, is a pro archer and a business owner,” said Kevin Sr. “Recently, the store has seen phenomenal growth, and KJ comes into work every day with a smile on his face. He’s an inspiration to more and more people each and every day.”