Half a lifetime after his paralysis, para archer Ryan Lindstrom has his eyes set on LA28
Navy veteran Ryan Lindstrom has his sights on qualifying to shoot at the LA28 Paralympic Games. It’s only been a year and a half since the 42-year-old Paralyzed Veterans of America (PVA) Florida Gulf Coast chapter member first started competing in archery seriously.
After being selected to Team USA’s para archery team for the second straight year, he’s gearing up for the Paralympics in Los Angeles, which are less than two years away.
For as long as he can remember, the Tampa, Fla., resident’s life has been about propulsion. Propulsion from his teenage years into the Navy after 9/11, propulsion into adaptive sports once a car accident left him paralyzed, propulsion across 20-plus years of elite wheelchair rugby competition and — most recently — propulsion in the form of a cross-country road trip as he returned home from another training session with his Team USA teammate, Army veteran, PVA Texas Chapter member and Paralympic gold medalist Jason Tabansky.
“Oh yeah, I’m on the archery range five days a week, you know?” says Lindstrom, who competes in the men’s W1 division, which includes archers with impairments in at least three limbs and the core who must shoot using a wheelchair. “And I did some math, ’cause I had these strings on my bow, and I was like, ‘I wonder how many arrows I put through this? I did the math, and in the last year and a half, I probably put 30,000 arrows through that bow.”
Today marks the Navy’s 251st birthday — and Lindstrom’s own early experience says it shaped him to be who he is today. Before those 30,000 arrows, before those decades on the wheelchair rugby court, Lindstrom was a patriotic young man from a military family in Florida with ambitions of joining the military.
‘For Sure’
His dad served in the Air Force in Vietnam. His grandfather was in the Navy in Korea. And his great-uncle was in the Navy in World War II.
Lindstrom had already planned to join the military because of his family history, but on Sept. 11, 2001, the then-high-schooler’s general life direction was ratified into a call to action.
“When that happened, it was like, ‘OK, I’m joining the military for sure,’” he says.
Lindstrom began the delayed enlistment program during his senior year of high school and shipped out for basic training 10 days after his 18th birthday. It had been a rough few years for the family, with Lindstrom’s dad dealing with multiple debilitating work injuries. A fresh, positive start held much appeal.
His earliest days in the service, perhaps unsurprisingly, reminded him of his upbringing in a family forged by the ideals of military life.
“Oh, I loved it,” says Lindstrom, who served as a fire controlman. “I was raised by my dad, a Vietnam veteran. You know, it was pretty easy to adapt ’cause it was always, ‘Do what I do, do what you’re told when you’re told and how you’re told. So, for me, it’s always been ‘stick with that attitude, and everything will be just fine,’ you know?”
Homecoming
Then, in late September 2002, Lindstrom came home to Tampa on leave to take his then-girlfriend to her high school’s homecoming dance.
As they drove home after the celebrations, around 3 a.m. on Sept. 29, 2002, Lindstrom fell asleep behind the wheel. He woke up sliding sideways in the dark as the vehicle lurched toward the first of multiple rolls. Lindstrom tried to take control in the split second he woke up, but a tire blew, and the steering wheel was ripped from his hands.
“When the wheel came out of my hand, I knew I couldn’t do anything else,” he says. “So, I just reached over and bear-hugged my girlfriend in her seat. As it started to roll, she slid out the back window, and I was hanging out of the rear passenger window because I came out of my seat belt.”
Because he was in his dress blues, Lindstrom had his cell phone tucked in his right sock, and he remembers asking his then-girlfriend to reach in and get it so he could call emergency services.
His then-girlfriend survived the accident with a few elbow scratches and not so much as a broken nail. But Lindstrom quickly suspected what had happened to him.
“I was lying there on my back and looking up at the truck going, ‘Oh, crap, OK, you’re alive,’ you know?’ ‘All right, now get up,’” he says. “And when I couldn’t get up, I thought, ‘There’s gotta be something on top of you. So, I put my hands down; I couldn’t feel my hands on my stomach or on my legs, and I thought right away, ‘You screwed yourself a good one this time.’ I knew I was paralyzed.”
Let’s Keep Moving
Lindstrom sustained a level C6-C7 quadriplegic spinal cord injury. Instead of a Navy career, his destiny was pulled away from him, and he was given a new one that he knew included life in a wheelchair. But the same desire to live life fully that initially sent him rushing into the Navy still churned inside.
“I was raised with the idea that you’re dealt certain cards, and you’ve just gotta play them as best you can,” he says. “So, it was one of those, ‘All right, this sucks, but let’s keep moving, and let’s get through it’ things, you know?”
So, he accepted an invitation from his recreation therapist to attend a wheelchair rugby tournament in Tampa. The action enthralled him.
“Watching the game, I was like, ‘Oh yeah, I’m playing this. This is it, I’m playing this for sure,’” Lindstrom says.
After playing for 22 straight years, this year will be his last for two years because of his current USA Archery commitment.
Paris 2024 and Tabansky
Two years ago, Lindstrom attended the 2024 Paris Summer Paralympic Games in France with his mom thanks to Tampa Bay’s Wounded Warriors Abilities Ranch, which covered flights and hotels for nine disabled veterans to attend the most prestigious event in adaptive sports.
While there, he had a friend who was a competing para archer, and Lindstrom had watched her shoot before, even messing around with her bow and arrow himself a few times before some of her earlier matches. But watching Tabansky wildly win the men’s individual W1 gold medal thanks to a 10-point bull’s-eye on his final shot to defeat then-world No. 1-ranked archer Han Guifei from China, 134-131, pushed him to try out the sport.
Once Lindstrom started up in 2025, he and Tabansky developed a bond and friendly rivalry. Lindstrom hit his Men’s W1 division qualification score in 2025, besting the 590 that’s needed with a 609. His goal is to hit that 590 each tournament.
Later, he earned a silver medal in the men’s W1 Open division at the August 2025 Americas Para Archery Cup in Chicago, falling to Tabansky. Then, Lindstrom won the USA Archery Indoor Nationals W1 combined division title. And he did it again this past March. After making the U.S. para national team again this summer, he recently teamed with Tabansky in the W1 Men’s Doubles division, but they lost in the quarterfinals at the June 28-July 4 Stage No. 2 of the World Archery Para Series in Nove Mesto, Czech Republic. Lindstrom says he’s improved nearly 20-30 points per tournament.
Lindstrom maintains a consistent schedule of archery training and meets. In fact, this week he’s competing at the Penalolen National Archery Training Center in Santiago, Chile, in the Santiago 2026 Hyundai World Archery Para Series, and then next week he heads to Lima, Peru, for the Oct. 21-25 Parapan American Championships.
Lindstrom still has friends from back when they went into the service together. He’s kept in touch. Still, helping others, especially veterans, remains important to him.
“Knowing that I was a part of that, and still am a part of it, you know? And I get to help out veterans now after the fact, you know, it’s a big part of my life,” Lindstrom says. “We have a lot of family members that aren’t technically blood. That’s one of the big things when you’re in the military, and you then leave, you’re immediately searching for that bond again.”