Paralympics

[RussellEbertHandball]

I've been watching in London and I've found the Paralympics enthralling, but then Channel 4's coverage is excellent. They've explained the categories very well with a system called Lexi which was designed by an ex-Paralympic swimmer .

The swimming has pretty much blown my mind. How anyone without what you really call arms can do a sub 30 second 50m freestyle as a Chinese swimmer did tonight is something else.

I've never seen Wheelchair Rugby before either and love it and the basketball is pretty good to watch as well.

Got to say, the Brits have really embraced it. Tickets for a lot of events are very hard to come by.

Edit: That women's 34 point medley relay tonight was a cracker. Four swimmers coming into the wall at the same time. Bloody ripper.

The ABC used the Lexi system videos to explain the category. The ABC coverage had a lot of dead spots where they weren't receiving pictures so they had a lot of interviews in the studio with athletes to fill in time. They said they want to provide more images but the host broadcaster wasn't supplying them. Was that the case in the UK as well Doodles??

First saw decent ParalympicTV coverage in 1996 when the ABC started showing delayed coverage. The swimming I found difficult to understand then becasuse you had mixed disabilities so it didn't really grab me, except for the girls and guys with no arms or half a stub plus missing leg(s) could swim so fast. Was amazing.

Went and watched a lot of basketball in Sydney and got tickets to the rugby gold medal match where the yanks beat the aussies by 1 pt. They are both good sports to watch at that level. They propmoted rugby in Sydney as murderball and some of those guys took no prison's. Great the boys beat Canada here especially given the basketball guys lost the gold medal match against Canada. The Rollers were favourite but Patrick Anderson for Canada was just too big and too good shooting 34 points. Was interesting to hear that Anderson left wheelchair basketball after 2 golds in Sydney and Athens and silver in Beijing, he moved to Vancouver to study and had a crack at trying to make the winter paralympic team for the 2010 Vancouver games.

The Brits have been magnificent in attending the events. 80,000 at morning and night sessions at the athletics stadium and sellouts at most other venues.

The Medley relay was an amazing finishing. Almost a quadruple dead heat. Felt for the last Russian girl who was so far in front but finished 4th. Jacqui Freney is a superstar. 8 swims - 8 gold medals.

Pity Kurt Fearnley didn't have enough in the petrol tank to hang on down the Mall in the marathon and take gold but Brit David Weir and Swiss Marcel Hug got him in the last 100 metres.

I think my favourite athlete was Aussie T38 100m and 200m runner Evan O'Hanlon. 2 world records including a 10.79sec in the 100m. He doesn't have normal feelings all down his left hand side of his body. His bio piece on the ABC was great and I love his interview after the 200m when he said his coach told him to run fast and remember to turn left. It was more his joyous smile after winning both events and sticking out his big tounge and arms stretched out when he crossed the finish line that won me over.

 

[Doodlesweaver]

There was a lot of studio stuff on the main channel but c4 also had three dedicated online feeds so I watched those mostly. That's how I got to see so much swimming and wheelchair team events. I could watch at work which has made my boring job a lot more fun than usual.

Matt Cowdrey was amazing in the swimming. Technically a beautiful swimmer to watch and nailed his turns and underwater work better than anyone else almost in the entire meet. The GB swimming commentators were drooling about him and I completely understood why. Freney was classifed down from s8 before the games and at Beijing she got bronze medals in s8 events so she was always going to own s7.

 

[RussellEbertHandball]

I didn't realise that Freney had dropped down a category. Still a big effort as its a big program she undertook and her two relay swims were grand efforts.

Since I have moved back to Adelaide 2.5 years ago I have been plesantly surprised how big a profile he has in SA. As you say he is a fantastic technican and trains with the able bodied squad through SA Sports Institute. I think he spent time with the AIS in Canberra several years ago. He's an impressive young man studying joint law and journalism degrees. He was on the front page of the Adelaide Advertiser couple Wednesday's ago the day before the opening ceremony. He had his long swimming trunks, looked really cut in the stomach, they had done a bit of trick photography making it look like he was holding back a wall of water and the headline was - History awaits our golden gun, and then on page 6 a longer story with the heading swimmer on a gold rush. I guess 5 golds out of 8 events is a gold rush.

 

[Wallaby]

Freney was classifed down from s8 before the games and at Beijing she got bronze medals in s8 events so she was always going to own s7.

Even when she went down to S7, she was probably going to get beaten by the US swimmer Mallory Weggemann. Weggemann won 9 golds in S7 at Beijing. She was re-classified as S8 just before London. She appealed, but lost.
She would have beaten Freheny based on times. There's always plenty of classification controversies.

It's one of the reasons I find it difficult to get overly enthused about Paralympic Gold medals - I watched, enjoyed some of the contests (am I the only one who finds wheelchair basketball more entertaining than the real thing?), but, inevitably the competition is limited by arbitrary classifications. So when people talk about 'elite athletes' I feel a little uncomfortable. Sure they train just like elite athletes and sacrifice for their sport - but it's still a restricted competition (in some cases, very restricted) - and it has to be to give disabled athletes a 'fair go'. Comparing Paralympic medals to Olympic medals is meaningless - they are completely different competitions, and in many cases completely different events, because of classifications.

Example - There's a lot of rumblings in the wheelchair rugby world about Riley Batt. Wheelchair rugby was invented as sport for paraplegics and quads to play - people with spinal injuries and no use of legs. Batt has no legs - but he has all the muscle function right down to where his legs should start. He has far more movement in his trunk, hips, core etc than almost all other players - it's one of the reasons he is the best player in the world.

 

[Doodlesweaver]

Even when she went down to S7, she was probably going to get beaten by the US swimmer Mallory Weggemann. Weggemann won 9 golds in S7 at Beijing. She was re-classified as S8 just before London. She appealed, but lost.
She would have beaten Freheny based on times. There's always plenty of classification controversies.

It's one of the reasons I find it difficult to get overly enthused about Paralympic Gold medals - I watched, enjoyed some of the contests (am I the only one who finds wheelchair basketball more entertaining than the real thing?), but, inevitably the competition is limited by arbitrary classifications. So when people talk about 'elite athletes' I feel a little uncomfortable. Sure they train just like elite athletes and sacrifice for their sport - but it's still a restricted competition (in some cases, very restricted) - and it has to be to give disabled athletes a 'fair go'. Comparing Paralympic medals to Olympic medals is meaningless - they are completely different competitions, and in many cases completely different events, because of classifications.

Example - There's a lot of rumblings in the wheelchair rugby world about Riley Batt. Wheelchair rugby was invented as sport for paraplegics and quads to play - people with spinal injuries and no use of legs. Batt has no legs - but he has all the muscle function right down to where his legs should start. He has far more movement in his trunk, hips, core etc than almost all other players - it's one of the reasons he is the best player in the world.

There are other players who have equal torso function as him. I think he's the best as he has a lot of sporting ability and also because he was born like that. His adaptations to his body are completely natural to him. He was 'born' to play wheelchair rugger if you like.

 

[Wallaby]

There are other players who have equal torso function as him. I think he's the best as he has a lot of sporting ability and also because he was born like that. His adaptations to his body are completely natural to him. He was 'born' to play wheelchair rugger if you like.

I don't dispute anything you say. here is an article by a Uk Wheelchair rugby player and a Paralympic commentator:
http://blogs.channel4.com/paralympics/2012/04/14/is-ryley-batt-too-good-at-wheelchair-rugby/

key quotes:

In terms of where I sit in the debate, I think he is probably too good to play wheelchair rugby, but like everyone else I’d rather wait to see how he performs at London 2012 before fully forming an opinion.
To exclude those who play at too high a standard seems at odds with the concept of elite sport – but the roots of wheelchair rugby help explain why Ryley’s on court dominance is raising eyebrows.
“Wheelchair rugby was designed to be inclusive. It was invented in spinal cord injury rehab units by a bunch of people who couldn’t play wheelchair basketball,” continues Justin. “They were too disabled – they didn’t have the function in their limbs and their trunk (torso). So they invented wheelchair rugby, and it was inclusive enough to give people who have little or no triceps, stuff like that, a real role in sport.
“As it has grown to include other people – not just those with spinal injuries, but other disabilities too – the classification system has always attempted to involve them, but it’s just a question of whether that has been done in the right way,” he adds.
“So how able-bodied is too able bodied? I think people will look at Ryley and think ‘Well, he doesn’t have any hands or legs, so how can he possibly be too able-bodied?’ but then he doesn’t have impaired movement in his trunk, so he can twist his chair without putting his hands on the wheels, leaving them free to reach out and grab the ball. He can tip his chair up and lean forward in it to gain extra height. He can hit that much harder. He starts quicker. He turns better. And he’s got so many extra bodily functions that spinal cord injured players don’t have – sweat function, lung function, blood pressure and so on. These are hard things to measure, and I’m not saying that people with these disabilities shouldn’t be in the game, but these are the advantages that they have. Seeing him on court and what he can do with his limitations, it’s really, really powerful.”

It's a fair enough question.

 

[Doodlesweaver]

I read that as well but Justin Frishberg backed down from his statements during the competition. He said - when asked if Ryley Batt should be playing wheelchair rugby - that other teams have players with equal to or higher functioning bodies than Batt, and so if anyone gets reclassified out of the sport, Batt would not be the first one to go. That particular iinterview was on the Channel 4 paralympics site.

Canada have a young player who is still learning the sport but has little spine impairment and even GB's Aaron Phipps is not a quad as such. He's like Chris Bond and had meningitus at a young age which led to amputation of limbs and impairments in hands. If Batt got kicked 'upstairs', they couldn't allow anyone other than players with spinal injuries to play the sport as dumping players due to their superior athletic ability is a dumb ceiling to set for a sport.

 

[RussellEbertHandball]

The paralympics can't really have super strict classifications or not have mixed disabilities because otherwise the number of competitors would be a lot shallower than what they are now

 

[red+black]

Paralympics ad in the UK. NB: embedding disabled so click here to go to Youtube

"Public Enemy - Harder Than You Think" (original clip / live clip)

Just watching Gruen Planet and they mentioned this track again. Originally released in 2007, thanks to the London 2012 Paralympics, Harder Than You Think has become Public Enemy's biggest ever UK song in a career that spans 25 years (NB: songs says 20 years cos it's 5 years old!). The song has been in the charts for 8 weeks reaching #4 last week and is currently #7.

So do yourself a favour and watch the clip again.

 

[imadodgyumpire]

You know, I tried to get into the Paralympics, but I couldn't. I was hoping to use the high you get from watching an Olympics, to last a little bit longer. What also surprised me, something I didn't know about myself, was the fact that constantly seeing people with a disability was actually confronting for me.

 

[Doodlesweaver]

It had a strange effect on me as well. I was watching so much of it at work that whenever I went outside I was looking for amputees and people with cerebral palsy and wheelchair users and wondering where they were and why weren't there loads of them in the streets. It completely normalised disability for me.

 

[blackcat]

It had a strange effect on me as well. I was watching so much of it at work that whenever I went outside I was looking for amputees and people with cerebral palsy and wheelchair users and wondering where they were and why weren't there loads of them in the streets. It completely normalised disability for me.

I prefer the homeless World Championships in football (soccer).

This paralympics seemed like a bigger propaganda feel good exercise than the August Olympics, and a truck load of gold buouyed our collective self esteem.

Ukraine was fourth on the medal tally. I wonder where they won medals?

 

[Doodlesweaver]

I prefer the homeless World Championships in football (soccer).

This paralympics seemed like a bigger propaganda feel good exercise than the August Olympics, and a truck load of gold buouyed our collective self esteem.

Ukraine was fourth on the medal tally. I wonder where they won medals?

It is s feel good exercise, but it's more than that. Why shouldn't disabled athletes have a big global tournament?

 

[RussellEbertHandball]

I prefer the homeless World Championships in football (soccer).

This paralympics seemed like a bigger propaganda feel good exercise than the August Olympics, and a truck load of gold buouyed our collective self esteem.

Ukraine was fourth on the medal tally. I wonder where they won medals?

21 sports @ the para's
Medal table is at below link - just click on relevant country
http://www.london2012.com/paralympics/medals/medal-count/

Ukraine 32-24-20 =84
http://www.london2012.com/paralympics/country/ukraine/medals/index.html
Athletics 8-7-7 = 22
Swimming 17-14-13 = 44
--------------------
Total....... 25-21-20 = 66

Australia 32-23-30 = 85
http://www.london2012.com/paralympics/country/australia/medals/index.html
Athletics 5-9-13 = 27
Swimming 18-7-12 =37
--------------------
Total....... 23-16-25 = 64

 

[blackcat]

It is s feel good exercise, but it's more than that. Why shouldn't disabled athletes have a big global tournament?

you have the relevant points and I was a misanthrope. Apologies to the athletes and respect for the competition/competitors... indeed, they deserve a centre stage. I remember at my public primary school when they put in ramps for a disabled whippersnapper in a wheelchair.

We never put in those disabled ramps or elevators in my bourgeois private school tho. Private School FAIL

 

[RussellEbertHandball]

.....

Matt Cowdrey was amazing in the swimming. Technically a beautiful swimmer to watch and nailed his turns and underwater work better than anyone else almost in the entire meet. The GB swimming commentators were drooling about him and I completely understood why. Freney was classifed down from s8 before the games and at Beijing she got bronze medalne Cw s in s8 events so she was always going to own s7.

The (relatively ie less than 12 months old) new Adelaide aquatics swimming centre will have the main pool named after Matt Cowdrey.

And he will play in a charity game of retired crows players against retired collingwood players in the annual Slowdown match in a couple of weekends time. It used to be between retired Port and cros players until a couple of years ago when they made it a state of origin games.

http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/...-matthew-cowdrey/story-e6frea83-1226481367161

AUSTRALIA'S greatest Paralympian, Matthew Cowdrey, is to have the main pool of an aquatic centre named after him.

Cowdrey, 23, has competed in three Paralympic Games and won 23 medals - 13 of them gold and the main pool at Adelaide's SA Aquatic and Leisure Centre will be named in his honour.

Premier Jay Weatherill said yesterday it was a fitting honour for the swimmer who, he said, could add to his already impressive tally if he competed in Rio in 2016.

"Matt's success at the Paralympics is an inspiration to all Australians," Mr Weatherill said. "His resilience, dedication and attitude make him a wonderful ambassador for the state."

Cowdrey said he was asked about the honour on Saturday and took a few days to think about it before accepting.

"I'm still not at the point where I've come to terms with exactly what I've achieved," Cowdrey said.


"So I was blown away when they asked me about re-naming the pool.

"It's a huge honour and to have my name associated with it is quite humbling."
Cowdrey said while it would take some time getting used to swimming in a pool with his name attached to it, the honour was recognition for the entire elite squad at Marion.

"We've got a fantastic opportunity with a state-of-the-art facility there, so it's more about what we can achieve from here," he said.

Mr Weatherill made the announcement to coincide with today's Paralympic civic reception in Adelaide.
"Being a Paralympian takes an extra measure of guts and determination," he said.

"Many of our Paralympians would have been told from a young age about everything they can't do, and they decided to throw every effort into what they can do.

"Pushing themselves to the limits, going way beyond the expectations others have set is truly inspiring." Swimming Australia president David Urquhart said Cowdrey was an outstanding ambassador.

http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/...-matthew-cowdrey/story-e6frea83-1226481367161

Paralympian legend Matt Cowdrey, who will play in this year's Slowdown charity match for the Little Heroes Foundation, makes a splash behind foundation members sisters Jaymee, 10, and Ashlei, 9 at the Adelaide Aquatic and Leisure Centre.

 

[worbod]

Does anybody know the official reason why the Paralympics, or even the Deaflympics, are not held at the same time as the Olympics?

 

[Wallaby]

The Paralympics follow immediately after the Olympics. The Deaflympics and Special Olympics (just resurrected this week - for people with mental disabilities) have no 'official' Olympic association. And in true Olympic spirit, the IOC refuse to recognise them and have threatened to sue them in the past for using the term. I think even the IOC saw that was a step too far in the 'Bad PR' stakes.

The Special Olympics is set up to cater for an enormous range of disabilities - far more categories than are available in the Paralympics. It becomes a massive logistical undertaking for the athletes and their assistants. And it's genuinely more about the competing than the medals.