Quote of the Week

"One's dignity may be assaulted, vandalized and cruelly mocked, but cannot be taken away unless it is surrendered".  

Michael J. Fox, Actor

Paralympic Fact - Did you know...........

The first Paralympic Games took place in Rome, a week after the 1960 Summer Olympic Games were held there.

400 athletes with spinal cord injuries from 23 countries competed in eight sports, including snooker, fencing, field events, basketball, swimming, table tennis, archery, and the pentathlon.

In 1964, they were again held in the same venue as the Olympics, in Tokyo.

In 1968, Mexico City (home of that year's Olympics) declined to host the Paralympics, so they moved to Tel Aviv instead.

From then until 1988, the Paralympics continued to be held in locations other than the Olympics.

The 1972 Paralympics included the first competition for quadraplegics, and demonstration events for the visually impaired.

In 1976, the visually impaired, amputees, and "les autres"—a catchall term embracing many sorts of motor disabilities—were fully included for the first time.

1976 also brought the first Paralympic Winter Games, featuring events in Alpine and Nordic skiing for visually impaired athletes and amputees.

Paralympic Athlete Highlight

Simon Munn was introduced to Wheelchair Basketball shortly after a train accident which resulted in the loss of his leg. He immediately feel in love with the game and began competing in 1991.

To date, he has represented Great Britain in five Paralympics winning Bronze in Beijing, Bronze in Athens and Silver in Atlanta as well as numerous European and World Championship accolades.

Over more than two decades of playing Wheelchair Basketball Simon has played for a number of clubs including Super League Club MK Aces, Tameside Owls and London Club Capital City.

Simon has already announced that this will be his last Paralympics before retiring and his intention is to go out on a high – a Gold medal in his hand.

Quote of the Week

"Just because a man lacks the use of his eyes doesn't mean he lacks vision".

StevieWonder, Muscian

Paralympic Fact - Did you know......

The story of the Paralympics began with Dr. Ludwig Guttman of Stoke Mandeville Hospital in England.

In 1944, he began using sports as a form of recreation and physical therapy for veterans of World War II with spinal cord injuries.

In 1948, on the day that the Olympic Summer Games opened in London, he organized the Stoke Mandeville Games, a competition for wheelchair athletes. This became an annual event, and, in 1952, it achieved international standing, as athletes from the Netherlands joined the competition.

This competition—now known as the World Wheelchair Games—is still held annually, except in years with Paralympic Summer Games.

Paralympic Athlete Highlight

Ben Quilter (Great Britain)

Sport: Judo

Paralympian Ben Quilter boasts an impressive Judo career – a sport he started as a seven year old. Undeterred when he began to lose his sight at 10 years of age, because of the degenerative condition Stargardt's Disease, he continued within the sport he loves.

Ben missed out on selection for the Athens Games but was selected for the 2008 Beijing Games, where he finished fifth.

He has continued to progress and won the world title in 2010 and added the 2011 European title to his tally.

Ben Quilter comes to the London Paralympic Games 2012 as the world number one and World and European champion in his -60kg category.

Quote of the Week

We know that equality of individual ability has never existed and never will, but we do insist that equality of opportunity still must be sought.

Franklin D. Roosevelt

Paralympic Facts - Did you know.............

The name "Paralympics" comes from the Greek prefix "para-" (in this context, "beside" or "alongside") and "Olympics." "Parallel Olympics" approximates the intended meaning.

It has nothing to do with "paralysis" or "paraplegia."

Its motto was "Mind, Body, Spirit" from 1994 through 2003, and is now "Spirit in Motion."

Paralympic Athlete Highlight

Alexandra Rickham and Niki Birrell (Great Britain)

Sport: Sailing

Alexandra Rickham and Niki Birrell joined forces in 2007 competing in the two-handed Skud category and have gone from strength to strength ever since. At the Beijing Paralympics they secured fifth place in a very competitive field.

Success has continued as this year they have secured their fourth World Title in a row and Silver medals at events in Hyeres and Miami.

Niki Birrell comes from a family of keen sailors while Rickham came in to the sport following a diving accident in her native Jamaica.

They will be competing in Weymouth as the favourites and are hoping to win Team GB their first medal in the sport.

Quote of the Week

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.  

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Paralympic Athlete Highlight

Jon-Allan Butterworth (Great Britain)

 Sport: Cycling

Jon-Allan Butterworth joined the RAF in 2002 and served in Afghanistan in 2005 and Iraq in 2007 as a SAC(T) Weapons technician. During this tour of Iraq, he was involved in a rocket attack and was operated on by doctors in a battlefield hospital who carried out an above the elbow amputation of his left arm.

During 2008 he became involved with the Help for Heroes Big Battlefield Bike Ride, a 350 mile cycling challenge around the battlefields of Northern France to help raise funds to benefit other injured servicemen and women.

Following  this experience and watching British cyclists in the Beijing Olympic Games 2008 Jon-Allan attended a British Cycling Development Programme and was accepted onto the British Paracycling Programme in January 2009.

Aged 26-year-old from Sutton Coldfield,Jon-Allan made his international debut at the 2011 World Championships in Italy, winning gold in a world record time in the kilo event in his C5 category.

He retained his title at this year's World Championship in Los Angeles, again setting a world record.

At London Paralympic Games 2012, Jon-Allan will see his kilo event being factored. This means he will be going head-to-head for a Gold medal against his fellow GB team-mate Jody Cundy who will be competing in the C4 category. Only one of them can take the Gold medal - determined by which rider is closest to the world record for their class.

Quote of the Week

“The most important thing in life is to stop saying 'I wish' and start saying 'I will.'
Consider nothing impossible, then treat possiblities as probabilities.”  

Charles Dickens, David Copperfield