[Brief history of the sports for the disabled]
[Sports for the disabled in Slovenia]
Brief history of the sports for the disabled
Disabled people have played sports for more than 100 years. However, the International Commitee of Sports for the Deaf (CISS - Comité International des Sports des Sourds), the oldest disabled sports association, dates from the 20th century twenties. The first Games were organized in 1924, in Paris, and during the competition, due to its great success, deaf sports leaders from the nine participating countries gathered and created CISS. But it was after World War II that the sports for the disabled developed the most, due to the great number of injured war veterans. Dr. Ludwig Guttmann is a very important person in the development of disabled sports: he introduced sports as a form of reabilitation of people with spinal injuries in the Spinal Unit at Stoke Mandeville Hospital.
After the first "try" in 1952, the first Olympic Games for the disabled - Paralympic Games, in which the "para" means "parallel" and not "paraplegic" - took place in Rome, in 1960, and only people suffering from spinal injuries could participate. Three Games after, in 1970 (the Games were every four years), the competition was opened to people with other kinds of disabilities. So different associations were created in order to represent people the different disabilities:
- CP-ISRA: Cerebral Palsy International Sport and Recreation Association
- IBSA: International Blind Sports Association
- INAS-FID: International Association Sport for Persons with an Intellectual Disability
- ISMWSF: International Stoke Mandeville Wheelchair Sports Federation
- ISOD: International Sports Organisation for the Disabled
If you want to learn more about the history of the Sports for the Disabled follow the hyperlinks in the associations' names.
Sports for the disabled in Slovenia
The Sports Federation for the Disabled of Slovenia (ZSIS - Zveza za Sport Invalidov Slovenije) was founded in 1950 and includes twenty-one sports: alpine skiing, athletics, basketball, chess, cycling, fishing, football (soccer), goalball, marathon, 21km marathon, nordic skiing, sitting volleyball, shooting, swimming, table tennis, tennis, volleyball, whellchair basketball and whellchair tennis.
This association, whose president is Mr. Emil Muri, is extremely important in the promotion of disabled sports and in the introduction of sport in the lives of physically and mentally disabled people, with all its positive effects. ZSIS is financed by the Slovenian state and humanitarian organizations, and in 2000 the "Paralympic Fund " was created with the cooperation of several public figures: Miro Cerar (former gymnast) and Brigita Bukovec (athlete), about whom you can read in the "Other Sports" section, Janez Cadez (general director of the RTV television channel), Milos Kovacic (president of Krka, a leading pharmaceutical company) e Mitja Mersol (journalist and editor of the newspaper DELO).
The Slovenian disabled athletes have achieved gerat international success, especially since they started competing in the Paralympic Games in 1972 (included in the Yugoslavian team, of course). Twenty years later, in 1992, they started competing for their own flag, and since then they have won about 170 medals in international competitions, of which about one third is gold, another third is silver and, obviously, another third is bronze.
In Sydney 2000 Paralympic Games four Slovenian athletes added four medals to the previous collection:- Franc Pinter, who had won the shooting (standing air rifle) silver medal in 1996, won just the same medal in 2000;
- Franjo Izlakar, who had been the first Slovenian paralympic medalist ever (shot put gold with world record and discus throw gold with paralympic record, both in Barcelona 92) and had won theshot put silver medal in Atlanta, won it again in Sydney;
- Janez Roskar, who had won the javelin throw bronze medal in 1996, also repeated his achievement;
- Dragica Lapornik had her "paralympic podium debut": she won the shot put bronze medal.
- The 17 athletes of the 2000 Slovenian Paralympic team also achieved two fourth places (France Pinter again, this time 3x40 air rifle, and Andreja Dolinar in table tennis), as well as several "top ten" positions. Slovenes competed in athletics, goalball, shooting, swimming and table tennis.
In Athens the Slovenians got the same amount of medals (four), but this time the Slovenian anthem could be heard in the Paralympic stadium, because Mateja Pintar won the gold medal in table tennis. Franc Pinter achieved the silver one in shooting and Tatjana Majcen won two medals: silver in javelin throw and bronze in discus throw.
For the success achieved in Paralympic Games, World and European Championships and other important competitions, other Slovenian athletes also deserve to be mentioned: Sabina Hmelina, Lojzka Meglic and Samo Petrac (deaf skiiers), Franc Simunic (table tennis), Danijel Pavlinec (the swimmer who won all Slovenian paralympic medals besides the above mentioned: two bronze mendals, in 100m and 200m freestyle, in Atlanta) and Marjan Peternelj (athletics). The collective sports teams, like the goalball team, the men's deaf basketball team - silver medalists in the Deaflympic Games Roma 2001, they were the only team who played equally against USA (who had won all other matches without any trouble) and the women's sitting voleeyball team.
The disabled are people who, after beating their own prejudice, face a daily fight against a more or less serious handicap, against the prejudice of other people, against little details in our world who seem to ignore the existence of people with special needs... and they also face the everyday fight, that fight we all find so difficult and hard. Slovenian disabled sports athletes, as well as the Portuguese and those from all around the world, are an example to those people and to all the others too; they are living symbols of strong will, courage and charisma. Go beyond one's own limits is the first, greatest an toughest victory; the victory that makes way for all the others. These are the true Slovenian sport heroes.
