Paralympic News

 

The Special Olympics World Summer Games Athens is the biggest sports event in Greece since 2004’s Olympic Games and the largest in the world this year with 180 countries and 7000 learning disabled athletes.

 

With nine days of competition in the Greek capital that has seen GB record an incredible 187 medals across 17 sports and a host of personal bests.

 

Amid the economic and political chaos in the Greek capital, the GB team competed 20 minutes away from the riots against not only international competitors, but also the heat, exhaustion, homesickness and other kinds of sickness.

 

Opening Ceremony: The spectacular Opening Ceremony headlined by singing legend Stevie Wonder and actress/singer Vanessa Williams (Desperate Housewives, Ugly Betty) was staged at the ancient Panathinaikon Stadium, the venue of the first modern 1896 Olympic Games.

 

Following a tremendous concert, Wonder warmly embraced the evening and gave a shout-out to all his heroes ranging from Nelson Mandela to Helen Keller to Widnes’ Omar Haddad. The hundreds of British families in the audience exploded with cheers as Wonder shouted Omar’s name. Omar is well known with Special Olympics athletes for starring in a film named after him: www.encourageomar.co.uk which just won a Cannes Film Festival Bronze award in the Interactive film category.

 

The team was proud to participate in the traditional Olympic Parade of Athletes cheered by 20,000 volunteers, 3000 officials, 40,000 family members, the President of the Hellenic Republic, the Prime Minister of Greece and film and sports stars from across the world. It was broadcast live on national Greek TV, both BBC and ITV have shown highlights.

 

British Ambassador Welcomes Team: A welcome reception was hosted by HE British Ambassador to Greece Dr. David Landsman of Winchester to celebrate the team’s arrival in Greece. Hundreds of dignitaries and the team enjoyed a rocking garden party at the Ambassador’s Residence. Special Olympics International CEO Tim Shriver enthused, “Who knew the Brits could rock?!”

 

Skiathos Host Town: The World Games kicked-off with 5 days on the idyllic Greek island of Skiathos with a Host Town Programme -- a unique opportunity for the athletes and volunteer coaches to bond together, do team-building exercises, experience a new culture and acclimatize to the sunny weather. The Delegation marched in a parade through the old town streets where they were cheered by locals and hundreds of ex-pats on the island. They were met by the mayor and a marching band at the scenic old port.

 

Unlucky 13: The start of the 13th Games was unlucky for some GB athletes: two dozen of the 157 athletes were struck down by a debilitating stomach bug which affected their performances and for some even prevented them from competing. A basketballer was hospitalized with appendicitis and a cyclist was led off the track following a mid-race crash. Others had typical minor sports injuries.

 

Oldest & Youngest: The youngest gymnast on the team, Jemma Bowie-Hallam, 13 (Wales) was one of the athletes hit by the stomach flu. She finished with four 5ths and a 6th place – an outstanding performance by the young athlete who insisted on giving it her best shot even though she was clearly under the weather.

 

The team’s oldest competitor, 54 year old Lynn Williams (Harrogate), was absolutely thrilled with 1 Gold, 1 Bronze and 1 Silver and a 4th place finish in powerlifting!

 

Gymnastics: The GB gymnastics squad fought-off powerhouses China and Russia to be the big winners of the World Games. Jon Mackie (East Kilbride), returns with 6 Golds and a Silver, Omar Haddad (Widnes) with 5 Gold and 2 Bronze, while Samantha Godel (Jersey) delivered a flawless demonstration across all disciplines and brought home 5 Golds! Other strong performances came from Felicity Martin (Crewe) with 2 Golds and 3 Silvers and Philip Davies (Caulsdon, Surrey) with 1 Gold, 1 Silver and 5 Bronze.

 

Football: All of the football squads medalled: 5-a-side Ladies won Silver and 5-a-side Men won Bronze with a medal presentation from former Leeds United legend Lucas Radebe. The 11-a-side also Bronzed with Ireland taking Silver and Turkey Gold. According to 11’s Head Coach Stephen White, “We went the entire competition undefeated but we just had too many draws. It was a magnificent achievement!”

The Unified Football team is participating for the first time at the World Games. They met San Marino on the pitch and held onto Silver. Unified Football? is a ground-breaking programme designed to breakdown the social barriers between people with learning disabilities (called Athletes) and those without (called Unified Partners), by bringing them together on the same team to understand that people with differences are really just the same.

 

Athletics: The 7 members of the athletics squad have ALL had Personal Bests! The team is competing in the impressive Olympic Stadium where some of the best runners in the world have competed – including 2x Olympic medallist and Special Olympics GB Ambassador Darren Campbell, MBE. Campbell was on hand to see the team and wish them luck.

The stand-out performer on the track was Owen Miller (Dunfermline) with 2 Golds in 800m with a time of 2 minutes 5 seconds and Gold in the1500m, An outstanding showing at the very highest level. Richard Murphy (Redditch) was GB’s sprint king with Gold in the 100m and 200m.

 

Bocce: GB dominated in the new World Games sport of Bocce, an exciting variant of Crown Green Bowls and Boules. The Team took Gold and Adam Bloor (Crewe) won three Golds including the top division in singles and heather Williams (Barry) also took Gold in the women’s singles.

 

Equestrian: Unlike the Olympics and Paralympics, Special Olympics riders do not travel with their horses, which is a true test of their horsemanship. GB rider Zahra Kazmi (Dundee) is only 5’5” and won a 2 Golds and a Bronze on a massive 17.1 HH horse she had been paired with. Owen Keeble (Stirling) also earned a Gold and 2 Silvers in dressage with an outstanding display of control and discipline. Christine Durrance, 23, (Melton Mowbray), garnered 1 Gold and 1 Silver in the dressage while Stephen Barry (Peterborough) is proudly wearing Silver. Ellis Wilson (Dunlop) was consistent with three 6th place finishes in the top tier of competition.

According to GB Equestrian Head Coach, Nancy Peters (Glasgow), “I am so proud of all of them – with or without medals around their necks!”

 

Closing Ceremony: The closing ceremony will feature M People’s Heather Small of Manchester and a speech by Tennis Player Shain Lewis of Wales. Shain is surprised and honoured to be chosen to deliver a Thank You speech on behalf of all the 7000 athletes competing at the World Games. The speech will be delivered on-stage in front of 7000 athletes, 20,000 volunteers, 30,000 families and hundreds of thousands of people watching the live broadcast on Greek National TV. He will be proudly wearing the Bronze medal he won in men's singles.

Last month Shain celebrated his 19th birthday at 10 Downing Street when he met Prime Minister David Cameron along with 6 team mates.

 

“Special Olympics has given me the chance to represent my country. I feel it is an honour to play tennis for Great Britain. I want to show people that with a disability you can achieve the same as others,” says Shain.

 

The team was lead into the Closing Ceremonies by Chris Kane (Dundee) who was unable to compete due illness.

 

“We’ve really come up against it since we arrived in Athens but we’ve pulled together superbly and we can fly back to Great Britain on Tuesday with our heads held high and straining under the weight of so many medals!” proudly says McCormack.

 

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COHEN CREW RELISHING HUNT FOR SONAR GLORY AT IFDS WORLDS

Athens 2004 Sonar champion skipper Dror Cohen (ISR) insists he is ready for a fight to the title as he moved within two points of French rival Bruno Jourdren’s first-placed crew on day four of the IFDS Disabled Sailing World Championships (Wednesday 6 July).

 

Cohen, Benni Vexler and Arnon Efrati revelled in the stronger winds that blasted around Portland Harbour today, picking up a second and third for their two races as Jourdren, Eric Flageul and Nicolas Vimont-Vicary scored a fourth and fifth leaving everything to play for with two days and three races to go.

 

Skandia Team GBR’s John Robertson, Hannah Stodel and Steve Thomas are still in contention for the top prize, five points in arrears of the Frenchmen, despite a gybing error in race eight leaving them with a ripped mainsail, and finishing that race in ninth.

 

Breezes over 20 knots provided the 155 sailors competing at the RYA-run event at Weymouth and Portland National Sailing Academy this week with a completely different challenge to the first three days of racing.

 

With the wind now forecast to remain for the rest of the week, Cohen is looking forward to some close to the knuckle racing.

 

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The last lengths have been swum, the medals have been handed out and our note-taking pencils have been worn down to their rubber tips.

 

That's right, the 2011 IPC Swimming European Championships have finished with Ukraine crowned winners ahead of own own impressive GB swimmers.  

 

The GB star performance 

 We saw a lot of outstanding displays from British stars this week: Ellie Simmonds displayed her dominance with four gold medals and two world records, Hannah Russell showed maturity way beyond her 14 years to take home a silver and a bronze at her first major championships, while Susannah Rodgers bagged an incredible five golds and one silver medal. But for us, it was triple gold-medallist Jonathan Fox's display on day five of the IPC Swimming European Championships that really stood out.

 

GB hadn’t won a gold for nearly 24 hours when Fantastic Mr Fox took to the starting blocks for the men’s S7 100m Backstroke, an event in which he held the world record. The starting gun went and Fox bossed the race from start to finish, smashing his previous best by one and a half seconds. It was the gold that broke the levee; GB stars added a further five medals to the British tally in the remaining five events, including two more golds. Inspirational stuff from Foxy.  

  

Race of the Championships 

We could talk about Susannah Rodgers' nail-gnawingly close battle with Germany's world record holder Kirsten Bruhn in the S7 100m Backstroke final all day. But our choice for race of the championships was an event where the world record was broken an incredible three times in one day - the women's SB4 100m Breaststroke.

 

We should have realised we were about to witness something special in the morning session of day five. Nataliia Prologaieva of Ukraine finished her heat in a new world best, which was immediately bettered by Sarah Louise Rung in the following qualifier. The Norwegian then pulled out all the stops to repeat the feat in the final - much to the disappointment of Prologaieva, who finished the race in a quicker time than Rung's previous record.  

  

Record breakers

A whopping 31 world records were broken during seven frenetic days in the pool, while 28 European records also fell. Record book-keepers were forced to scribble down names and times so regularly, smoke could be seen rising from their notepads. Thursday was their busiest day, with five world and six European bests smashed like plates in a Greek restaurant. GB clocked up 11 records in all; five world and six European. Jonathan Fox and Ellie Simmonds led the way with two world records apiece, while Susannah Rodgers set two European bests. The leader of the individual record table? That would be the man who may have set some sort of world-record-breaking record, Ihar Boki. The Belarusian behemoth smashed three worldies during the Championships and also managed four individual golds.  

 

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