I had a motorbike accident that left me partially
paralysed. Paraplegic.
Amongst the amazingly good things that came out of
that, I
discovered para-sports.
Through that, I realised that my chances of becoming a
world-class athlete (overall) were massively improved by
having a near-fatal
accident. My whole life before, I was
fit and healthy, but had no illusions that i could compete
at national level in any sport. After the accident, I found
I
was in a (comparatively) small pool of people who could
compete at international para-level in many sports. Not
that I actually did- I just got on with my life.
But I did look at criteria for competing in (for instance)
Paralympic sailing, and found that I didn’t meet the
minimum (or rather maximum) ability criteria for any
particular Paralympic class. I’m not “disabled enough” to
qualify for any category. There are lots of categories of
disability in paralympics.
Which got me thinking...
If you’re going to categorise competitive sports classes
on
the basis of ability... where (and how) do you draw the
line?
I suppose this is just a philosophical pondering, but taken
to the extreme, there could be an Olympic medal for
“Slightly overweight, myopic, underprivileged unfit 47-
year-old neurodiverse male javelin” category.
Taken to the extreme, there is a class for every sport (or
competitive endeavour), which takes into consideration
your physical and mental composition, your genetic
disposition, and the sum of your lifetime experiences, in
which you are the world number one.
Well done!
Have a gold medal!