While the concept of people with disabilities playing sports is nothing unique, the level at which they can compete today, and the accessibility and quality of modern facilities, have surpassed what many would have envisioned only a few decades ago.
The historic passing of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) in 1990 was the first step in creating a more accepting and accommodating country for those with disabilities. While much work still needs to be done to eliminate those challenges, adaptive sports have made huge strides.
Adaptive sports are competitive and recreational sports for people with disabilities. On the surface, most of these sports are played the same as with non-disabled athletes, but allow modifications or use a classification system to put athletes with physical challenges on an even playing field with each other.
Examples include wheelchair basketball or track and field athletes who use prosthetics or braces.
Move United is the largest and longest-serving organization in the adaptive sports space. It was created in 2020 by the merger of Adaptive Sports USA and Disabled Sports USA, founded in 1956 and 1967, respectively.
Move United offers athletes more than 70 adaptive sports, including archery, basketball, cheerleading, curling, fencing, gymnastics, ice skating, mountain biking, powerlifting, rowing, sitting volleyball, snowboarding, surfing, and triathlon. With 200 member organizations, Move United serves more than 100,000 individuals across the United States.
Shortly after its creation, Move United announced the ambitious goal that by 2028, 90 percent of Americans would live within 50 miles of one of their member organizations.
One such member is Turnstone Center in Fort Wayne, Ind. Celebrating its 80th anniversary this year, Turnstone aims to empower people with disabilities to achieve their highest potential by providing comprehensive services and programs. Overall, Turnstone offers almost 70 recreational and competitive opportunities for athletes.
Michelle Kimpel, Turnstone’s director of sports and recreation, says the great thing about adaptive sports is it brings “all the good qualities that sports have and create something where you are allowing everybody to be able to participate.”
Kimpel points out that the challenges participants bring to adaptive sports can be as varied as the athletes themselves. For example, some athletes who play wheelchair basketball don’t necessarily need a wheelchair all the time.
Turnstone launched its therapeutic sports and recreation program for adults and children in 1996. However, Kimpel says adaptive sports have thrived more recently.
On a local level, center staff visits middle schools, high schools, and even colleges to raise awareness about disabilities and adaptive sports, and local businesses have become valuable advocates for their work.
The success of adaptive sports is also thanks to the growing profile of the Paralympic Games and the zeitgeist of “inclusive awareness” increasingly seen today, Kimpel adds.
“Organizations advocating for people with disabilities continue to grow at a fast rate,” she says.
Turnstone also has the advantage of running its own sports facilities, including four collegiate-sized fields. However, it is not just the fields that athletes find important, Kimpel explains. The facilities have 18 fully accessible showers, something she says many athletes cannot find in their hotel rooms. To her, this is another example of how disabled athletes cannot take anything for granted.
While recreational opportunities have been around for some time, the competitive area of adaptive sports continues to grow.
“Recreational is so open that it covers many different levels. You might have somebody who has never played or a person who is trying to enhance their techniques,” Kimpel says. “It does help create that pathway to being more competitive, and even the dream of being on the podium for the Paralympics.”
Turnstone hosts between 10 to 12 tournaments annually, drawing in teams from the Midwest (Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, Kentucky, etc.) but also from New York, Pennsylvania, and Michigan.
Kimpel says it is encouraging to see the increasing number of spectators they bring into their events.
“We have a great relationship with our local media. So, we always try to push out the message to get more local people out,” she says. “It was awesome
to see the support from our community to come out and watch. You know you are doing something and making an impact.”
Another organization helping disabled athletes to thrive is ParaCheer Spirit, founded in 2018 by Lee Trudell, who also serves as the director and head coach.
Trudell told SportsEvents that the mission of ParaCheer Spirit is to find the middle ground between a Special Olympics cheerleader and a traditional cheerleader.
“We focus on highlighting the strengths of what they can do,” Trudell explains. “We don’t necessarily want their disability to be highlighted or identified.”
A unique aspect of ParaCheer Spirit’s programs is their teams include disabled and non-disabled athletes.
“That’s where we can really highlight the strengths [of disabled athletes] because they can blend in with athletes without disabilities,” he says.
When asked if having mixed teams can cause some uncertainty for non-disabled athletes, Trudell says the key is education, not just for them, but
for any coach or parent involved with the organization.
“It’s about letting them know if you make a mistake, that it is okay, it’s part of the learning process,” Trudell says. “It’s about making them comfortable and not afraid of the unknown. That’s how we become truly inclusive of everybody.”
Trudell says inclusivity seems to be gaining momentum across the whole sports industry.
“I think we are seeing more because of TV shows, movies, and the Paralympics. We are seeing the advanced skills of athletes with disabilities,” he says.
For Trudell, the most important thing is the athletes are recognized simply as that, not necessarily as disabled athletes.
“Everybody wants to be recognized as a person and the skills they have. They don’t necessarily want to be recognized for what they can’t do, rather what they can do,” he says.
There is hard evidence that the profile of adaptive sports is on the rise. The 2022 Beijing Paralympics in China were the most viewed Winter Paralympics in U.S. history. With nearly 12 million viewers across 12 platforms on the NBCUniversal platform, it was a 107 percent increase in viewership from the 2018 PyeongChang Paralympics.
