{"product_id":"what-are-the-paralympic-games-isbn-9781524792626","title":"What Are the Paralympic Games?","description":"\u003cb\u003e\u003cb\u003eIt's time to cheer for the inspiring athletes of the Paralympic Games! \u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAs the Opening Ceremony for the 1948 Summer Olympic Games commenced in London, a similar sporting competition was taking place a few miles away. But the men at Stoke Mandeville weren't your typical athletes. They were paralyzed World War II veterans. The games at Stoke Mandeville were so successful that they would eventually lead evolve into the Paralympics. Participants from all around the world vie for the gold medal in a variety of sports, including archery, basketball, swimming, speed skating, and ice hockey. Author Gail Herman highlights their achievements, describes how these athletes train--both mentally and physically--for the games,  and gives the reader a better understanding of what makes the Paralympic Games one of the world's most viewed sporting events.Gail Herman has written several biographies and nonfiction books, including \u003ci\u003eWho Is Wayne Gretzky?\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eWhat Is the World Series?\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eWhat Is Climate Change?\u003c\/i\u003e, and\u003ci\u003e What Is the Stanley Cup?\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003eWhat Are the Paralympic Games?\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e It is a humid September evening in 2016. At the Maracanã Stadium in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, more than seventy thousand spectators fill the seats for the opening ceremony of the fifteenth Summer Paralympics. Seventeen days earlier, the closing ceremony for the Olympics took place here, too.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e The Olympics and the Paralympics both feature summer and winter games. Both are held every four years. And thousands of athletes from around the world gather to compete in both sets of games.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e There’s one real difference: At the Paralympics, the athletes have a range of disabilities—any conditions that somehow limit movement or activity. Some swim without arms, race without legs, or run without sight.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e The opening ceremony begins with a parade of athletes entering the stadium. Teams arrive from over 160 countries, each led by a flag-bearer. Some athletes are in wheelchairs, some have guides, and some wear prosthetics—artificial limbs. Speeches are given, and music is played. Performers take the stage.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e Then an announcement is made. “Ladies and gentlemen, the Paralympic flame!” After a relay across Brazil, the torch arrives.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e Marcia Malsar receives the torch just as it starts to rain. Water drenches Malsar, who must use a cane to cross the stage. She raises the flame above her head. Suddenly, she slips and falls. The torch drops to the ground.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e Immediately, Malsar gets to her feet. Someone holds out the torch. She takes it, smiling. The crowd roars with approval. So do the other athletes. They understand that when you fall, you just get up again.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e Now Marcia delivers the torch to the next in line. The cauldron is lit. Fireworks explode.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e Let the Games begin!\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003eChapter 1\u003c\/b\u003e: \u003cb\u003eThe Idea Forms\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e The Paralympics began with one doctor’s vision: He believed that paraplegics—people who can’t move their legs or lower body—could lead full, useful lives. Many other doctors at the time didn’t think they could improve the health or well-being of people in wheelchairs, so they didn’t even try.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e During the years after World War II, Dr. Ludwig Guttmann saw hospitals filled with wounded soldiers, many with spinal cord injuries. At the Stoke Mandeville Hospital in England, Guttmann created workshops and classes designed to get the patients moving.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e One afternoon Guttmann jumped in a wheelchair to join patients hitting a puck with canes. \u003ci\u003eWhy not have team sports, too?\u003c\/i\u003e he thought. Another day, he brought in bows and arrows for archery.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e Doctors in other hospitals soon adopted Guttmann’s program. And that gave Guttmann another idea: to host a sports competition between hospitals.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e In 1948, the first Stoke Mandeville Games for the Paralyzed took place. He chose the date with care: July 29. It was the same day as the opening ceremony of the Olympics in nearby London.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e Already, Guttmann had a plan to have an Olympics for those with disabilities.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e Of course, no one would confuse the first Stoke Mandeville Games with the Olympics. There was just one sport, archery, and only two teams. Fourteen men and two women competed. But the Games were such a success that Guttmann decided to hold them every year. Each year, more events were added. Soon there were wheelchair races on the track and swimmers in the pool.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e In 1952, the Games welcomed a team from another country, the Netherlands. By the time the United States sent a group in 1955, there were seventeen other countries competing. The International Olympic Committee took notice. The next year, it gave Guttmann’s Stoke Mandeville Games an award for outstanding Olympic ideals.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e Years passed and the Games added a flag, a parade of athletes, and an opening day relay. Instead of a torch, “runners” who traveled by car and wheelchair carried a scroll stating the Paralympic mission: “To unite paralyzed men and women from all parts of the world . . . [to] give hope and inspiration to thousands of paralyzed people.” In the very first relay, in 1958, Dick Thompson brought the scroll home to Stoke Mandeville.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e At the Games, Thompson was already a star. At the age of seventeen, he had broken his back in a climbing accident. He wound up paralyzed from the chest down. One year later, in 1950, he won the javelin event, a throwing contest.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e The javelin is a long spear, and in the nondisabled sport, a thrower gets a running start. But wheelchair throwers are seated—and remain at a standstill—using only shoulder strength, not momentum, to hurl the javelin.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e Thompson’s first winning throw was forty-six feet, one inch.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e At one event, Thompson even competed against two nondisabled men: the British javelin and shot put champions. Guttmann sat them down in wheelchairs. Thompson beat them both.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e Then came 1960. The Olympics had just been held in Rome. And Thompson, along with wheelchair teams from more than twenty countries, was headed there, too. Guttmann’s dream was coming true. After all, what better way was there for the Paralympics to be like the Olympics than for it to share a host city?\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003eChapter 2\u003c\/b\u003e: \u003cb\u003eThe Early Years\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e The 1960 Games are considered the first international Paralympics, and Margaret Maughan was thrilled to be part of them.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e Just a year and ahalf earlier, Maughan had been in a car accident. She would never walk again. At Stoke Mandeville, she took up archery. She was a natural. For Maughan, making Great Britain’s team was the easy part. However, getting on an airplane meant being raised to the airplane door by a forklift.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e In Rome, teams had to stay in buildings without elevators. Luckily, the Italian army was called in to help. They were stationed on landings to carry people up and down the steep stairs.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e No TV cameras focused on these four hundred or so para-athletes. There were no cheering crowds at Margaret Maughan’s archery event. Maughan wasn’t even sure there were officials keeping score. She had no idea how she’d done until she was on a bus and someone told her she was wanted at the awards ceremony. She had won a gold medal.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e Like most everyone else, Maughan competed in more than one sport. Wheelchair racers played basketball. Fencers threw the shot put. With little funding, only a small group of British athletes was able to go. They had to cover all different events. Maughan won a gold in swimming for a backstroke event where she was the only contestant in the pool.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e In 1964, the next Olympic year, Paralympic teams traveled to Tokyo. They competed right after the Olympians. Once again, the two events shared one host city. They were tied together, part of Guttmann’s Paralympic plan.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e But the connection wouldn’t last.","brand":"Penguin Workshop","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46302787797221,"sku":"NP9781524792626","price":5.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9781524792626.jpg?v=1767743799","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/what-are-the-paralympic-games-isbn-9781524792626","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}