Berlin hosts the Special Olympic World Games
The Special Olympic World Games will take place in Berlin, Germany, from June 17 to 25, with the participation of 7,000 athletes
Berlin will host the Special Olympics World Games from June 17 to 25, in which around 7,000 athletes with intellectual and multiple disabilities will participate.
Founded by Eunice Kennedy-Shriver, sister of US President John F. Kennedy in the early 1960s, they were first held in 1968. The Special Olympics are the world’s largest sports movement for people with intellectual and multiple disabilities.
Today, more than 5 million athletes from at least 190 countries belong to the movement, whose goal is for people with intellectual disabilities to become more self-confident and participate in society through sport. The movement is recognized by the International Olympic Committee.
The Special Olympics are held every four years, alternating summer and winter. This year, they are welcomed for the first time by Germany. It is the largest multi-sports event held in the country since the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich.
The Special Olympics allow the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities to be put into practice and allow them to participate more in social life and, especially, in sport. Athletes with intellectual and multiple disabilities compete, while athletes with physical disabilities compete in the Paralympics.
The program includes a total of 26 sports disciplines. Some of them have been grouped in the facilities of the Berlin Fair and in the Olympic Park of the German capital. Badminton, basketball, bowls, apparatus gymnastics, weightlifting, rhythmic gymnastics, table tennis and volleyball will remain at the Fair. Participants in football, futsal, handball, hockey, athletics, skating and horse riding will compete in the Olympic Park. Aquatic competitions, swimming and diving, at the Europasportpark in Grünau, on the outskirts of Berlin.
The 3×3 basketball competition will take place near the Neptune Fountain, beach volleyball will be played on the BeachMitte beach, sailors will sail on Lake Wannsee and cyclists will run along the June 17 street. The SC Brandenburg club will host tennis, while bowling will be played at the Bowling World facilities, but without spectators.
The program includes the modality of unified sport, in which people with intellectual disabilities and people without it participate, which emerged in the 1980s. Through joint sport, participants with disabilities are supposed to gain more self-confidence and reduce their fears.
Another feature of the Special Olympics is that there is no medal table, although gold, silver, and bronze medals are awarded at each competition. It is that in the meeting there is no competitive pressure at the national level.
Spectators who want to attend the competitions have all the facilities. For seven sports, there is even free entry. In others, day tickets cost between six and eight euros (6.50 and 8.67 dollars). In addition, eleven television channels will report live for more than 400 hours.
Source: dpa
(Reference image source: Bryan Turner, Unsplash)
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