The Top Advancements In Sporting Technology For Disabled Athletes

Physical activity is essential to maintain health and strength of both mind and body. It’s suggested that adults need at least 2 hours of moderate intensity activity every week. This is to ward-off and reduces the risk of high blood pressure, heart problem, and diabetes. When a physical impairment is suffered, and an individual becomes disabled, that can be a truly life-changing moment. However, it’s in most people, to never ever give up, to always strive forward and find a way. Technology and products specifically designed for disabled people have made various sports that were otherwise inaccessible before, a viable option again.

Low and fast

You may be disabled, and you legs no longer function due to a spinal or genetic disease, but that doesn’t mean you can’t go super fast. The Shark RT is a new, low-down sporting wheelchair design, that’s center of weight is fine tuned and balanced and built for racing. It’s a hand bike design that uses an innovative frame that’s compact and light. The design offers adjustability and flexibility to the user, so whatever kind of physical disability you have, you’re still able to shoot down the road with speed.

No hill too steep

People who have lost limbs, feel that they’ve lost a part of their mind forever. Staying active can be challenging when you simply don’t have the muscle mass acquired for modern sports. However disabled people are being fitted with the latest prosthetic limbs that are engineered so that Physically demanding activity is aided and made easier. Mountain biking was once thought of as off the table, but with electronically powered easy motion bikes, the uphill struggle is no more.

Alpine adventures

Adaptive skiing is an extreme sport where thrill seekers and adrenaline junkies get to show the bravery and skill down a fast and treacherous mountain course. The mono-ski has evolved from once a crude singular shell, to a highly manufacturer carbon fiber ski. Designed to be used while in a sitting position, It gives the wearer a great sense of independence. Two handheld outriggers are used to maintain balance and assist in sharp cornering. The mono-ski is specifically suited to individuals who have suffered a T-6 or below spinal cord injury or someone who is a double lower amputee.  

It’s all in the shoulders

It’s all speculation at the moment, but there are talks among those involved directly with the Paralympics, that skeleton and bobsleigh may have credence to enter into the 2018 games. In the sport of skeleton, an individual lies a specially designed sled and hurtles down an enclosed ice track. Steering is done with a movement of the shoulders, putting weight in the top corners of the sled, thereby pinning the blade on either the left or right side causing the sled to turn in whichever direction. This could see, double amputees of the lower limbs, even double arm amputees, able to compete safely as the motion of limbs is taken out of the requirements in the sport.

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