ABSTRACT
This book has arisen from the presentations and debates that took place during the international congress ‘Being disabled, becoming a champion’, held at the University of Lausanne on 12 and 13 November 2015. The first part of the book consists four articles examining different facets of the history of sports organizations set-up during the 1950s for athletes with motor or intellectual impairments. Starting from their inception, the chapters in the first part retrace their history and focus upon how and by whom they were founded, have been managed and have developed over the course of more than 60 years. The second part consists in three articles that focus on the athletes. Voices are given, turn by turn, to the top-level athletes in adapted sports interviewed by Yann Beldame, to the pioneers of wheelchair racing who invented a new discipline, off-road wheelchair racing.
