Commonwealth Paraplegic Games

The Commonwealth Paraplegic Games were an international, multi-sport event involving athletes with a disability from the Commonwealth countries. The event was sometimes referred to as the Paraplegic Empire Games and British Commonwealth Paraplegic Games. Athletes were generally those with spinal injuries or polio. The Games were an important milestone in the Paralympic sports movement as they began the decline of the Stoke Mandeville Games' dominating influence.^[1] The event was first held in 1962 and disestablished in 1974.^[2] The Games were held in the country hosting the Commonwealth Games for able-bodied athletes, a tradition eventually fully adopted by the larger Olympic and Paralympic movements.

The countries that had hosted the Commonwealth Paraplegic Games were Australia, Jamaica, New Zealand and Scotland. Six countries — Australia, England, New Zealand, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales — had been represented at all Commonwealth Paraplegic Games. Australia and England had been the top-ranking nation two times each: 1962, 1974 and 1966, 1970 respectively.

^ Bailey, Steve (2008). Athlete first : a history of the Paralympic movement. Chichester: John Wiley. p. 34. ISBN 978-0-470-05824-4.
^ DePauw, Karen P; Gavron, Susan J (2005). Disability sport. Human Kinetics. pp. 102–. ISBN 978-0-7360-4638-1. Retrieved 25 February 2012.

[bailey-1] Bailey, Steve (2008). Athlete first : a history of the Paralympic movement. Chichester: John Wiley. p. 34. ISBN 978-0-470-05824-4.

[2] DePauw, Karen P; Gavron, Susan J (2005). Disability sport. Human Kinetics. pp. 102–. ISBN 978-0-7360-4638-1. Retrieved 25 February 2012.

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