First day of competition

I have not been as regular as past Games when I was pretty good at getting something posted everyday. Was it my own excitement of trying to engage readers not the world of parasport? Was it my own excitement at being involved so close to the action? I certainly had more pictures as Rio (2007) and Beijing (2008) were my first Parapan Am and Paralympic Games. Taking many pictures and having almost daily pages to describe the sports was my goal. It was meant to provide somewhat of an education to many readers who are simply not familiar with what the sports are....to be honest I wasn't either which is likely why I had more to show and more to say. Another reason is likely because there are such strict rules on "reporting". We cannot report on the days activities as I used to do. I also cannot post tons of pictures of athletes without their consent. These are different times with the changes in social media from 2008 to now.

So the first day, as was already reported as we are about to start day 3, was full of medals ...and some confusion in some events. What one has to understand is there are so many "same events" in the same  sport due to classification. I wonder if we should deal with classifications first as it is what leads everything that happens here. This could take a while but I'll try to make it somewhat clear.

The International Paralympic Committee (IPC) governs all sports for athletes with a disability. So the first step is: what constitutes a disability? There are massive documents detailing this issue. The simple fact is different sports she different reasons for their participation: spinal cord injuries with associated paraplegias and motor deficits, visual impairments, limb deficiencies either acquired or congenital ,cerebral palsies and other variations of neurological impairments and, of course because not everything is as specific, "les autres". The latter is an actual term or category within the impairment lists. It translates from the french to "the others". It groups many complex conditions not specific enough for the other 4.

So I have to say it here: Paralympics and Parapan Am do not mean "paraplegic games". The "Para" is for "parallel" as the Games are a parallel to Olympics and Pan A Games.

Various sports are associated with specific disabilities whereas some others are a collection. Wheelchair basketball and tennis, for example, are evidently associated with sports for athletes requiring a wheelchair d=for daily ambulation. Swimming has 13 categories of physical disabilities and 3 for visual impairment levels. So yo could have "Men's 100m breaststroke finals in S1 class" ... all the way to S13. So if there are enough athletes, you could see 13 finals for the same "event" in the pool. It makes for not only a busy swimming schedule but many medals. In WC basketball it's classified differently as it is within the sport and controls the court participation. Every athlete is assigned a classification number from 1.0 to 4.5 depending on their abilities, not disability. On the court, the coach has to limit the "points on the floor" to 14. Which means you can have one 4.0, one 3.0 and two 2.5, and one 2.0 on the floor. Makes for some complex line up changes. Every athlete has to be seen by a classifier to participate in all parasports.

The above also dictates how many medals are won every day. Since there are not as many participants in the Americas as there will be in an International Game like the Paralympics, some events don't have enough participants to be run at all. It happened in the cycling road race where due to not enough participants, a few classes were grouped together and the women raced alongside and against the men. I saw that at a race near Barrie, where I live, when small numbers had a Criterium race grouping everyone together.

We did get some medals though. Mark Ledo, of Maple Ontario, got Canada's first gold medal in handbike racing. There are a few classes there too but not needed to be described.

Mark Ledo

Alexandre Cloutier and Daniel Chalifour

Alex Cloutier and Daniel Chalifour, on the tandem, were leading the Columbian team and eventually hauled in a silver in what was described as "the same time". I suspect they had a photo finish.

Audrey Lemieux and Robbi Weldon raced hard and' although leading the women's tandem teams, came in 5th. It was a great race on a very nice course along the waterfront and through High Park. One of our riders did not finish as he crashed, about 20 feet from my position in the downhill S curve. We were positioned at key areas along the course where potential danger lurked for cyclists. Our cyclist caught the fence and went down hard.


Tandems are "piloted" by a strong Canadian cyclist with a visually impaired rider in the back. Both are strong riders and nobody is "along for the ride". The pilot is able bodied: no disability. The best pilots are just off the National Cycling team or have just been short of making it.  They wouldn't have time to be on both the Paralympic team as a pilot and the able bodied events like Olympics and others.

Audrey Lemieux and Robbi Weldon

The women's WC Basketball team was on the court and easily disposed of the Guatemalan team. It was very one-sided but our classy women were not there to simply run up the score and embarrass anyone. They tried different things, changed their game and different line ups to allow some training but not to be disrespectful to the overpowered Guatemalan. The Guatemalan athletes were visibly thankful during post game handshakes. The score. 78-18, could have been worse.

Maude Jacques and Arin Young keeping their eyes on the ball

Katie Warnock can always be trusted to keep us entertained

Cindy Ouellet goes from intense energy to poise on the free throw line

 I am also covering the men's team who didn't hold back against the Venezuelan team taking it at 102-27. They have a tougher pool and cannot take it easy and have to not let themselves be complacent.

Adam Lancia was giving the Venezuelan some difficulties.