I raced paracycling for a few years. I was 2nd a nationals once, but never good enough to make it to the paralympics. There are lots of categories. It's change

I raced paracycling for a few years. I was 2nd a nationals once, but never good enough to make it to the paralympics. There are lots of categories. It's changed slightly now, but when I raced there was C1 - C5 for cyclists, T1 - T3 for tricyclists and H1 - H4 for hand cyclists. So that's 12 categories for each men and women in cycling. I needed to be evaluated twice by physiotherapists for strength, range of motion, etc. Then I was placed in a category. Obviously you want to be put in the lowest possible category for your disability. Lots of shady stuff goes on, faking additional disability etc. You can lodge a protest against other athletes if you think they are in the wrong category. As I understand it now, they've reduced the number of medals given out, so instead of each category having a medal, each category has a standard speed, and the athlete that beats the standard by the greatest percentage wins. Other sports still have medals for each category but cycling went away from it due to not enough athletes per category. Swimming probably has the most athletes. Here is the classification guide: http://www.handbiken.at/Regeln/Paracycling%20Classification.pdf http://www.handbiken.at/Regeln/Paracycling%20Classification.... For example, my category C5 is: Neurological Fair to normal - Major and minor neurological signs - Minimally affected diplegic with spasticity grade 1 or 1+ - Truly ambulant hemiplegic with spasticity grade 1 or 1+ - Monoplegic and minimal athetoids - Possible loss of function by uncoordinated hands or one leg Co-ordination Fair to normal - Very slight signs of inco-ordination on the bike (not normal function) Abilities - Fair to normal (0-2 points): mostly functional but not normal, major and minor signs Amputation, Impairment as described in 2b 2 “fair to normal” - Single amputation AE, with or without prosthesis, no functional grip (54 points) - Single amputation BE with the use of a prosthesis Minimal disability: Amputation of all fingers and thumb (through MCP) or amputation of more than half foot (forefoot). In the case of a single AE-, BE- amputation or a single upper limb dysmelia, the minimal impairment is met if all fingers and the thumb of one hand is missing through the MCP joint or other impairments who are equivalents, without a functional grip. As a proof of the loss of functional grip, the affected athlete will not be able to operat