Is the visual impairment origin a performance factor? Analysis of international-level para swimmers and para athletes

ABSTRACT

The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of congenital and acquired visual impairments on the international performance of Para swimmers and Para track and field athletes. We collected results from visually impaired Para athletes competing in Para swimming or Para athletic events at all IPC-labelled competitions between 2009 and 2019. The dataset contained 20,689 events results. Impairment origin was collected from the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) website. We separated impairment origin into two groups to distinguish those with a congenital impairment from those with an acquired impairment. In visual impairment sport classes (11–12-13), the performance level and the age performance relationship were investigated according to the impairment origin. In classes 11 and 12, peak performance was achieved earlier by male and female swimmers with a congenital impairment compared with those who had an acquired impairment (p < 0.05). No differences were present in class 13 or in any class in Para athletics (p > 0.05). A similar performance level was observed among the two sport disciplines for each class (p > 0.05). This study demonstrated that impairment origin can influence the performance pathway among visually impaired swimmers.

KEYWORDS:

• Swimming
• athletics
• Paralympic
• impairment origin
• talent identification
• para sport

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online https://doi.org/10.1080/02640414.2021.1999618.

Acknowledgments

The authors thank the INSEP teams, the French National Sport Agency (ANS), the French disabled sports federation (FFH), and the French Paralympic and Sports Committee (CPSF) for their full support. In addition, the authors thank all the curators of the IPC website.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Availability of data and materials

Available on request.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the French Ministry of Sports and the French disabled sports federation (FFH). It was realised within the framework of the priority research program “Sport of very high performance” PARAPERF supported by the French National Research Agency.