Everything Ryan wrote below is right on the money IMHO. Going on the personal experiences of training a partially sighted chap and witnessing a fully sighted team play though, I'd say that perhaps Goalball is the closest thing I've found to an exception. The team made up of fully sighted dudes were seriously tight defensively, I wasted half the game just blasting them with power shots assuming that a few minutes of play would leave them disorientated, more fool me. Observing them as the tournament developed, their offensive gameplay came on in leaps and bounds too. One winger in particular was developing a real knack for keeping track of where he'd last heard members of the opposing team and sliding shots neatly through the gaps. Textbook technique, it was cool!
That said, I'm surprised these guys made it to a tournament at all because of the rule where every player has to be blindfolded, and to be brutally honest the partially sighted chap on my team only really got involved as a way of getting on the subs bench to spend more time with a rather attractive young lady, although he ended up being a decent player. I see it as something of a catch 22, because the rule about everyone wearing blind folds is always going to hamper interest, but at the same time, having practised penalties with a few people unblindfolded, I'll happily acknowledge that the rule does need to be there. I mean, I'm totally blind, and even I hate being blindfolded and find that it throws me off my stride for the first few minutes LOL! Scott On 6/8/12, Ryan Strunk <[email protected]> wrote: > After reading the article and seeing your feedback, I can't help but nod my > head in agreement. It got me to thinking about a perennial problem with > so-called "blind sports," and I wonder what the solution is. > If this strays too far from the realm of accessible gaming, please feel > free > to steer the topic back in a more suitable direction. > In all blind sports I have seen--goal ball, beep baseball, accessible > cricket, power showdown, and now this--the common trend seems to be that > blind players are forced to play only with other blind players. In some of > these sports totally blind people even get a different set of rules than > those with partial sight. Nuts to that, and I have some residual vision. > The article talks about how tennis teaches blind people that they can do > the > same things as their sighted peers, but I'm having trouble seeing how > modified tennis makes that case. Certainly I believe that blindness can be > relegated to the level of an inconvenience, and I believe that given the > proper training and opportunity, blind people can compete on an equal > playing field with the sighted--no pun intended--but I don't know if that's > often the case when it comes to sports. > I know that certain forms of martial arts lend themselves to equal > competition between blind and sighted people; one of my co-workers this > Summer takes part in UFC fights. I myself wrestled for 8 years while going > to school. But when it comes to other sports, especially team sports, I > wonder how we could go about participating on an equal level. Is the answer > to create a new sport that blind and sighted people can play together? Do > we > develop a new set of techniques so that we, too, can play pickup > basketball? > I don't know, but I'd sure like to find out. My days of training to be a > star athlete are certainly behind me, but it's not too late for the younger > guys. > All the best, > Ryan > > -----Original Message----- > From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On > Behalf Of Scott Chesworth > Sent: Wednesday, June 06, 2012 10:46 AM > To: Gamers Discussion list > Subject: Re: [Audyssey] tennis, anyone? > > I gave this a shot, but was pretty underwhelmed TBH. Has to be said that > I'm > no athlete, but my spacial awareness, coordination and confidence when > moving aren't too shabby. I found the adaptions felt clunky, and that there > was little satisfaction to be gained. Sitting in on a few games between > people who'd been training casually but consistently for a couple of years > didn't inspire me any further, it didn't have anywhere near the breakneck > pace and fluidity of play that unmodified tennis does, and that was kinda > the appeal here. > > One person's take of course, it's all subjective. Not posting this to > discourage, just to make sure people will turn up for their first session > prepared for a long slog. It's certainly not something that you can just > dive into and let off some steam with like Goalball for example. > > Scott > > > --- > Gamers mailing list __ [email protected] > If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to > [email protected]. > You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at > http://mail.audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. > All messages are archived and can be searched and read at > http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]. > If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, > please send E-mail to [email protected]. > --- Gamers mailing list __ [email protected] If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to [email protected]. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://mail.audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to [email protected].
