Abstract

The purpose of this investigation was to describe the training history and injury experience of the competitive skier with a disability. A retrospective survey was administered to 68 athletes who participated in the National Handicapped Sports and the United States Association for Blind Athletes Winter National Games held in March 1989. Upper extremities were injured 1.4 times more often than the lower extremities. The number of chronic injuries was greater than the number of acute injuries for both the upper and lower extremity. The thigh and knee were involved in 30 of the acute injuries, followed by the shoulder (25), and neck and spine (15). For chronic injuries, the shoulder, thigh/knee complex, and arm and elbow accounted for 73.3 of the total injuries reported. The skier with a disability incurred approximately the same proportion of injuries as the skier without a disability. Conditioning programs should be developed to emphasize both the aerobic and anaerobic energy systems to reduce the number of injuries. Verf.-Referat