[ad_1]
Gold medallists get to savour Crucible experiencepublished at 20:34
Michael Emons
BBC Sport at the Crucible Theatre
Image source, WDBSFrom left to right – Thanapol Seekao, Songkiat Raebankoo, Rob Walker, Gary Swift, Steve Davis, Nigel Mawer, Tony Southern, Carl Gibson and coach Surasak Weraphong at Cue Zone
Disability snooker is growing at a rapid rate and in December, England won three gold medals at the World Abilitysport Games in Thailand, a multi-sport event which featured competitors from nine countries taking part in the snooker competitions.
The three English gold medallists – Tony Southern, Carl Gibson and Gary Swift as well as Thai champions Songkiat Raebankoo and Thanapol Seekao – have all been at the Crucible on Wednesday and Thursday.
The group were introduced to the crowd before Wednesday morning’s session, played exhibition matches at the Cue Zone at the nearby Winter Garden and went on a tour of the iconic Crucible on Thursday.
Southern said: “To play from a chair is probably 10 times more difficult than when I was standing up playing because you have to play 70% of your shots with a rest or extension so you have to be super-hot with the rest in order to compete.
“I have cerebral palsy which I’ve had since birth. It affected my walking, I was playing standing up until the age of 40 then it got too bad in terms of falls so I decided to play from a chair and not looked back since.
“The standard is getting higher and higher. We recently had one of one visually impaired players get a 100 break at an event and one of our players with an amputee got a maximum in practice.
“The wheelchair players are regularly getting 40 or 50 breaks at events. My best in a chair is 87, which is probably the equivalent of 130 when standing up because of the complexity of trying to get around the table and play your shots with the rest.”
[ad_2]
Source link