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Table Tennis is open to male and female athletes
with a physical or learning difficulty spread over
11 classes. Classes 1 to 5 are for players in
wheelchairs. 1 being the most severely disabled
athletes and five the least disabled. Classes 6 to
10 are for ambulant athletes, 6 for the more
severely impaired and 10 for the least disabled.
Class 11 is for athletes with a learning difficulty.
Every game consists of five sets, the first player
to win three sets winning the match. The Paralympic
programme comprises individual class
(classification) competitions for men and women, an
open wheelchair and an open ambulant competition for
men and women and a class team event, which is made
up of four singles and one doubles match. The first
team to win three matches wins the match.
The rules differ very little from the able bodied
game. The exceptions being that in the wheelchair
games the service must exit from the end of the
table, not from the side, and that those with an
amputation or hand impairment do not need to throw
the ball up when serving.
Table Tennis is practiced in 104 countries |