Australia at the 1980 Winter Paralympics
| Australia at the 1980 Winter Paralympics |
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| IPC code | AUS | ||||||||
| NPC | Australian Paralympic Committee | ||||||||
| Website | www |
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| in Geilo | |||||||||
| Competitors | 2 in 2 sports | ||||||||
| Medals |
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| Winter Paralympics appearances (overview) | |||||||||
Following the success of the first ever 1976 Winter Paralympics in Örnsköldsvik four years earlier, Norway was selected to host the Paralympic Games in 1980.
Amongst the 18 nations represented, the 1980 Winter Paralympics at Geilo was the first time Australia had sent an official team. These games were originally known as the 2nd Olympic Winter Games for Disabled.
Out of 299 participants (a 40% increase in participation in comparison to the first Paralympic Games), 229 men and 70 women, categorised into either amputees, blind/visually impaired and spinal cord injuries, competed in 63 events. Three sports were programmed to make up the 63 events in these games: alpine skiing, cross-country skiing and ice sledge speed racing.
The selection of Geilo as the Host City was decided at a joint meeting of the International Stoke Mandeville Games Federation (ISMGF) and the International Sports Organisation for the Disabled (ISOD) in July 1977. This gave the city three years to prepare for the games to commence on the 1st of February 1980 for seven days to the 7th of February at Lake Placid.
The logo for the Games included the Geilo city emblem at that time stylised with a snowflake held between the antlers of two reindeer facing each other.
The medal representing the 1980 Winter Paralympic Games featured a flaming torch overlapping the three interlocking wheels of the International Stoke Mandeville Wheelchair Sports Federation (ISMWSF). This trend of including the ISMWSF logo on the medals can be traced back to the 1968 Summer Paralympics in Tel Aviv, Israel, where the emblem is dominant on the medals.
No mascot was included in these games. Mascots were not implemented until the 1980 Summer Paralympics in Arnhem.
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