The Netherlands is considering it important that people who are disabled also can perform in a sport and therefore the association for disabled sports is organizing a lot of opportunities for disabled people to exercise. For the people who are mentally  handicapped, the people oriented an organization in 1973.  But for people with a physical disability there wasn’t a foundation yet, because the people didn’t have the right possibilities to help them.  In 2001, an official club for the disabled was founded. Known sports for disabled human in the Netherlands are: tennis, swimming, basketball and skiing. The Netherlands are giving a lot of money to organizations to ensure that special facilities can be built for disabled people, so that there are many opportunities for disabled people to practice there sports. Due to this fact we also have real talents in The Netherlands. An example in tennis, we have the world champion Esther Vergeer. She shows that people with disabilities can be just as good in a sport as people who don’t have disabilities. She’s a living proof. We have done some research and found out that the disabled are very pleased with sports, because they are for a moment not concerned with their disabilities and they are having so much fun when they play sports.

We also have in our area facilities for disabled sports. For example, on our hockey club. On Saturday mornings the club is giving hockey lessons and hockey matches for mentally and physically disabled. On our hockey club are about 20 disabled kids, for the both mentally and/or physically handicapped.