Country (sports) | United States | ||||||||||||||||||||
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Born | Grantsburg, Wisconsin, U.S. | October 7, 1977||||||||||||||||||||
Height | 5 ft 10 in (178 cm) | ||||||||||||||||||||
Medal record
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Jon Rydberg (born October 7, 1977) is a world-class American wheelchair tennis player.
Rydberg was born in Grantsburg, Wisconsin [1] and raised in Pine City, Minnesota. He played tennis since 1992. He was a member of the 2004 United States Paralympic team that competed in Athens, Greece. In 2007, after winning gold at Parapan American Games in Brazil he became the top-ranked wheelchair tennis player in the United States. [2] At the 2008 Summer Paralympics, he competed in both singles and doubles. In the singles event he lost in the third round to eventual gold medalist Shingo Kunieda, and in doubles he and his partner Stephen Welch were knocked out in the second round.
Also an accomplished wheelchair basketball player, Rydberg has contributed to the Rolling Timberwolves program that the Minnesota Timberwolves sponsors. He currently resides in the Twin Cities and has his own clothing line, Midevil[ sic?], Inc.[ citation needed ]
Wheelchair tennis is one of the forms of tennis adapted for wheelchair users. The size of the court, net height and rackets are the same, but there are two major differences from pedestrian tennis: athletes use specially designed wheelchairs, and the ball may bounce up to two times, where the second bounce may also occur outside the court.
Randy Snow was the first Paralympian to be inducted into the U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame and the first paralympian to win medals in three different sports: track, basketball and tennis.
The United States sent a delegation to compete at the 2008 Summer Paralympics in Beijing, China. A total of 213 U.S. competitors took part in 18 sports; the only 2 sports Americans did not compete in were soccer 5-a-side and 7-a-side. The American delegation included 16 former members of the U.S. military, including 3 veterans of the Iraq War. Among them were shot putter Scott Winkler, who was paralyzed in an accident in Iraq, and swimmer Melissa Stockwell, a former United States Army officer who lost her left leg to a roadside bomb in the war.
Peter Robert Norfolk OBE is a British wheelchair tennis player. Following a motorbike accident which left him paraplegic, he uses a wheelchair. He took up tennis and following a further spinal complication in 2000, he began competing in the quad division. He is nicknamed The Quadfather.
David Wagner is an American wheelchair tennis player. Paralyzed from the mid-chest down and with thirty percent function in his hands, he competes in the quad division. He plays by taping the tennis racket to his hand. He is currently ranked number three in the world in singles and number two in doubles.
Israel was the host nation of the 1968 Summer Paralympics in Tel Aviv. The Israeli team finished third in the medal table and won sixty-two medals: eighteen gold, twenty-one silver and twenty-three bronze. Over 750 athletes from 28 nations took part in the Games; the Israeli team included 53 athletes, 37 men and 15 women.
David Robert Hall, OAM is an Australian former professional wheelchair tennis player. With eight US Open singles titles, two Masters singles titles, and a Paralympic gold medal in singles, he has been referred to as Australia's greatest ever wheelchair tennis player.
Daniela "Danni" Di Toro is an Australian wheelchair tennis and table tennis player. Di Toro was the 2010 French Open doubles champion and has also been the Masters double champion. In singles, Di Toro is the former world number one and two time masters finalist. In 2015, she moved to para-table tennis and represented Australia at the 2016 Rio Paralympics, where she was team captain with Kurt Fearnley. At the 2020 Tokyo Paralympics, her sixth Paralympics, she was the team captain and Opening Ceremony flag bearer with Ryley Batt.
Ben Weekes is an Australian wheelchair tennis player. He represented Australia at the 2020 Tokyo Paralympics, his fifth Games.
Janel Manns is an Australian wheelchair tennis player. She has been selected to represent Australia at the 2012 Summer Paralympics in tennis.
Andrew David Lapthorne is a British wheelchair tennis player. He took up wheelchair tennis in 2005, and entered the quad division in 2008. He is active in both singles and doubles tournaments, and has 16 multiple grand slam titles in singles and doubles. He competed at his first Summer Paralympics at London 2012 in the quad singles and in the quad doubles, in which he won a silver medal and is now a three-time Paralympic medallist and British no.1 Quad tennis player, who started playing wheelchair tennis at the age of ten.
Gordon James Reid is a British professional wheelchair tennis player. He was ranked world No. 1 in singles and world No. 1 in doubles. He is a Paralympic gold, silver, and bronze medalist, two-time Grand Slam singles champion, and twenty-two time Grand Slam doubles champion.
Daniel Javier Caverzaschi Arzola is a Spanish wheelchair tennis player. He represented Spain in 2012 and 2016 Summer Paralympics...
Stephen Welch is an American wheelchair tennis player.
Mackenzie Soldan is an American wheelchair basketball and wheelchair tennis player. She represented the United States at the 2011 Parapan American Games where she won two gold medals, 2012 London Paralympics in wheelchair tennis and 2016 Rio Paralympics in wheelchair basketball. She has played for the U.S. women's wheelchair basketball team since 2013.
Maria Dolores "Lola" Ochoa Ribes is a Spanish wheelchair tennis player. A paraplegic as a result of an accident when she was 14, she picked up tennis as a wheelchair player following it. She has gone on to represent Spain at the 2004 Summer Paralympics, 2008 Summer Paralympics and 2012 Summer Paralympics, and the 2013 World Championships. In 2013, she was ranked 61st in the world.
Francesc Tur Blanch is a wheelchair tennis player from Spain. He has competed in the men's single and doubles events representing Spain at the 2004, 2008 and 2012 Summer Paralympics. His top international singles world ranking was 19th, a rank he held in August 2010.
Diede de Groot is a Dutch professional wheelchair tennis player who is the current world No. 1 in both singles and doubles.
Wheelchair tennis at the 2020 Summer Paralympics in Tokyo, Japan took place at the Ariake Tennis Park from 27 August to 4 September 2021.
Brad Alan Parks is an American wheelchair tennis player who co-invented wheelchair tennis with Jeff Minnebraker. During the Uniqlo Wheelchair Tennis Tour in the 1990s, Parks won five singles and seven doubles titles during Championship Series events. During the 1992 Summer Paralympics, Parks reached the quarterfinals in the men's singles and won gold with Randy Snow in the men's doubles. At the 1994 Wheelchair Tennis Masters, Parks also reached the quarterfinals in the men's singles. As an executive, Parks co-founded the National Foundation of Wheelchair Tennis in 1980 before becoming the first president of the International Wheelchair Tennis Federation in 1988. Parks became part of the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 2010 and was the 2016 Philippe Chatrier Award recipient from the International Tennis Federation.