Wheelchair Tennis is a technical and tactical
sport, very similar to its Olympic counterpart and is played by athletes in more than 100
countries. The most significant difference to Olympic
tennis is the ‘two-bounce rule”, whereby a player can allow the ball to bounce twice
and must return it before a third bounce. The second bounce can be inside or outside
the court boundaries. Matches are the best of three sets. The first player to reach six games by a margin
of two, wins the set. As with the able-bodied version, if the set
is tied at 5-5, one of the players must win 7-5. If the score is 6-6, a tie-break is used to
decide the set. The wheelchair tennis competition consists
of six medal events: men’s singles, women’s singles, men’s doubles, women’s doubles,
quad singles and quad doubles. Players use sports wheelchairs with wheels
adapted to allow better balance and mobility. As with all Paralympic sports, classification
in wheelchair tennis is based on the principle that an athlete has a medically diagnosed,
permanent impairment. For wheelchair tennis, this impairment must
be physical. Athletes whose impairment affects up to two
limbs, compete in the men’s and women’s ‘open’ competitions, and athletes whose
impairment affects three or more limbs compete in the quad division which is a mixed gender
division.