50 free The Paralympics trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Paralympics trivia quiz covers the world's biggest sporting event for athletes with disabilities, from a hospital archery contest for paralysed war veterans in 1948 to a Games with thousands of competitors and record ticket sales. The easy questions handle the basics: where the Paralympics are held relative to the Olympics, the doctor who started it all, the city of the first official Games, what the name means, the three-coloured Agitos symbol and the two sports with no Olympic equivalent. From there it moves through the milestones: the first Winter Games in Sweden, Seoul 1988 sharing Olympic venues, the founding of the IPC in Düsseldorf and the 2001 deal that tied the two Games together for good. The harder half is for sports historians: George Eyser's wooden leg at the 1904 Olympics, the ten eligible impairment types, Trischa Zorn's 55 medals, Ragnhild Myklebust's winter record, the Spanish basketball scandal of Sydney 2000, boosting, the murderball origins of wheelchair rugby, the bells inside a goalball, Tanni Grey-Thompson's six London Marathons, Oscar Pistorius's blades and Channel 4's Superhumans. If you enjoyed our Olympics or sports history quizzes, this is the deep dive on the parallel Games. Every answer was checked against the encyclopaedia entries for the Paralympic Games, the IPC, Ludwig Guttmann, the individual sports and the athletes named before publishing.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Since 1988, when are the Paralympics held relative to the Olympics?
Shortly after them, in the same host city
Seoul was the first to use the same host city and most of the same venues, a precedent formalised by an IOC-IPC agreement in 2001.
Q 02The 1948 competition that grew into the Paralympics was for British war veterans with what kind of injury?
Spinal cord injuries
Guttmann ran the National Spinal Injuries Centre at Stoke Mandeville Hospital, and every torch relay now begins there.
Q 03Which German-Jewish neurologist, a refugee from Nazi Germany, founded the games at Stoke Mandeville Hospital?
Ludwig Guttmann
He was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1966, and had once saved 60 of 64 Jewish patients from deportation by admitting them without question after Kristallnacht.
Q 04The first Stoke Mandeville Games were held on 29 July 1948, the same day as what?
The opening of the London Olympics
All the participants were paralysed patients, and Guttmann's aim was an elite competition equivalent to the Olympics.
Q 05In which city were the first official Paralympic Games held in 1960?
Rome
They were also the ninth Stoke Mandeville Games, and were largely financed by an Italian workers' accident insurance fund.
Q 06How many athletes competed at the 1960 Rome Paralympics?
400
They came from 23 countries; the only disability included was spinal cord injury.
Q 07Which Italian doctor, a friend and follower of Guttmann, proposed staging the 1960 Games in Rome?
Antonio Maglio
He was head of the Spinal Centre in Rome; the term for the Games was only approved by the IOC in 1984.
Q 08Which of these unusual sports was on the programme of the 1960 Rome Paralympics?
Dartchery
The eight sports also included snooker, wheelchair fencing and table tennis.
Q 09The name 'Paralympic' was originally a portmanteau of 'Olympic' and which word?
Paraplegic
Once other disability groups joined, the official explanation switched to the Greek 'pará', meaning beside or alongside.
Q 10The term 'Paralympic' first came into official use at the 1988 Games in which city, the first to share the Olympic venues?
Seoul
That precedent was followed in 1992, 1996 and 2000 and formalised by an IOC-IPC agreement in 2001.
Q 11At which Summer Paralympics were athletes with disabilities other than spinal injuries included for the first time?
Toronto 1976
With more classifications the Games grew to 1,600 athletes from 40 countries.
Q 12Where were the first Winter Paralympics held in 1976?
Örnsköldsvik, Sweden
Sixteen countries sent 196 athletes for Alpine and Nordic skiing, plus a demonstration of ice sledge racing.
Q 13In which German city was the International Paralympic Committee founded on 22 September 1989?
Düsseldorf
Its headquarters are now in Bonn, and Canadian Robert Steadward was its first president.
Q 21Which American swimmer, blind from birth, is the most decorated Paralympian in history with 55 medals?
Trischa Zorn
Forty-one of them were gold, won across seven Games from 1980 to 2004; she was also an alternate on the boycotted 1980 US Olympic team.
Q 22Which Norwegian holds the record for most Winter Paralympic medals, with 22 won between 1988 and 2002?
Ragnhild Myklebust
She retired at 58 after winning five golds at the 2002 Games.
Q 23Which country's intellectual-disability basketball team was stripped of its 2000 gold after most players were found not to be disabled?
Spain
A player claimed only two of the twelve met the rules; ID events were suspended until London 2012.
Q 14Where has the International Paralympic Committee been headquartered since 1999?
Bonn, Germany
Andrew Parsons has been its president since 2017; the IPC also acts as international federation for five sports.
Q 15What is the Latin-derived name for the three asymmetrical crescents in the Paralympic symbol?
Agitos
Agito means 'I move'; the three colours, red, blue and green, are the ones most common in national flags.
Q 16The first IPC logo, created for the 1988 Games, was based on which traditional Korean decorative element?
The pa
Two pas make up the taegeuk on South Korea's flag; the IOC asked for a redesign in 1991 because five of them looked too like its own emblem.
Q 17What has the Paralympic motto been since 2019?
Change Starts with Sport
It replaced 'Spirit in Motion', introduced at Athens 2004.
Q 18What is the title of the Paralympic anthem, adopted in 1996?
Hymne de l'Avenir
Composed by Thierry Darnis, its name means 'Anthem of the Future'.
Q 19Unlike the Olympics, which single language is the official language of the Paralympic movement?
English
Announcements at each Games are made in it plus the host country's official languages.
Q 20How many eligible impairment types does the IPC recognise for Paralympic competition?
Ten
They range from limb deficiency and short stature to vision impairment and intellectual impairment.
Q 24'Boosting', a banned technique in Paralympic sport, involves athletes deliberately doing what?
Raising their blood pressure through self-harm
Trauma below a spinal injury is painless but can lift performance by up to 15%, especially in endurance events.
Q 25Who was the first athlete with a disability to compete at the Olympics, a gymnast with a wooden leg in 1904?
George Eyser
Later examples include Hungarian shooter Károly Takács, who lost his right arm and won gold shooting left-handed in 1948 and 1952.
Q 26Which New Zealand archer set the precedent for Paralympians at the Olympics by competing in Los Angeles in 1984?
Neroli Fairhall
She was a wheelchair user, and only the third Paralympian ever to appear at the Olympics.
Q 27By how much did Oscar Pistorius miss qualifying for the 2008 Olympic 400 metres?
0.70 seconds
He won Paralympic gold that year at 100, 200 and 400 metres, and reached the Olympic 400 m semi-final in London four years later.
Q 28Which company manufactured the carbon-fibre 'Flex-Foot Cheetah' blades Oscar Pistorius raced on?
Össur
Biomedical engineer Van Phillips developed the J-shaped prostheses; the nickname 'Blade Runner' came from the film.
Q 29Which two Paralympic sports have no counterpart on the Olympic programme?
Boccia and goalball
Boccia is a precision ball game akin to bowls, and goalball is played with a ball full of bells.
Q 30Boccia was originally designed for people with which condition?
Cerebral palsy
Players throw red or blue leather balls towards a white jack; it became a Paralympic sport in 1984.