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Para Snowboard is practised worldwide and features four events: snowboard-cross, snowboard cross team event, banked slalom and dual banked slalom.
The competition includes male and female athletes with a physical impairment such as spinal injury, cerebral palsy and amputation.
The sport owes its success to the determination of a group of pioneering riders who in 2005 began their quest to have the sport included at the Paralympic Winter Games. After many years of campaigning, in 2012 it was announced that Para Snowboard would make its debut at the Sochi 2014 Paralympic Winter Games as part of the Para alpine skiing programme, with two medal events in lower-limb impairment classifications for men and women in snowboard-cross time trial.
This thrust Para Snowboard onto the global stage and in 2015, the first World Championships were held in La Molina, Spain. Here, banked slalom and snowboard-cross head-to-head were contested for the first time, whilst the lower-limb impaired classifications were split and upper-limb impaired riders also competed for coveted world titles.
Athletes now compete in three categories based on the degree of activity limitation resulting from the impairment – SB-LL1 and SB-LL2 for lower-limb impaired riders and SB-UL for upper-limb impaired athletes. Snowboarders use equipment that is adapted to their needs including snowboard and orthopaedic aids.
Since July 2022, the International Ski and Snowboard Federation (FIS) acts as the International Federation for the sport following the transfer of governance of Para Snow Sports from the International Paralympic Committee.
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