Talking Vision is Vision Australia Radio’s flagship program, discussing the latest news and issues from a blindness and low vision perspective.
In the first of our final two interviews leading up to the IBSA Games in Birmingham later this month, Sam catches up with Ben Dew from Tennis Australia.
Sam and Ben chat about the recent Blind and Low Vision Tennis Championships in Melbourne, look ahead to the Games and encourage people to get involved in blind and low vision tennis at a court near them.
Blind and low vision tennis has been a comparatively recent trend in Australia compared to other parts of the world such as Europe or Japan, but Ben has been blown away by the positive response and enthusiasm from players who have taken to the sport in great numbers.
“It’s come a long way from a few come and try days about three or four years ago. Since then we’ve been working to further develop the grassroots side of things and get more people into the sport, and now we’ve got a full calendar and tours with five state events and the national championships,” Ben said.
One of the most exciting developments for Ben is the strength of the tennis contingent that is heading to Birmingham to compete for Australia at the IBSA Games.
“We have an 11 member team for tennis, so we’re the largest tennis team actually out of all the countries so that’s a pretty big deal. We’ve been a little bit behind quite a few of these other countries in terms of how long we’ve been playing BLV tennis, so it’s really pleasing to see so many of our players get accepted into the Games,” he said.
Listen to the full interview on Omny or in the player below:
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