The Birth of Gravity
A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, Gravity ™ was born (read earlier this year, about 6 months ago). Therafin has been building and innovating industry-shattering products for nearly 50 years, so naturally an adaptive sport like Boccia beckoned our skillful craft, and we heeded its mighty call.
Boccia is a sport that requires intense concentration, highly skilled precision– developed from hours of hard work and exhausting practice– and of course, the right Boccia equipment.
Want to know more about Boccia? Read our other blog post here.
There are four main Boccia classes for athletes in wheelchairs. Three of the four classes consist of athletes who can use their hands or feet to project the Boccia ball onto a court. But one of the four classes (we call this class the BC3 class) requires a Boccia ramp and a sports assistant to compete in this incredible sport.
You may be thinking to yourself: “Well, that’s not really fair. They get someone to help them play?” Think again. These BC3 players have an assistant primarily as an extension of their own body. The assistant can only do what the athlete commands him or her to do; the assistant cannot talk back; the assistant can make no recommendations; the assistant can’t even look at the court of play. They can do absolutely nothing unless specifically commanded to do so by the Boccia athlete.
When we first saw Boccia athletes competing in person, we were floored. We saw players bouncing Boccia balls out of the way, we saw athletes rolling one ball on top of another (see picture below), we saw people kicking the Boccia balls onto the court; we thought we’d seen it all.
But then we thought to ourselves… Hold on just a minute. We’ve been manufacturing wheelchair products, accessories, and seating systems for 50 years. Couldn’t we make a Boccia ramp?
Thus, Gravity: Premium Boccia Gear™ was born. We’ve already sold MILLIONS of ramps! (Disclaimer: We have not sold millions of ramps.)
The truth is, we received so much demand for our first Boccia Ramp, called The BOSS, that our entire manufacturing facility, including the office workers, had to come together to help build ramps! We were so backed up by demand that we had to teach our Finance Department, our IT department, and our Human Resources department how to assemble ramps from scratch (I’m serious!). And that was all the buzz just from our very first Boccia product. We weren’t really sure how to proceed other than to keep networking all over the globe with Boccia teams (like the Nassau Thunderbolts), Boccia clubs, VA Hospitals, Wheelchair Associations, Cerebral Palsy networks, and more.
More and More and More Gravity Products
Then, the unimaginable happened. We released another Boccia Ramp (the BOSS 360), and have a third one on the way, called The Hammer.
Oh, and we don’t only make ramps. We make Boccia Balls, Head-pointers, Mouth-pointers, Ball-holders, T-Shirt, Polos, Ramp Extensions, and much, much more coming soon. We’re developing a Boccia stool for ramp assistants. We’re designing a wheelchair holder that clips to the back of your wheelchair to hold all your
Boccia accessories. And did I mention we make custom ramps too? That’s right. We do everything you can think of and more.
If you aren’t as excited as we are about these Boccia products, then feel free to email me directly at danielb@therafin.com. I’ve been known to converse so elegantly that anyone within a 30-meter radius breaks out into inexplicable joy and radiance. Just ask our Therafin dog, Thomas. He can’t be in my presence for more than 5-seconds without politely requesting a belly-rub.
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