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= Brad Alan Parks = Brad Alan Parks, born on April 2nd, 1957 (age 61), is known as the founder of the competitive sport, wheelchair tennis.

Biography
Brad Parks was born in the United States in Orange, California. Parks had dreams of becoming a skiing professional and took part in many competitions. In the year 1976, Parks was an 18 year old college freshman in Utah participated in a skiing competition where he fell on his shoulders while doing a back layout flip and became paralyzed. During his rehabilitation in 1977, he wanted to play more than just wheelchair basketball and had the idea of playing wheelchair tennis. His only obstacle was that the wheelchair he had was not efficient in mobility. With the help of his friend Jeff Minnebraker, wheelchair athlete and recreational therapist, they designed a sport chair for Parks and made some changes to the way tennis was played in order to better fit wheelchair tennis. In 1980 Brad Parks started the National Foundation of Wheelchair Tennis and was devoted to popularize tennis across the country. That year was also the first time wheelchair tennis would be in the US Open where Brad Parks won the first championship against Randy Snow. Brad Parks and Randy Snow would team up as doubles partners to compete in the 1992 Paralympics. In 1987 Parks took part in the Wheelchair Games in Stroke, Mandeville and from then on it took part of the Paralympic Games in Barcelona. He played anywhere he could in order to bring popularity to the sport. Then after the Sport took off and the International Wheelchair Tennis Federation (IWTF) was created in 1988 and Parks was the inaugural president. Ten years later, 1998, the IWTF was fully integrated in the International Tennis Federation. In 2010, Brad Parks was presented in the International Tennis Hall of Fame.

Additional
The Brad Parks Award was created in 2002 by the United States Tennis Association (USTA) and in 1993 by the International Tennis Federation (ITF)  and given to an individual every year for outstanding or significant contributions to the sport of wheelchair tennis.