Paralympic World Cup - 2008 - Manchester Highlights

Steve Cram introduces coverage of the Paralympic World Cup from Manchester. The five-day meeting, which features athletics, swimming, track cycling and wheelchair basketball, is one of the most important on the disability sports calendar and forms a crucial part of the Paralympics build-up with the Beijing Games now just around the corner. Around 400 athletes from 45 different countries will be competing, including a strong contingent of Britons. David Weir, who won his third consecutive London Marathon in April, will be among those in action on the track, while three-time Paralympic swimming gold medallist Jody Cundy will be looking to continue his successful transition to track cycling. Britain will have teams in both the men's and the women's wheelchair basketball with GB's men hoping to improve on the bronze medal that they have won in the previous two years. The top-class international line-up includes South African swimmer Natalie du Toit, who won three events in Manchester last year to bring her total of Paralympic World Cup gold medals to eight. Dame Tanni Grey-Thompson, Britain's most successful ever Paralympian who retired after last year's Paralympic World Cup, will be part of the BBC commentary team.