BEIJING WAS BIG WINNER; Joy at record audiences for Paralympics.

Byline: By SARAH JUDD

TEESSIDE athletes past and present have welcomed news the 2008 Paralympics were the most watched ever.

More people around the world tuned in to the event in Beijing than any other Paralympic Games according to figures from the International Paralympic Committee (IPC).

More than 3.8 billion people in 38 countries watched more than 1,800 hours of TV coverage from the Games.

The 2008 figure was double that of Athens 2004, giving the Beijing Paralympics the largest cumulated TV audience in its history.

Wheelchair basketball star Terry Bywater, who brought a bronze medal back to Redcar from the event, said he felt people showed as much interest in the Paralympics as the Olympics in 2008.

"In Beijing, I didn't feel the Paralympics were just a follow-on from the Olympics," he said.

"This time round, more people watched and found out we are not just people in wheelchairs doing a sport, but this is our lives, our job. They realised how intense it is."

Former Paralympic wheelchair racer, Dame Tanni Grey-Thompson, also from Redcar, said she was amazed by the packed stadiums of Beijing during her work with the BBC.

She said: "In the Athens Paralympics you could practically count the people in the stadium and they were usually related to someone competing, but in Beijing it was packed all the time."

But in an interview with the Daily Telegraph, Dame Tanni, who won 11 gold medals and was awarded the OBE, the MBE and made a Dame in 2005, pointed to a "lack of parity" in the honours system.

Her comments came after every Olympic gold medalist at Beijing received New Year's Honours, but 17 of the 35 Paralympic athletes who brought home gold missed out.

Dame Tanni said the achievements of able-bodied and disabled athletes should be given equal recognition after the 2012 games in London.

"The reality - and it is surely not right - is that you have to multi-medal at the Paralympic Games to get a New Year's Honours list award," she said.

"By the time 2012 comes around, we need to get this in order. There is a lack of parity, and we are playing catch-up."

However she has since stressed she wasn't condemning the system as a whole - just pointing out its possible shortfalls.

Since the Paralympics, Terry Bywater, 25, has moved to Madrid with wife Jodie to play for Spanish wheelchair basketball team Fundosa, who are currently top of the league.

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GAMES STARS: Dame Tanni Grey-Thompson, left, and Terry Bywater, right, have both enjoyed medal success at the Paralympics