CORALVILLE -- Kip and Tyson Neubauer of Iowa City led the athletes through the gauntlet of flags, carrying the Iowa and American flags forward to the front of the procession Saturday morning in the Northwest Junior High gymnasium.

After the playing of "Proud to Be an American" by Lee Greenwood, the roughly 40 athletes took the oath of the Special Olympics.

"Let me win," they said in unison, repeating after Special Olympics Iowa special programs director Kathy Irving. "But if I cannot win, let me be brave in the attempt."

The athletes, all with multiple mental and physical disabilities, were at Northwest on Saturday morning for the Special Olympics Challenge Day. It is a one-day event that allows those who cannot participate in the regular Special Olympics competitions because of severe disabilities to take part in games with the help of volunteers.

"We do Challenge Days because it gives athletes the chance to participate," Irving said. "We take games their peers play and (modify them). They get to make a basket and be like everyone else."

Participants in the Challenge Day, most of whom are wheelchair-bound, could take part as a team or as an individual in sports including ball darts, balloon volleyball, dice bowling, ramp bowling and wheelchair basketball. All of the sports are done with the aid of switch-activated equipment, and the participants get a ribbon and a gold medal for participation at the end of the day, Irving said.

Among those participating were Kip Neubauer, 40, and his brother, Tyson, 30. Both were diagnosed with pelizaeus merzbacher, a rare genetic disorder in which coordination, motor abilities and intellectual function deteriorate over time, and have been confined to wheelchairs for most of their lives, said their mother, Bonnie Neubauer of Oxford. Both also have been participating in Special Olympics for most of their lives, with both qualifying for national contests in various events. Both played wheelchair basketball and bowled on Saturday.

"Challenge Day is a wonderful event," Bonnie Neubauer said. "This really works well. This is (Kip's) Special Olympics."

Among the roughly 75 volunteers helping out were several athletes from the regular Special Olympics contests.

They included Traci Long of Iowa City, who will compete in the national Special Olympic Games in tennis in July in Lincoln, Neb. Long was helping with the ball darts game on Saturday.

"It's a great cause," she said. "I like helping other people out. I have a lot of friends here today."

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