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The 2024 Paris Olympics brought such tremendous joy and unity this summer, people were practically distraught when it ended.
Thankfully, the Olympics is merely the shot, and the Paralympics is the much-needed chaser. Our appetites for next-level sporting prowess were wetted, and now we’re being well and truly fed.
From the outspoken and outstanding track queen Hannah Cockroft on the T34 100m, to Sheetal Devi, the Indian archer without arms who uses her feet, shoulders and mouth to hit the target, here are the Paralympians we can’t stop thinking about at the 2024 Paris Paralympics.
1. Sheetal Devi
In a performance so jaw-dropping that it led people to declare that the Olympics was “just a warm up” to the Paralympics, Sheetal Devi proved to the masses this week that archers don’t need arms to hit the bullseye.
The 17-year-old Indian athlete went viral for her technique, which involved using her feet, shoulders and mouth to position the arrow into place, pull back the bowstring and shoot.
Winning moments of our favourite duo 🇮🇳🫶
— The Khel India (@TheKhelIndia) September 2, 2024
Sheetal Devi & Rakesh Ji are Paralympics Medalistspic.twitter.com/7loWRC58xQ
Devi has previously won gold and silver medals for her country at the Asian Para Games, but this weekend marked her first Paralympics win as she and her partner Rakesh Kumar secured a bronze medal for India in the mixed team compound archery.
Sheetal, who was born with phocomelia, a rare congenital disorder leading to underdeveloped limbs, could be seen welling up at the result, overcome with emotion.
2. Hunter Woodhall
Anyone who knows anything about athletes knows this: they love to date other athletes. It makes sense to date within the world of sports: the discipline, the insane training hours, the stunning physiques - why wouldn’t you?
So, sporting couples are hardly novel. But to watch an Olympian being cheered on by their other half and then, less than a month later, see said other half compete at the Paralympics… well, that’s pretty special.
This is the case for Hunter Woodhall, the Team USA Paralympic track and field athlete who happens to be married to Tara Davis-Woodhall, the Team USA Olympic long-jump champion who took home her own Paris 2024 gold medal just two weeks ago.
They’re an incredibly cute couple, and while Hunter failed to bag a medal at the men’s 100m T64 final yesterday, you can rest assured that Tara will have been on the sidelines regardless, ready to support her husband.
3. Oksana Masters
You know what they say: jack of all trades, master of none. Well, Oksana Masters is the opposite, having won a whopping 17 sporting medals across four different sports. It’s literally in her name.
She also has one of the most heartbreaking and compelling backstories out there: Masters, 35, was born in Ukraine three years after Chernobyl, leaving her with numerous radiation-induced birth defects. This included a condition called tibial hemimelia, which resulted in her having different leg lengths, as well as missing weight-bearing shinbones in her calves, webbed fingers with no thumbs, and six toes on each foot.
She was abandoned by her birth parents and moved to an orphanage, where she was regularly beaten and raped by men, until she was seven years old. She was then adopted by an American professor at the University at Buffalo, who became her mother and raised her in a loving home. When Oksana took to the stage to accept her Laureus World Sports Award in 2020, she turned her mother, saying: “Mom, thank you for saving me, for giving me a second opportunity at life and for opening the doors of sports and then waiting for me until I was ready to walk through that door.”
Paris 2024 marks Masters’ seventh Paralympics, where she’ll be competing as a Para cyclist in the road race and time trial events on September 4 and 5.
4. Hannah Cockroft
Homegrown talent Hannah Cockroft has continued her absolute domination of the 100m T34 event, earning yet another gold medal for her efforts on Sunday. This is the wheelchair racer’s fourth consecutive gold in the category, which must be annoying to everyone but her and the citizens of Great Britain, who are all absolutely chuffed.
But Cockroft is not only beloved for her sporting prowess. She’s also a vocal advocate for differently abled athletes, and most recently made headlines for her comments on Paralympic prize money - or rather, the lack of it.
“It's tough seeing the Olympic guys get the money from World Athletics, and then we can't replicate,” she said in an interview after her race. “It's frustrating. That would really pay for my wedding quite well. We want parity and that's what we push for every time.”
5. Ezra Frech
This sprinter has got all the TikTok teens hot under the collar as he catalogues his journey through the Paris 2024 Paralympics. Another delegate from Team USA, Ezra Frech was born without most of his left leg and missing fingers on his left hand.
The 19-year-old athlete now competes in multiple track and field sports - long jump, high jump and 100 metre races - after growing up as an all-round sports lover. As a child he played basketball, baseball, soccer, and karate before focusing on track and field when he was around eight years old.
Yesterday, Frech secured the gold medal in the men’s 100m T63. His family celebrated in the stands, hugging each other and crying in disbelief. While he failed to medal in the men’s long jump T63, he competes in his category of the high jump today, so there’s still time for him to bag another medal.
6. Omara Durand
They call her uncatchable. Cuban athlete Omara Durand became the world’s fastest female para athlete in 2015, where she clocked a record-breaking time at the Toronto 2015 Parapan Am Games in Canada. Then, a few months later, she broke four more world records at the Doha 2015 IPC Athletics World Championships. Durand now has a total of eight Paralympic gold medals to her name, as well as 14 world championships. Mooski said it best: She's a runner, she's a track star.
Durand is visually impaired due to congenital cataracts, causing chronic myopia (nearsightedness) and astigmatism. She started in the T13 classification then moved to T12 when her eyesight deteriorated after her daughter, Ericka, was born.
Durand has big goals for Paris: she wants gold medals in three distances - 100m, 200m and 400m. And if you think it’s all hard work and discipline, don’t worry, Durand doesn’t take it *too* seriously - at least, not so seriously that she won’t eat fried chicken. “I hardly do diets except sometimes if I am overweight,” she told interviewers, “I really like fried chicken, fries and ice cream, but I eat pretty healthy.”
7. Simone Barlaam
It’s not everyday that you rock up to your first Paralympics and bag four medals. But that’s exactly what Italian swimmer Simone Barlaam did in Tokyo back in 2021, and now he’s back for more. Barlaam has already bagged three medals so far this Paralympics, including a gold medal for his efforts in the men’s 50m freestyle S9, where he also broke a world record.
Barlaam has congenital hypoplasia, which changes the way he swims. In an interview where he discussed his condition, he explained: “Compared to an able-bodied swimmer, my stroke is more upper body driven. My left leg serves more as a kind of propulsion, so I push from the block or from the wall with my left leg and my left foot, while my right leg is just there kinda for stabilisation and it really does not [do] much.”
He’s got one swimming event left - the 100m butterfly this Friday, 6 September - so let’s see if he can keep up with tradition and bag a fourth medal too.
