While everyone tuned in for the Paris 2024 Olympics this summer, there seems to not be as much hype for the Paralympics. These athletes, who are historically underestimated, have taken bodily limitations and created innovative new strategies that earn them each spots among the best athletes in the world.
These legends are breaking barriers where accessibility is prioritized in sports, showing those who are told their disabilities are limitations that limits are meant to be pushed past.Forbescontributor Gus Alexiou highlighted the disparities in accessibility to fitness for those with disabilities who cited societal and physical barriers making it impossible for fitness.
The Paralympics is a statement that limitations are only as strong as the innovations that smash through them. Here are some of the legends and big moments that made waves at this year’s Paralympics.
Ali Truwit's triumphant return to swimming
American Paralympian Ali Truwit made a triumphant return to swimming after losing her leg in a shark attack 16 months prior. On May 24, 2023, Truwit was on vacation with her teammates and coach on the Yale swim team. While swimming off the coast of Turks and Caicos, she was bitten by a shark. This would result in the amputation of her foot and part of her lower leg.
Now, Truwit is a Paralympian and a two-time silver medalist. In an interview with People, Truwit spoke about overcoming PTSD and her fears when getting back into the water.
“It's hard to imagine where I was a year ago, and the fact that I'm here today — I have so many pinch-me moments where I'm walking in the village or walking on the pool deck,” Truwit said. “To look back and think about where I was and where I am is crazy.”
Truwit posted a TikTok showing the progress from the first time she entered the water after her shark attack to her swimming for the first time in the Paralympics pool.
“Someone saw the video, and they wrote that ‘the smile says it all,’" Truwit said in her interview with People. “And I think that was such a nice comment for me to hear. To look and see the difference in those videos and think about the fact that I've reclaimed that love of the water, and that I feel so comfortable and happy in the water again. That is honestly bigger to me than any medal.”
Hunter Woodhall and Tara Davis-Woodhall are a real power couple
A few weeks ago, Olympian Tara Davis-Woodhall embraced her husband, Hunter Woodhall after winning her first gold medal at this year’s Summer Olympics. It would be Woodhall’s turn to have a viral moment, where he embraced his wife, after he won his first gold medal in the men's T62 400-meter sprint Sept. 6.
The couple said in a Today interview that those moments with each other keep them grounded.
"I think we spent so much time dreaming about it, how it would be and how it would feel, and then when you get in that moment, it's like, you need somebody to remind you that it's really happening and it kind of grounds you,” HUunter Woodhall told Today. “We've been through this whole process together so there's no one I would rather want to see first after such an incredible performance.”
The two later spoke on the power of manifestation in the interview, and how they both used manifestation to win their medals. Davis-Woodhall wrote in her journal that she would win gold, and Woodhall did the same in his wife’s journal.
"I absolutely believe in the power manifestation," Davis-Woodhall told Today. "I believe the tongue has a lot of power."
Matt Stutzman, the first armless archer to win a gold medal
Matt Stutzman took control of his life when he bought his first bow and arrow. Born with no arms, Stutzman dealt with therejectionfrom jobs and businesses in his hometown in Iowa because they didn’t want to take a chance on him. Being tired of their rejection and the responsibility of providing solely for his wife, he took to a bow and arrow to teach himself how to hunt.
“I really had no idea how I was going to shoot,” Stutzman said in a Los Angeles Times interview. “I googled ‘How to teach an armless man to shoot a bow’ and found nothing.”
This would lead Stutzman on a journey that has now made him a four-time Paralympian and gold-medalist who broke a world record in 2015 for the farthest accurate archery shot with a compound bow when he hit a target from 310 yards.
Stutzman has announced that this was his last Paralympics. Although audiences will no longer see this legend compete in the Paralympics, he has left a legacy. Stutzman started out being the only armless archer in the Paralympics, but three other armless archers competed in this year’s Paralympics.
This Paralympics embraced being in the City of Love
This year’s Paralympics saw the athletes embracing Paris with their displays of love.
Italian Paralympic sprinter Alessandro Ossola proposed to his girlfriend, Ariana, in a crowd of 40,000 people after failing to qualify for the men’s 100m. Ariana, shocked by the proposal, told Ossola “You’re crazy!” as he asked her to marry him.
“Our relationship is like a maelstrom because every athlete needs people around them to push them,” Ossola said in an Olympics interview. “Sometimes, she believed in me more than I believed in myself, and that’s something truly amazing. ‘You can do it, you can succeed, you can, you can,’ she would say. This is something everyone needs, and I hope that everyone finds someone like her. She is my partner … for life.”
American Paralympic archer Tracy Otto had two major announcements at this year’s Paralympics. Otto’s fiance, Ricky Riessle, proposed under the Eiffel Tower, shared through an Instagram post captioned, “I may not have won a medal today but I am going home with something shiny.” She also announced her pregnancy on Instagram.
This year has been filled with great moments for our Paralympians, and these legends continue to represent their nations.
