 Ben Popham in 2019 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Personal information | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Nationality | Australian | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Born | 4 September 2000 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sport | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Country | Australia | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sport | Paralympic swimming | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Disability class | S9 SB8, SM9 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Club | Arena Swim Club | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Coached by | Simon Redmond | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Medal record
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Ben Popham OAM (born 4 September 2000) is an Australian Paralympic swimmer. He represented Australia at the 2019 World Para Swimming Championships, winning a silver and two bronze medals, and the 2020 Summer Paralympics in Tokyo, where he won two gold medals and a silver.
Popham was born on 4 September 2000. He was diagnosed with cerebral palsy as an infant. [1] In 2011 he was chosen to be one of the Channel Seven Perth Telethon's "Little Telethon Stars". [2] In 2019, he commenced a Bachelor of Commerce at Curtin University. [1]
Popham commenced swimming as a seven year old as part of his physical therapy program for cerebral palsy. [1] Popham made his international debut when he represented Australia at the 2018 Pan Pacific Para Swimming Championships in Cairns and won the Men's 100m Freestyle S8 and was a member of the Men's 4x100m Freestyle Relay (34 points) team. [3]
At the 2019 World Para Swimming Championships in London, Popham won a silver medal in the Men's 100m Freestyle S8 and bronze medals in the Men's 50m Freestyle S8 and Men's 4 x 100m Freestyle 34 points. [4]
At the 2020 Tokyo Paralympics, Popham won a gold medal in the Men's 100m freestyle S8 with a time of 57.37 Together with Rowan Crothers, Matt Levy and William Martin, he won gold and broke the current World Record for the Men's 4×100 m freestyle 34 pts by almost 2 seconds. [5] In the Men's 4x100m Medley 34 pts, he swam together with Timothy Disken, Timothy Hodge, and William Martin. His team won the silver medal in a time of 4:07.70, just over a second behind the winners, RPC, who set a new world record. [6] [7] He also competed in the 400 m freestyle S8 where he qualified for the final. He came eighth in the final with a time of 4:49.32.
He has since been reclassified to an S9 swimmer, a class for athletes with more physical ability compared to the S8 classification.
Jessica Tatiana Long is a Russian-born American Paralympic swimmer from Baltimore, Maryland, who competes in the S8, SB7 and SM8 category events. She has held many world records and competed at six Paralympic Games, winning 30 medals. She has won over 50 world championship medals.
Matthew John Levy, is a retired Australian Paralympic swimmer. At five Paralympic Games from 2004 to 2020, he has won three gold, one silver and six bronze medals.
Blake Cochrane, is a retired Australian Paralympic swimmer. He won a silver medal at the 2008 Beijing Paralympics, two gold medals at the 2012 London Paralympics, a silver medal at the 2016 Rio Paralympics, and a silver and one bronze medal at the 2020 Tokyo Paralympics.
Grant Patterson is an Australian Paralympic swimmer. At the 2020 Tokyo Paralympics, his second games, he won a silver and bronze medal. At the 2024 Paris Paralympics, he won two bronze medals.
Maddison Gae Elliott, is an Australian swimmer. At the 2012 Summer Paralympics in London, she became the youngest Australian Paralympic medallist by winning bronze medals in the women's 400 m and 100 m freestyle S8 events. She then became the youngest Australian gold medallist when she was a member of the women's 4 × 100 m freestyle relay 34 points team. At the 2016 Rio Paralympics, she won three gold and two silver medals.
Alexander "Alec" Robert Elliot is a Canadian competitive Paralympic swimmer.
Rowan Crothers is an Australian freestyle swimmer. He represented Australia at the 2016 Rio Paralympics, 2020 Tokyo Paralympics and 2024 Paris Paralympics. He won two gold and one silver medals at the Tokyo Paralympics and two silver and one bronze medals at Paris Paralympics.
Jesse Bage Aungles is an Australian Paralympic swimmer. He represented Australia at the 2016 Rio Paralympics, 2020 Tokyo and the 2024 Paris Paralympics.
Emily Jane Beecroft is an Australian Paralympic swimmer. She represented Australia at the 2016 Rio Paralympics, 2020 Tokyo Paralympics and 2024 Paris Paralympics.
Lakeisha Dawn Patterson, is an Australian Paralympic swimmer. She won medals at the 2014 Commonwealth Games and 2015 IPC Swimming World Championships. At the 2016 Rio Paralympics, she won Australia's first gold medal of the Games in a world record time swim in the Women's 400m freestyle S8. At the 2020 Tokyo Paralympics, she won the gold medal in the Women's 400 m Freestyle S9. At the 2024 Paris Paralympics, she won the silver medal in the Women's 400 m Freestyle S9.
Timothy Malcolm Disken, is an Australian paralympic swimmer. He represented Australia at the 2015 IPC Swimming World Championships and won bronze in the men's 4 × 100 m freestyle relay. At the 2016 Rio Paralympics, he won a gold medal in the men's 100m freestyle S9, a silver medal in the men's S9 50m freestyle and a bronze medal in the men's 200m individual medley SM9. He also competed at the 2020 Summer Paralympics.
Alice Rose Tai is a British paralympic swimmer. Tai competes in the SB8, SM8 and S8. She has represented Great Britain at European and World Championships and at the Commonwealth and Paralympic Games, gold medals at all levels.
Denis Tarasov is a Paralympic swimmer from Russia competing mainly in category S8 events. At the 2012 Summer Paralympics in London he won five medals, including gold in the 50 metre freestyle S8 event. He has represented Russia at two IPC World Championships with a total of 12 medals. At the 2015 IPC Swimming World Championships in Glasgow he set four world records, two as part of Russian relay teams and two individual records, in the 50m and 100m freestyle S8 events.
Timothy Hodge is an Australian Paralympic swimmer. He has represented Australia at the 2016, 2020, and 2024 Summer Paralympics, where he won two gold, three silver and one bronze medals.
McKenzie Coan is an American swimmer. At the 2012 Summer Paralympics in London, she swam the 400m Freestyle in the S8 category. Coan was one of four S8 category swimmers chosen to compete for Team USA at the games. She later had her breakout games in the 2016 Summer Paralympics, where she would go on to win 3 gold medals in the category S7 50, 100, and 400M Freestyle races, with an additional silver medal in the 34-point women's 4 × 100 m Freestyle relay. In the process of getting her gold medal in the 50M Freestyle she also set a new Paralympic Record.
Dimosthenis 'Dimos' Michalentzakis is a Greek Paralympic swimmer who competes in S9 and S8 classification events. He won Paralympic gold in the 100m butterfly S9 at 2016 Summer Paralympics in Rio de Janeiro and Paralympic bronze in the 100m freestyle S8 at 2020 Summer Paralympics in Tokyo. He was born in Alexandroupoli in 19/10/1998 and he has origin from Feres. He holds the world record in 200 meters freestyle in his category with a performance of 2:07:16. The Municipal Swimming Pool of Alexandroupoli has his name.
Morgan Bird is a Canadian Paralympic swimmer who competes in international level events, she specialises in freestyle. She won a bronze medal, at the 2020 Summer Paralympics, in Women's 34pts 4x100m relay. She is a double Parapan American Games champion and double World silver medalist.
William Michael Martin, is an Australian Paralympic swimmer. He won three gold and one silver medals at the 2020 Summer Paralympics in Tokyo, breaking two world records and a Paralympic record in the process.
Keira Kristina Stephens is an Australian Paralympic swimmer. At the 2020 Summer Paralympics, she won two bronze medals. At the 2024 Paris Paralympics, she won a gold medal as a heat.
Isabella Vincent is an Australian Paralympic swimmer. At the age of fifteen, she was the youngest Australian swimmer selected for the 2020 Summer Paralympics in Tokyo, where she won a silver and bronze medal.
