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Priya Naree Cooper, is an Australian world champion disabled swimmer, winning nine Paralympic gold medals as well as world records and world championships. She competed in the Australian swimming team at the 1992, 1996 and 2000 Summer Paralympics with an S8 classification. She was twice the co-captain of the Australian Paralympic team, including at the 2000 Paralympic Games in Sydney, and carried the Australian flag at the closing ceremonies for the 1992 and 1996 Summer Paralympics. Cooper has cerebral palsy and spends much of her time in a wheelchair. She attended university, working on a course in health management. After she ended her competitive Paralympic career, she became a commentator, and covered the swimming events at the 2002 Commonwealth Games.
Australia was the host nation for the 2000 Summer Paralympics which was held in Sydney. Australia competed in the games between 18 and 29 October. The team consisted of 285 athletes in 18 sports with 148 officials. It was the country's largest ever Paralympic delegation to a Games. Australia has participated at every Summer Paralympic Games since its inception. Australia finished at the top of the medal tally with 63 gold, 39 silver and 47 bronze medals to total 149 medals for the games. This was the first time and the only time to date that Australia has finished on top of either an Olympic or Paralympic medal tally. The most successful sports were athletics, cycling, equestrian, swimming and wheelchair tennis. As one of the sporting events, sailing involved the implementation of forecasting systems and services in Sydney Harbour, in addition to the recruitment of professionals to design the project’s plans and processes. This occurred in order to fulfil the requirements of both event organisers, competitors and visitors.
Canada sent a delegation to compete at the 2008 Summer Paralympics in Beijing. 143 Canadian athletes competed in 17 sports. Canada also sent several officials to the games, including Tara Grieve in boccia and Andrew Smith in rowing. Canada finished seventh on the medal table at the Beijing games after finishing third on the medal table at the 2004 Summer Paralympics. Swimmer Donovan Tildesley, a world record-holder and medalist at the 2000 and 2004 Paralympics, was the country's flag bearer at the opening ceremony. The delegation is headed by Chef de Mission Debbie Low.
Australia sent a delegation to compete at the 2008 Summer Paralympics in Beijing. The country sent 167 athletes in 13 sports and 122 officials. It was the country's largest ever Paralympic delegation to an away Games. The team sent to Beijing was described as the emergence of the new generation of Australian athletes with 56 percent of the team attending their first Paralympic Games. The delegation's chef de mission was Darren Peters.
Australia has participated officially in every Paralympic Games since its inauguration in 1960 except for the 1976 Winter Paralympics.
Evan George O'Hanlon, is an Australian Paralympic athlete, who competes mainly in category T38 sprint events. He has won five gold medals at two Paralympic Games – 2008 Beijing and 2012 London. He also represented Australia at the 2016 Rio Paralympics and 2020 Tokyo Paralympics, winning a silver medal and a bronze medal respectively. In winning the bronze medal in the Men's 100m T38 at the 2019 World Para Athletics Championships in Dubai, O'Hanlon became Australia's most successful male athlete with a disability. His bronze medal took him to 12 medals in five world championships – one more than four-time Paralympian Neil Fuller.
Paralympics Australia (PA) previously called the Australian Paralympic Committee (APC) (1998–2019) is the National Paralympic Committee in Australia for the Paralympic Games movement. It oversees the preparation and management of Australian teams that participate at the Summer Paralympics and the Winter Paralympics.
Australia competed at the 2012 Summer Paralympics Games in London, United Kingdom, from 29 August to 9 September 2012. The London Games were the biggest Games with 164 nations participating, 19 more than in the 2008 Beijing Paralympic. Australia has participated at every Summer Paralympic Games and hosted the 2000 Sydney Games. As such, the 2000 Sydney Games, regarded as one of the more successful Games, became a point-of-reference and an inspiration in the development of the 2012 London Games.
Australia competed at the 2004 Summer Paralympics in Athens, Greece. It was Australia's 12th year of participation at the Paralympics. The team included 151 athletes. Australian competitors won 101 medals to finish fifth in the gold medal table and second on the total medal table. Australia competed in 12 sports and won medals in 8 sports. The Chef de Mission was Paul Bird. The Australian team was smaller than the Sydney Games due to a strict selection policy related to the athletes' potential to win a medal and the International Paralympic Committee's decision to remove events for athletes with an intellectual disability from the Games due to issues of cheating at the Sydney Games. This was due to a cheating scandal with the Spanish intellectually disabled basketball team in the 2000 Summer Paralympics where it was later discovered that only two players actually had intellectual disabilities. The IPC decision resulted in leading Australian athletes such as Siobhan Paton and Lisa Llorens not being able to defend their Paralympic titles. The 2000 summer paralympic games hosted in Sydney Australia proved to be a milestone for the Australian team as they finished first on the medal tally for the first time in history.In comparing Australia's 2000 Paralympic performance and their 2004 performance, it is suggested that having a home advantage might affect performance.
Hamish Anderson MacDonald, OAM is an Australian Paralympic athlete. He was born in Melbourne and lives in Canberra. He has cerebral palsy. His achievements and advocacy have made him one of Australia's most respected Paralympians.
Brad Dubberley is an Australian Paralympic wheelchair rugby Head Coach and former athlete. He won a silver medal as an athlete at the 2000 Sydney Games and as the head coach at the 2008 Beijing Games in the mixed wheelchair rugby event. He is the head coach of the Australian Wheelchair Rugby team known as the Australian Steelers.
Sarah Rose is a Paralympic swimming competitor from Australia. She was born in Sydney with dwarfism. At the 2004 Athens Games, she competed in four events and won a bronze medal in the Women's 50 m Butterfly S6 event. At the 2008 Beijing Games she competed in four events.
John Alexander Maclean, OAM is an Australian triathlete, rower, and motivational speaker. A promising rugby league player in his youth, he became a paraplegic after being knocked from his bicycle by a truck in 1988. He subsequently became the first paraplegic to finish the Ironman World Championship and the first to swim the English Channel. Later, he was part of the athletics team at both the Olympics and Paralympics in 2000, and won a silver medal in rowing at the 2008 Beijing Paralympics. In 2014, he completed the Nepean Triathlon without using a wheelchair, after regaining some use of his legs through Ware K Tremor therapy. He is the founder of the John Maclean Foundation, which assists wheelchair users under the age of 18. As a motivational speaker, his clients have included eBay and Pfizer.
Jason Scott Hellwig is a leading Australian sport administrator. He was the chief executive officer of the Australian Paralympic Committee from 2010 to 2015.
Carol Lynn Cooke, is a Canadian-born Australian cyclist, swimmer and rower. A keen swimmer, she was part of the Canadian national swimming team and was hoping to be selected for the 1980 Moscow Olympics before her country boycotted the games. She moved to Australia in 1994, was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 1998, and took up rowing in 2006, in which she narrowly missed out on being part of the 2008 Beijing Paralympics. She then switched to cycling, where she won a gold medal at the 2012 London Paralympics, two gold medals at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Paralympics and a silver medal at the 2020 Tokyo Paralympics.
Melissa Perrine is a B2 classified visually impaired para-alpine skier from Australia. She has competed at the four Winter Paralympics from 2010 to 2022. At the 2015 IPC Alpine Skiing World Championships, she won three gold, one silver and one bronze medals. At the 2018 Winter Paralympics, she won two bronze medals.
Australia sent nine competitors to the 2014 Winter Paralympics in Sochi, Russia. The delegation also consisted of two sighted guides and 15 support staff. The team won two bronze medals. Toby Kane won a bronze medal in the men's Super combined standing, and Jessica Gallagher and guide Christian Geiger won one in the women's giant slalom visually impaired event.
Australia competed at the 2016 Summer Paralympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, from 7 to 18 September 2016. Australia repeated its 2012 Summer Paralympics achievement in finishing fifth of the medal tally.
Australia sent a team of 12 athletes and three guides to the 2018 Winter Paralympics in PyeongChang, Korea. Australia finished 15th on the medal table and it was its fourth best medal performance at the Winter Paralympics.
Australia participated at the 2020 Summer Paralympics in Tokyo, Japan, from 24 August to 5 September 2021. It sent its largest away team - 179 athletes to a Summer Paralympics. Australia finished eighth on the gold medal table and sixth on the total medals table.
References
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- ↑ Marks, Kathy (14 April 2000). "Hit squad will send harbour sharks scooting". The Independent. Sydney, Australia. Retrieved 21 October 2011.[ dead link ]
- ↑ "The merry-go-round at the top of Australian sport". Sydney, Australia: Sydney Morning Herald. 23 May 2003. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
- ↑ "AM - Paralympians urge more commercial support for Games". Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Retrieved 21 October 2012.
- ↑ "Paralympians hit their medal target - Sport". The Age. 14 March 2006. Retrieved 21 October 2012.
- ↑ Barlow, Karen (15 September 2008). "Class issues surface at Beijing Paralympics". ABC. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
- ↑ "Australia's Paralympians halfway there". Nine MSN. Archived from the original on 10 June 2015. Retrieved 21 October 2012.
- ↑ "Para-Equestrian Team Ride for Gold". Riding for the Disabled. Archived from the original on 9 August 2011. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
- ↑ "Speedo to outfit Paralympic Swim Team". Swimming Australia. 19 November 2007. Archived from the original on 15 October 2011. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
- ↑ "New Chief Backs Winter Team". The Australian. Retrieved 21 October 2012.
- ↑ Mannion, Tim (15 August 2008). "Chance To Row Into Record Books". Australian Paralympic Committee. Archived from the original on 5 June 2011. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
- ↑ McDonald, Margie (18 April 2011). "Jason Hellwig entrusted as Chef de Mission". The Australian. Sydney, Australia. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
- ↑ Simon Darcy; Richmard Cashman (2008). Benchmark Games. Benchmark Games. pp. vi. ISBN 978-1-876718-05-3 . Retrieved 21 October 2012.