Personal information | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Full name | Susan Marjory Freeman | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Nationality | Australia | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Born | 10 January 1948 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Died | 4 October 2023 75) Gladstone, Queensland, Australia | (aged||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Medal record
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Susan Marjory "Tracey" Freeman ( née Lumby; 10 January 1948 – 4 October 2023) was an Australian Paralympic athlete who won ten medals at two Paralympics.
Freeman was born on 10 January 1948 [1] and became a quadriplegic due to polio at the age of two in 1951, while living in the Queensland city of Mount Isa. She went to the Crippled Children's Centre in the Sydney suburb of Redfern until the age of 15, when she moved to the Mt Wilga Rehabilitation Centre. She developed a passion for sports competition, having been introduced to archery, field events and swimming during her rehabilitation. She then moved with her family back to Queensland and spent time at the Kingsholm Rehabilitation Centre in Brisbane. [2] She married Warren Freeman shortly before the 1972 Heidelberg Paralympics and they had two children. [1] [2]
Freeman died in the Queensland city of Gladstone on 4 October 2023, at the age of 75. [1] [3]
Freeman's first national competition was the National Wheelchair Games in Sydney, where she won all the events she entered; she broke Australian records in discus, javelin, shot put and the 60 m sprint, and won a gold medal in table tennis. [2] She was therefore selected for a place in the Australian team at the 1972 Heidelberg Paralympics, where she won three gold medals and broke world records in the Women's Discus 1B, Women's Javelin 1B, and Women's Shot Put 1B events, and two silver medals in the Women's 60 m Wheelchair 1B and Women's Slalom 1B events. [2] [4] She was the most successful athlete at the games, [5] the first Australian woman to win a gold medal at a Paralympic athletics competition, and one of Australia's first high-profile Paralympic competitors. [2]
Freeman defended her national titles in athletics events at the 1973 National Wheelchair Games in Adelaide and won a gold medal in the wheelchair slalom. [2] She won four gold medals in shot put, discus, javelin, and slalom and broke world records in the first two events at the 1974 Commonwealth Paraplegic Games in Dunedin. [2] [6] The next year, she won gold medals in the discus and shot put and silver medals in the 60 m and slalom at the 1975 FESPIC Games in Japan. [2] At the 1976 Toronto Games, she won three gold medals and three world records in the Women's 60 m 1C, Women's Javelin 1C, and Women's Shot Put 1C events, and two silver medals in the Women's Discus 1C and Women's Slalom 1C events. [4] She hoped to participate in the 1980 Arnhem Paralympics but a car accident just before the games forced her to withdraw from the competition. [2] She made a comeback in the early 1990s, when she once again won medals in national competitions and set Australian records, before retiring in early 1996. [2]
In 1976, Freeman became the first athlete with a disability to win The Courier-Mail Sportswoman of the Year award. [2] In 2000, she received an Australian Sports Medal. [7] In December 2016, Freeman was inducted into the Australian Paralympic Hall of Fame. [8]
Francis Ettore Ponta was an Australian Paralympic competitor and coach. He competed in several sports including basketball, pentathlon, swimming and fencing. A paraplegic, he lost the use of both his legs after a tumour was removed from his spinal column when he was a teenager. Ponta was a member of Australia's first national wheelchair basketball team, and is credited with expanding the sport of wheelchair basketball in Western Australia. At the end of his competitive career, he became a coach, working with athletes such as Louise Sauvage, Priya Cooper, Madison de Rozario, Bruce Wallrodt and Bryan Stitfall. He died on 1 June 2011 at the age of 75 after a long illness.
Australia competed at the 1968 Summer Paralympics in Tel Aviv, Israel. The Games significantly expanded in 1968 when compared to previous years, as did the Australian team and the events included in the Games. Mexico City were originally to host the 1968 Paralympics, however, they were moved to Tel Aviv in Israel.
Israel was the host nation of the 1968 Summer Paralympics in Tel Aviv. The Israeli team finished third in the medal table and won sixty-two medals: eighteen gold, twenty-one silver and twenty-three bronze. Over 750 athletes from 28 nations took part in the Games; the Israeli team included 53 athletes, 37 men and 15 women.
Australia sent a team to compete at the 1972 Summer Paralympics in Heidelberg, West Germany. Australian won 25 medals - 6 gold, 9 silver, and 10 bronze medals in six sports. Australia finished 11th on the gold medal table and 9th on the total medal table.
Australia has participated in every Summer Paralympic Games since the inception of the Paralympics in the year 1960. The 1976 Paralympic Games in Toronto was Australia's fifth Paralympic Games. Australia competed in 10 out of the 13 sports and were able to win medals in six of these sports. There were 44 athletes representing Australia at the Games with a number of these athletes participating in multiple sports. Of the 44 athletes, 34 were males and 10 were females. As a team, Australia won 41 medals, 16 of which were gold. This placed it just outside the top 10 in 11th position at the end of the Games. The Australian team won more gold medals at the 1976 Paralympic Games than at any of the previous four Paralympic Games. 26 athletes finished on the podium in their respective events. This represents more than half the number of athletes that Australia sent to Toronto. Six world records were broken by Australian athletes on their way to winning their respective events.
Daphne Jean Hilton was an Australian Paralympic competitor. She was the first Australian woman to compete at the Paralympic Games. She won fourteen medals in three Paralympics in archery, athletics, fencing, swimming, and table tennis from 1960 to 1968.
Gary Leslie Hooper, MBE is an Australian Paralympic competitor. He won seven medals at three Paralympics from 1960 to 1968.
Lorraine McCoulough-Fry was an Australian Paralympic swimmer, athlete and table tennis player.
Also known as the 13th Stoke Mandeville Games, the 1964 Summer Paralympics was the 2nd Paralympic Games. Hosted in Tokyo, the games ran from 8 to 12 November. Australia won a total of 30 medals and finished fourth on the medal tally behind Italy (3rd), Great Britain (2nd) and the United States (1st). Australia competed in 6 of the 9 sports at the Games, winning medals in each of those sports, but was most successful in the pool, winning a majority of their medals in swimming events.
Australia competed at the 1980 Summer Paralympics in Arnhem, Netherlands. It was the 6th Summer Paralympic Games in which Australia had competed. These Games were the biggest Paralympics yet, with 1,973 people participating. Of those participants, 57 were Australian. The team was made up of 45 men and 12 women, and was Australia's largest team to compete at any Paralympic Games so far.
Bruce Wallrodt, was an Australian Paralympic athlete. He competed at five Paralympic Games and won nine medals, four of them gold.
Eric Cyril Russell, MBE is an Australian Paralympic athlete, coach, and administrator.
T52 is disability sport classification for disability athletics. People in this class have good shoulder and upper body control, but lack fine motor skills in their arms and hands. They have no or limited trunk and leg function. The class includes people with a number of different types of disabilities including spinal cord injuries. Similar classifications are T51, T53 and T54.
T53 is disability sport classification for disability athletics. The class includes people with a number of different types of disabilities including spinal cord injuries. People in this class have full use of their arms but have no or limited trunk function. Similar classifications are T51, T52, and T54. People in this class have a functional upper limbs, but limited trunk usage and limited lower limb functionality. During classification, they both undergo a bench test of muscle strength and demonstrate their skills in athletics. People in this class include Tanni Grey-Thompson (GBR), Samantha Kinghorn (GBR), Angie Ballard (AUS) and Richard Colman (AUS).
Julie Caroline Van Keulen, BEM is an Australian Paralympic athlete.
Brydee Moore is an Australian athlete with cerebral palsy that competes in the shot put, discus and javelin. She won a silver medal at the 2015 IPC Athletics World Championships. She represented Australia at the 2016 Rio Paralympics in athletics.
F2, also T2 and SP2, is a wheelchair sport classification that corresponds to the neurological level C7. Historically, it was known as 1B Complete, 1A Incomplete. People in this class are often tetraplegics. Their impairment effects the use of their hands and lower arm, and they can use a wheelchair using their own power.
F3, also T3 and SP3, is a wheelchair sport classification that corresponds to the neurological level C8. Historically, it was known as 1C Complete, and 1B Incomplete. F3 sportspeople have functional issues related to the muscles in their throwing arm, though they have enough control over their fingers to grip a throwing implement normally. They have no functional trunk control.
F4, also T4 and SP4, is a wheelchair sport classification that corresponds to the neurological level T1- T7. Historically, it was known as 1C Incomplete, 2 Complete, or Upper 3 Complete. People in this class have normal upper limb function, and functional issues with muscles below the nipple line.
Ayala Malchan-Katz is an Israeli Paralympic athlete. Between the years 1968-1988 she participated in six Paralympic competitions and won 13 medals, of which 5 were gold.