GB Paralympic team set the bench mark for 2012

Beijing Success

The British Paralympic team enjoyed their best ever performances at a Paralympic Games to date, with an amazing medal haul of 102 medals, including 42 Gold medals, 29 Silver and 31 Bronze. Coming second only to hosts China and beating the United States into third place, what made Team GB’s performance even more impressive was the amount of medals won across a wide range of events, with personal best performances and new world records set. Some of the best individual and team performances came from the GB Cycling team where they won 12 of the 13 Gold medals available, smashing existing records in the process. In a Games that produced record beating crowds, as well as record beating performances, Peter Norfolk won the Quad Singles Gold in the Tennis in front of a crowd bigger than the crowd for the Federer-Nadal Olympic Tennis Final. A new sport making its Paralympic debut was Adaptive Rowing which Tom Aggar and Helene Raynesford marked in style for GB, coming away with Gold medals in the Single Sculls. The individual and team performances of the GB Swimming team were outstanding, winning medals across the board and setting new records. On the Track, there were outstanding individual performances from David Weir and Shelly Woods. Despite having to cope with illness during the Games David came away with two Gold medals. ‘It’s the best feeling in the World. I have trained four years for this’ he said, celebrating his victory. GB chief Phil Lane hailed the British effort at the games "a wonderful performance".

New stars emerge

Beijing produced some great performances from GB’s younger paralympic stars. Amongst the most outstanding performances of the Games had to be that of GB Swimming team’s 13 year old schoolgirl Eleanor Simmons, who brought home two Gold medals. Describing the last 50m of the event in which she won her first Gold, Eleanor remarked ‘All I did was kick my legs and just go for it’. Another outstanding performance was achieved by Track Racer, 18 year old Mickey Bushell. Mickey was expecting to gain experience from Beijing and was ecstatic to be selected. He produced a personal best to come away with a Silver medal in the T53 100m. His reaction was, ‘It’s mind blowing don’t know what to say. I am speechless, I am really happy’. Another young star who had a tremendous Paralympics was Shelly Woods. Shelly won a T54 1500m Silver and T54 5000m Bronze. Shelly was involved in perhaps the most controversial Paralympic final ever, which was re-run after a major collision even though the race wasn’t stopped and medals had been awarded. Showing enormous mental strength, Shelly still managed to stay focused and win a Bronze in the re-run. Describing the 5000m ‘It’s the biggest race of my life, I came into the stadium and it was packed and I was like wow, but I knew I had a job to do’.

Reaction of the Athletes

Wheelchair Basketball team Captain Johnny Pollock, described the team’s effort after winning the Bronze medal ‘ a fantastic win, an absolutely unbelievable win,….. there’s nothing I can say that can describe what were going through right now……. it’s a team sport,….. that’s what we wanted a team effort tonight, we had emotion, this team strived on playing with emotion and it proved it tonight’. Track athlete Ben Rushgrove on winning his Silver medal in the T36 100 m in a time of 12.35 said ‘It’s hard to describe the feeling of winning …or even coming second … the easiest way to describe it is …it’s beyond words’.

London 2012

Being 2008 has been a showcase for Paralympic Sport, with athletes performing in front of sell out crowds and producing record smashing performances, and with more media attention than at any previous Paralympic Games. In four years time London will host the games and Paralympic sport will be coming home to the country where Paralympic sport began. Mayor of London Boris Johnson said in a statement: "Our Paralympic athletes put in an absolutely brilliant performance in Beijing, bringing us all pride in their great achievement and renewing our confidence for 2012". Over the next four years there will be huge media attention on London 2012. There will never ever be a better opportunity to develop Paralympic sport and increase participation and access to sport for disabled people in Britain.