After Australia’s incredible performance at the Olympic Games, attention now turns to the nation’s Paralympic stars heading to Paris.
Australia took home 21 gold medals last time out in Tokyo, with their best ever performance coming in Sydney 24 years ago when they topped the medal table with 63 golds.
Their Paris effort may fall somewhere in between, if these awe-inspiring athletes perform at their best on the big stage.
Here, Daily Mail Australia profiles the Aussie stars heading to Paris and their incredible stories.
Australian athletes will be heading to Paris for the Paralympic Games this summer
Curtis McGrath
Defending Para-canoe medallist Curtis McGrath journey to the Paralympics began with a joke when he was laid out on a stretcher following a mine blast.
Having lost both of his legs, the combat engineer quipped: ‘I will go to the Paralympics’.
‘I knew my legs were gone, they weren’t coming back,’ he told the Sydney Morning Herald.
‘It was a traumatic day for everyone, and if I could say something to hopefully alleviate that, that’s why I said what I said.’
He has since become Australia’s greatest Para-canoeist, winning three gold medals in total.
‘The skills I learnt in the military helped me to persevere, to keep going when it got tough and be quite resourceful,’ McGrath, 36, added.
Curtis McGrath is an Australian war hero and survived a mine explosion in Afghanistan
Ma Lin
Aussie table tennis star Ma Lin was just five years old when his right arm was eaten by a brown bear during a family trip to a nearby zoo in China in the mid 1990s.
He was just five years old at the time of the attack and was lucky to survive, given the amount of blood lost during the episode.
‘I thought he was my friend because I used to go to the zoo every week to feed him,’ Ma Lin said.
‘So, I just decided to reach out and pat him, but I guess he was not in a good mood that day.’
Remarkably, Ma Lin remained conscious and did not cry throughout the ordeal.
“I think I was in a bit of shock,” he said. “But I didn’t cry. Not once.”
A talented pianist prior to the attack, Ma Lin focused on table tennis and had to teach himself to play left-handed, given he was naturally a right hander. He won golds for China in Beijing, London and Rio before defecting to Australia after moving Down Under.
Ma Lin lost his right arm after being attacked by a bear in China when he was just five
Madison de Rozario
Wheelchair racer Madison de Rozario developed a neurological condition called transverse myelitis when she was just four years old, which affects the spinal cord.
Just 10 years after becoming wheelchair-bound, de Rozario was representing Australia as a teenager at the Beijing Games.
She became Australia’s Paralympic athlete of the year after winning gold in the 800m and the marathon in Tokyo.
De Rozario will be her country’s flag-bearer in Paris, along with swimmer Brenden Hall.
Vanessa Low
Reigning long jump champion Low, 34, previously represented Germany before switching to Australia in 2019.
She was just 15 years old when she fell from a crowded platform in front of an oncoming train. As a result, Low lost both of her legs and suffered broken bones in her back and injuries to her head.
Low took up athletics two years later and made the German team. She became Australian when she met and married fellow Paralympian Scott Reardon. They share a son, Matteo, who was born in June 2022.
German-born Vanessa Low defected to Australia after marrying her husband Scott Reardon
Tristan Knowles
Australia’s men’s wheelchair basketball captain Knowles was diagnosed with bone cancer at the age of nine.
As a result, his left leg was amputated above the knee, but the cancer returned at age 12 and he had to go through 22 rounds of chemotherapy and a lung lobectomy.
After going into remission, he began his wheelchair basketball career as a teenager, and has led his nation in six separate Paralympic Games.
Ameera Lee
Lee arrived relatively late to the world of archery when her 15-year-old son, Huthaifa, encouraged her to try the sport back in 2016.
The single mother, who has multiple sclerosis, will be part of Australia’s biggest para-archery team in 40 years.
Chris Bond
Bond was 19 years old when he woke from a coma to learn he had lost his left hand, right fingers and his legs after surviving a bacterial infection and acute promyelocytic leukaemia.
The Steelers captain joined a wheelchair rugby team and established himself as one of the world’s best players just six years after waking from his coma.
He led the Steelers during their glistening era in which they won two Paralympic golds in London and Rio, as well as a world championship.
Chris Bond is one of the greatest wheelchair rugby players of all time
Daniel Michel
Twenty-nine-year-old Michel has muscular dystrophy and will represent Australia in boccia, which does not have a counterpart in the Olympics.
He claimed bronze in Tokyo but has been backed to challenge for the top prize in Paris.
Michel was the first athlete to compete in the sport for Australia in 16 years when he represented his nation in Rio.
Daniel Michel has represented Australia in boccia at two Paralympic Games
Alexa Leary
Leary was on course for a promising career in triathlon when a cycling accident in 2021 changed the course of her life.
She suffered permanent brain damage, blood clots and broken bones following the crash, and remarkably learnt how to walk and talk again, turning to swimming to support her rehabilitation.
Just two years later, she made it on the Australian para-swimming team and secured her place in Paris with gold and silver in the 100m and 50m swims at the world championships.
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