Paralympics 2024: Redemption time beckons for Australia’s bravest athlete

After being pipped at the line in Tokyo one of Australia’s bravest athletes Lauren Parker has ‘unfinished business’ as she sets out to claim gold in this year’s triathlon at the Paris Paralympics.

EXCLUSIVE : Olympic and Paralympic triathletes. (Medal chance) Tokyo bound Wheelchair Paratriathlete Lauren Parker (Paratriathlon Team to be officially announced on Monday 19/7/21. Picture: NIGEL HALLETT

At a time when some athletes are losing the nerve to speak freely for fear of upsetting anyone, Lauren Parker is a refreshing exception.

One of Australia’s most inspiring athletes who has won world championships in both para triathlon and para cycling, Parker is also a throwback to simpler times when Aussies were renowned for calling things as they see them.

Whether she’s winning or losing, Parker never hesitates to say exactly what’s on her mind. That upset some officials but also endeared her to the Australian sports-loving public, who have embraced Parker as one of the biggest sentimental favourites for gold at the Paris Paralympics.

Beaten by the narrowest of margins for the top prize in para triathlon at the last Games in Tokyo, Parker has never shied away from the fact she was gutted by the loss.

Lauren Parker was pipped at the line for gold at the Tokyo Paralympics. Picture: AFP

While many competitors will vouch that they are content with silver, Parker’s not one of them. For her, Paris is all about one thing: ”I’ve got unfinished business,” she told this masthead.

“Obviously, I want to get the gold.

“I’ve been working so hard for the last three years towards the one goal of Paris and getting the gold medal.

“So, I’m feeling ready. I’ve had a good preparation, a decent preparation, and I’m ready to go.”

Originally scheduled for Monday night (Australian time), the triathlon races have all been moved forward 24 hours to Sunday night to avoid an incoming storm that threatens to flood the city’s waterways and pollute the Seine river, where the 750m swimming leg will be held.

The choice of the Seine is already highly controversial, and not just because of the filthy state of the water. It also has a strong current, which could be treacherous for Paralympians, swimming without the use of all their limbs.

Not that Parker is fussed because she’s on a mission to make amends for Tokyo.

Silver medalist in Tokyo, Lauren Parker wants to win gold in Paris. Picture: Getty Images

In a wheelchair since a horrific cycling accident in 2017, Parker led all the way in the Japanese capital and looked destined for the top spot on the podium until she was pipped right on the line by American Kendall Gretsch, who is herself an inspiring wheelchair athlete.

The final margin was just one second but Parker had reason to feel aggrieved because she had lost valuable during the wheelchair leg after being held up by a lower competitor.

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Unafraid of rattling a few cages, she also launched a scathing criticism of Triathlon Australia (TA), effectively accusing the national body of ruining her chances of winning gold in Tokyo, claiming she lost critical time during the transitions between each of the three legs after a TA ruling which she said prevented her from using her regular handler.

It’s that blunt honesty and unwavering commitment to winning that’s earned Parker a reputation as one of Australia’s bravest and most admired athletes.

Seven years ago, Parker was an elite able-bodied athlete, out training on her bike when the tyres punctured without warning while she was riding at full speed on a highway.

Lauren Parker was paralysed from the waist down after a horrific bicycle crash in 2017. Picture: Getty Images

She was thrown into a metal guard rail where she suffered a punctured lung, broken ribs and multiple other fractures. Lucky to survive, doctors told her she would never walk again after she damaged her spinal cord.

Paralysed from the waist down, the 35-year-old remains in constant pain, which she has described as feeling like she’s being cut up by a chainsaw, which only disappears when she’s training or competing.

Parker is one of the favourites to win gold in para triathlon but if everything goes according to script, that may not be her only trip to the podium because she’s also entered in two para cycling events, the individual time trial and the road race.

If she manages to win medals in both sports, Parker will be the first Australian Paralympian to achieve the feat since Eric Russell at the 1980 Arnhem Games.

Russell is also the only Australian to win gold medals in different sports at the Paralympics, a feat he achieved in 1976.

And it would be fitting if Parker did emulate him because Russell was also a rebel with a cause.

In 1976, he created headlines around the world when he protested at his first medal ceremony, refusing to bow his head and accept one of the three gold medals he won.

Lauren Parker is a proud Aussie. Picture: Nigel Hallett

Shown live on US television, most people assumed that Russell was protesting against the involvement of South African athletes during the Apartheid Era.

But he later revealed he was conducting a personal protest against countries using athletes with a disability for political purposes.

Ludwig Guttmann, regarded as the founder of the Paralympic movement, immediately threatened to send him home, labelling the Australian “Russell the rascal” but he was allowed to stay and went on to win two more gold medals.

Originally published as Paralympics 2024: Redemption time beckons for Australia’s bravest athlete