[VIDEO] How An Amputee Learnt To Run Again And Became A World Champion
Scott Reardon's story proves that if you are focused on achieving something, nothing can hold you back.
By Sadho Ram — 14 Nov 2014, 01:15 PM — Updated about 10 years ago
This is Scott Reardon. Aged 24, he is the fastest single above-knee amputee in the history of Paralympics. But how he became what he is today is what makes Scott's achievement special.
When he was 12, Scott lost his right leg in a farming accident. After the accident, he got back into his passion of water-skiing and eventually became a world champion.
But in 2008, realising he wanted something bigger and better, Scott moved to the Australia Institute of Sport in Canberra. There, for the first time in his life, he got a prosthetic leg put on and soon started to learn to run again.
While the decision to give up waterskiing while at the top of his game was arguably one of the hardest decisions in life, in 2012 it paid. Scott achieved the dream by winning silver in the 100m T42 at the London Paralympic Games.
Scott says: "People always see the polished end product when we compete at the Paralympic Games but they don't realise the process to get from a nothing athlete, which is what I was, to a world-class athlete"
“It’s nice to show people that and to show the world that Paralympians aren’t just people with disabilities. We’re athletes who work really hard at what we do."
news.com.au