More than 4,000 athletes from around the world will compete in 549 events across 22 sports at the 2024 Summer Paralympic Games in Paris from August 28 through September 8. “The Paralympics represent a spirit of inclusivity, community, and inspiration,” says Michael Jaffee, MD, FAAN, chair of neurology at the University of Florida, one of the medical centers for the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee. “It's an example to all of us of how we can overcome whatever challenges we face.”

We spoke with six athletes who are training to qualify for or compete in this year's games.

Allysa Seely

Sport: Para Triathlon
Age: 35
Neurologic condition: Chiari II malformation, basilar invagination, Ehlers-Danlos syndrome

Allysa Seely, a 35-year-old Paralympic triathlete in Phoenix, grew up playing soccer, basketball, and softball. In college, she competed in triathlons. In 2008, she began experiencing fatigue, dizziness, severe chronic migraines, numbness in her extremities, spasticity, nerve pain, trouble walking, and fainting. Her symptoms got so bad she had to be hospitalized and was ultimately diagnosed with Chiari II malformation (a structural defect of the brain and spine), basilar invagination (a condition in which the top of the spine presses into the base of the skull), and Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (a genetic disorder that affects connective tissue, especially the skin, joints, and blood vessels).

By the time of her diagnoses, Seely was using a wheelchair. Soon thereafter, she underwent brain surgery and spent 18 months in a neuro rehabilitation center, learning to walk again and coordinate movements. By the end of her stint at the facility, she was running, swimming, and biking again and began competing in triathlons. In 2012, she won a bronze medal in the annual Paratriathlon World Championships. A year later, she had her left leg amputated below the knee after it got infected, but she was competing again by 2014, this time with a prosthesis.

She is excited for Paris. “We all have flaws,” she says, “but everyone has achieved great things.”

Steve Serio

Sport: Wheelchair Basketball
Age: 36
Neurologic condition: Spinal tumor

When Steve Serio discovered wheelchair basketball at the age of 15, he told his dad it was the first time he felt he didn't have a disability. Now 36, Serio, who lives in Brooklyn, NY, was born with a spinal tumor that went undiagnosed but became infected at 11 months, resulting in incomplete paralysis in his lower extremities. Before playing wheelchair basketball, Serio had participated only in able-bodied sports. “To play baseball, I'd walk up to the plate with braces and crutches and bat with one hand—someone else would run the bases.” Those experiences “left me with a lot of insecurities,” he says. A supportive physical therapist encouraged him to try wheelchair basketball, and he went on to compete in five Paralympics, winning a bronze in 2012 and gold in 2016 and 2020.

Serio made the team in March and is now training for Paris. “Wheelchair basketball has taught me not to be held down by my insecurities. By embracing my disability, I was able to shatter limitations that anyone could ever place upon me.” He is an advocate for the Paralympic movement, a leadership role he will continue long after Paris, which will be his last games. “It's my job to create more opportunities for future Paralympic athletes.”

Brittni Mason

Sport: Para Track and Field
Age: 26
Neurologic condition: Erb's palsy

Brittni Mason, 26, was born with Erb's palsy, a birth defect caused by injury to the brachial plexus (a web of nerves that connects the spinal cord to the arms), which affects her left arm. Every time Mason pumps that arm in a race, it moves laterally across her body. “I have to rebalance myself to stay straight. It takes more effort, and I end up losing milliseconds every time.”

Mason ran able-bodied track in high school and college until a coach encouraged her to try the Paralympics. At the Tokyo 2020 Games, she won silver in the 100-meter and 200-meter dashes and helped her team win gold in the 4 × 100-meter universal relay, setting a world record. Mason, who lives in Cleveland, loves the games. “These athletes are some of the most resilient people I've ever met.”

Todd Vogt

Sport: Para Rowing
Age: 49
Neurologic condition: Parkinson's disease

Todd Vogt was a nationally competitive rower in college, a masters rower after age 27, and a college rowing coach. In 2017, when he and friends went to Boston to compete in the Head of the Charles Regatta, he felt weak and slow. Later he developed a tremor in his left hand and had trouble swinging his left arm. At first he thought he was just overworked. After a series of visits to doctors and specialists, he was referred to a neurologist. During that visit, Vogt, who was 43 at the time, was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease.

“After a few months of soul-searching, I realized that maybe the Paralympic Games could be an option,” says Vogt, who lives in Portland, OR. He competed (and lost) in a two-person boat race at the World Championships in 2019, then qualified as an alternate for Tokyo 2020 but didn't compete. At the World Championships in Belgrade in 2023, he and his partner finished second. “I'm fired up for Paris,” says Vogt, who was selected for the team earlier this year. “I'm definitely faster now.”

Rowing keeps him fit and helps manage his symptoms. “When I'm rowing, I feel good, and my tremor doesn't bother me for hours afterward,” says Vogt, who will turn 50 during the games. At the Paralympics everyone is dealing with something, he says, and everyone has achieved something. “It makes you feel a little less self-conscious,” says Vogt, who mentors others with early-onset Parkinson's.

Leanne Smith

Sport: Para Swimming
Age: 36
Neurologic condition: Generalized dystonia

When she was introduced to aquatic therapy to help with her generalized dystonia, Leanne Smith just sat by the edge of the pool. “I was very reluctant,” recalls the 36-year-old, who lives in Beverly, MA. She'd always loved sports, participating in soccer, softball, and gymnastics in high school. As a college sophomore in 2010, she started experiencing facial paralysis and numbness on her left side. She developed muscle contortions in her limbs, especially her legs. It took two years for a diagnosis, during which time her condition deteriorated, and she went from using a walker and braces to a wheelchair.

After overcoming her reluctance to enter the pool, she slowly removed her braces and tried a dog paddle. Then she learned the swimming strokes and found adaptive ways to move her body. “Swimming gives me a sense of what it felt like back in my able-bodied days—it's an equal playing field for me mentally.”

Once she seemed ready, her swim coach encouraged her to compete, and Smith's time qualified her for the U.S. Paralympics swimming national team in 2013. A year later, she had a major medical setback when she began experiencing frequent seizures, which prevented her from trying out for the Rio 2016 Paralympic Games. But in 2017, in the qualifying meet to make the U.S. team, she set a world record in the 50-meter butterfly in her classification. In Tokyo 2020, she earned a silver medal in the 100-meter freestyle.

Her training regimen includes swimming five days a week, hours of physical and occupational therapy, and lifting weights. She also works closely with her neurologist to time her botulinum toxin injections, which help control muscle contractions but can impair performance. “The Paralympic Games are the most remarkable atmosphere I've ever been in. They are so positive and uplifting. You see all these people with different disabilities, and you're witnessing greatness at the same time.”

Nick Mayhugh

Sport: Para Track and Field
Age: 28
Neurologic condition: Cerebral palsy, epilepsy

Nick Mayhugh had a traumatic birth. He required a blood transfusion, had a stroke due to lack of oxygen, and experienced so many complications he was called a “miracle baby.” Growing up, he couldn't tie his shoes and was weak on one side. When he played soccer, he couldn't kick as hard with his left foot as he could with his right and was told to strengthen his left side. Then in his first year of college, he had a tonic-clonic seizure, which involves a loss of consciousness and involuntary jerking and twitching of muscles, and was subsequently diagnosed with epilepsy and cerebral palsy. The seizure “was the worst day of my life, but it was an explanation for everything I had been feeling,” he says.

Two years later, Mayhugh saw an ad on Instagram for the U.S. Paralympic soccer team. He tried out and made the team. He played for a few years, but when the team didn't qualify for Tokyo 2020, the U.S. Paralympic track and field team recruited him. In Tokyo, he won gold in the 100-meter and 200-meter dashes and 400-meter universal relay and silver in the 400-meter dash.

“I felt very supported when I joined the Paralympics,” says Mayhugh, who lives in Fairfax, VA. He can't believe he'd never heard of the Paralympics until he was 22. He hopes to help change that for others. “My goal is that those coming after me will have an easier path than I did.”

Paralympic Qualifications

To qualify for the Paralympics, athletes must have at least one permanent impairment caused by an underlying health condition, which is determined by a stringent set of medical and performance criteria specific to each sport.

Categories include impaired muscle power, impaired passive range of motion, limb deficiency (such as amputation), leg length difference, short stature, hypertonia (increased muscle tone making it difficult to move), ataxia (lack of or poor coordination), athetosis (slow, involuntary movements), impaired vision, and impaired intellectual development (present before age 18).

Each sport has guidelines for which impairments qualify and different classification categories for competition. Rowing, for example, has three classes—paralysis from the chest down, paralysis in the legs, and partial function in the torso and legs. Athletes are classified after a battery of tests. Once classified, athletes can qualify for the games in one of three ways: vying for a spot at the U.S. Paralympic Team Trials, submitting competition results from an international qualifying event, or being selected through a team evaluation process.