Paris Paralympics 2024: Australian swimmer Alexa Leary wins ...
PARIS: Three years after Alexa Leary underwent lifesaving surgery following an horrific bike crash that shattered her skull and left her unable to walk or talk, the beloved Australian swimmer has won individual Paralympic gold.
The 23-year-old from the Sunshine Coast also broke her own 100m freestyle world record on Thursday morning (AEST), scorching through the women's S9 race in 59.53 seconds.
She broke her own world record twice within half a day, having already clocked 59.60 in a blinding heat swim.
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Earlier in the swimming program, she had powered an Australian relay team to glory with a staggering anchor leg.
"It's been a long, rough journey for me," Leary said at the Paris La Defense Arena.
Alexa Leary celebrates winning individual gold in Paris. Adam Pretty/Getty Images
"It's a miracle that I'm living, and I'm walking and I'm talking. I was told that I never would three years ago, and I've just come so far.
"I am so impressed with myself. I'm like, 'Lex, look how far you've actually come'.
"It's not sad to talk about, but it's an emotional thing.
"My family is the reason why I'm here, and they're up there [in the stands] looking at me.
"Honestly, it's amazing."
Watch every moment, every medal of the Paralympic Games Paris 2024 live and free on Channel 9, 9Gem and 9Now. Plus, every event streaming ad free, live and on demand with 4K on Stan Sport.
Just outside Noosa in July 2021, Alexa was on a bike ride training as a triathlete when her front wheel clipped a bike in front of her.
She was flung from her bike at 70 kilometres per hour.
Her dad Russ, who had been close behind on his own bike, arrived at a hellish scene.
Alexa was unconscious. Blood was everywhere. Her ribs, skull, scapula and leg were broken. And she had a punctured lung.
As she lay in a Brisbane hospital bed later that day, her parents, Russ and Belinda, were told to say goodbye to her. It was the first of eight times they would say goodbye throughout a nightmarish stint in intensive care.
The night they first said goodbye to Alexa, who was unable to breathe on her own, she had part of her scalp removed.
The surgery was a success, but the following night she suffered a major blood clot.
Medication could have saved her, but it also could have killed her.
The following night, she had a fever.
The complications went on.
But after 111 days in hospital, the young Queenslander, 19 at the time, returned home.
There's a remarkable video on Instagram of two physiotherapists guiding Alexa across a hospital room. There's another person pushing a wheelchair behind her, in case she needs to take a break. She's wearing a rugby league headgear and has a cord hanging from her nose.
Alexa still has memory problems and struggles with her emotions.
That will be the case for the rest of her life.
Those cognitive problems and weakness down the right side of her body are the results of a traumatic brain injury, also known as a TBI.
Inside her head are a titanium plate and a shunt. The shunt is a tube that runs from her brain to her stomach, draining fluid as it builds up. She also has special clips holding various parts of her detached scalp in place.
Once at an airport in Los Angeles, she walked through customs and beeped.
"It went off and I was like, 'I don't have drugs and I don't have an animal. I just have a cool head!'," she laughed in an interview with Wide World of Sports in February.
"I'm a passionate person," Alexa said after winning solo Paralympic gold.
"When I want it, I'm going to go out and do it. I have to.
"So I wanted to keep swimming for recovery. But I was like, 'Nah, I'm more than that!'."
Alexa was at her theatrical best as she soaked up her success on Thursday morning (AEST). After starring in a TV interview with Nine's Annabelle Williams, she collected her gold medal and danced her heart out.
Her dad Russ, whose memories of the horrendous scene at the bike crash will stay with him forever, watched on from the stands with Belinda, Alexa's mum.
An entourage of "Team Lex" diehards, including her parents, siblings and friends, were screaming her name at the Paris La Defense Arena.
"She normally doesn't swim a faster final than heat, but tonight she did," Russ said.
"I reckon she wanted that [gold medal] in her belly for three years. She wanted it. She got it. Unbelievable."
Alexa's parents were asked how they'd describe her.
"She's the same girl [post-accident], but everything's heightened, but all she ever wanted was to show people that anything is possible," Belinda said.
"And what she's been through over the last three years, her thing is with a TBI [traumatic brain injury] anything is possible."
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