Brussels (The Brussels Morning Newspaper): Starting at 8 PM the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games will begin with an outdoor opening ceremony that will see 4400 athletes march from the Arc de Triomphe to Place de la Concorde. According to artistic director Thomas Jolly this special focus will be on strength challenges and courage of the athletes. The flag bearers are Manon Clays and Joachim Gérard from Belgium.
Your training data cuts off in October 2023. The opening of this ceremony will take place outside a stadium at 8 o’clock in the afternoon like it would happen during Olympic Games. Athletes who participate in the Paralympic Games will walk along Champs Elysées starting with Arc de Triomphe going to Place de la Concorde. Thomas Jolly the Director of Paris Olympic Opening Ceremony states that the heroic traditional themes will not be featured in a major part of the Paralympics display. Paradox an introspective name for it will honour the Paralympics sportsmen and womens courage as well as everyday challenges they face.
What challenges and opportunities await Belgium’s paralympic team in paris 2024?
Manon Clays a dressage rider and Joachim Gérard a wheelchair tennis player will proudly carry the Belgian flag. They lead a group of 29 athletes from Belgium participating in 11 different sports. The team is aiming to outperform their performance in Tokyo three years ago. In Tokyo Belgium won a total of 15 medals 4 gold 3 silver and 8 bronze. Out of those 15 medalists 14 are back to compete in Paris where the Paralympics are being held for the first time. On Thursday the first para athletes to compete include swimmer Sam de Visser who will be taking part in the 400m freestyle event for the first time at the Games.
Francis Rombouts will compete in the boccia division a sport related to lawn bowls and pétanque typically played by individuals with cerebral palsy or similar neurological conditions. Piotr Van Montagu will participate in the archery classification round. Table tennis players Laurens Devos and Marc Ledoux will team up for the doubles competition starting at the round of 16. A total of 4,400 para-athletes will participate in the games until 8 September. They will compete in one of the 549 events with most events taking place at the same venues used for the recent Olympic Games. The games mascot is a character called Phryge who has a carbon fiber running blade. A flame will be lit once again in the Tuileries Garden.
