Paralympics are the people’s Games – Sophie Christiansen

Mainstream media coverage also brought the Paralympics into the spotlight and showed everyone how exciting disability sport can be.

As an athlete, I shall never forget competing in front of a 10,000-strong home crowd and feeling the buzz of anticipation in the air as spectators willed me on to three gold medals in the stunning surroundings of Greenwich Park.

In my opinion, the Paralympics are the people’s Games.

Not everyone can run as fast as Usain Bolt, but everyone has challenges to overcome.

Paralympic athletes showed what could be done by having the drive and determination to fulfil their potential.

London 2012 inspired a generation. Now, a year on, the word on people’s lips is “legacy”.

How can we measure the impact the Games had upon both the nation and the world?

To all those who claim there is no legacy, is not the fact we are still talking about the Games a form of a legacy in itself?

As a member of the Paralympic Legacy Advisory Group,, external I could reel off a list of things that I believe prove there is a lasting legacy.

But have we gone far enough?

A lot of Paralympians are now household names and sporting superstars.

However, just as every able bodied person isn’t an elite athlete, not every disabled person is a Paralympian.

And you don’t have to win a gold medal to achieve.

Sitting up straight for a child with severe cerebral palsy or communicating with others for those with autism is an achievement in itself for some.

In my view, we need to use the momentum of the Games to keep perception of disability at an all-time high.