Paris Paralympics close after ‘historic summer’

The Paris Paralympics closed on Sunday with chief Paris 2024 organiser Tony Estanguet saying the Games and the Olympics had created a “historic summer”.

Speaking in the Stade de France in front of around 4,400 athletes from 168 Paralympic delegations , Estanguet said the closing ceremony marked the end of six weeks of Olympic and Paralympic fervour in the City of Light.

Estanguet said they would remain “etched in people’s memories”.

“This summer, France had a date with history, and the country showed up,” he said.

“This summer when people talked to each other, this summer when France was happy,” said the former Olympic canoeist, referring to how France had been left deeply divided by snap elections just weeks before the Olympics opened.

Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo passed the Paralympic flag to International Paralympic Committee president Andrew Parsons, who gave it to Lost Angeles mayor Karen Bass.

Broadway star Ali Stoker then sang the American national anthem before a film was shown of a band performing on a Californian beach as skateboarders and wheelchair athletes performed tricks.

Despite initial fears about ticket sales, the Paralympics took place in mainly full stadiums, benefiting from the feelgood factor from the highly successful Olympics which ended on August 11.

Parsons said the Paris Paralympics had shown that “change starts with sport”.

The action in Paris, the organisation and the gender parity of the competitors had set new standards for the Paralympics, he said.

The closing ceremony included an hour-long set featuring 20 DJs introduced by French electronic music pioneer Jean-Michel Jarre, 76.

Meanwhile the cauldron housing the Paralympic flame, in the form of the base of a hot air balloon, which has risen into the air every evening, was unable to make its last journey skywards from the Tuileries Gardens on Sunday because of high winds and rain, organisers said.

China finished top of the medals table in Paris, as they have for every Paralympics since Athens in 2004. They had 94 golds, followed by Britain with 49 and the USA with 36.

Ukraine’s athletes overcame considerable obstacles posed by the war with Russian forces to finish in seventh place with 22 golds and host nation France were eighth with 19 golds.

In the final day of competition, Switzerland won both Paralympic wheelchair marathons while the Netherlands secured back-to-back women’s wheelchair basketball titles, denying the USA on the final day of competition.

Early in the morning, Catherine Debrunner propelled her racing wheelchair through the autumnal chill in the streets of Paris to win the women’s marathon.

The 29-year-old Swiss athlete added to the four gold medals she has already won on the track at these Games, ranging from the 400 metres to the 5,000m, with a silver medal in the T53 100m thrown in for good measure.

Marcel Hug, 38, made up for a disappointing Games on the track by dominating the men’s wheelchair marathon, finishing three minutes and 40 seconds ahead of Hua Jin of China.

A minute’s silence was held after one of the women’s marathons in memory of Rebecca Cheptegei, the Ugandan Olympic marathon runner who died this week after an attack by her partner. Cheptegei had finished 44th in the women’s marathon on August 11.

The Netherlands scored a convincing 63-49 win against the USA to retain the women’s wheelchair basketball title they won at Tokyo 2020.

The Americans must wait until 2028 before trying to win a title that their men secured for a third Games in a row on Saturday. The USA women’s last title came at the 2016 Rio Games.