Sport Science student Hannah prepares for Rio Games
Monday 11 January 2016
SPORT SCIENCE student Hannah Russell has been selected to swim for Great Britain at the IPC European Championships as she prepares for Rio 2016.
The para-athlete is part of a 25-strong team competing in Madeira (April 27 – May 8) and looking to add to her impressive tally of medals in the pool.
The 19-year-old partially sighted student won a silver and two bronzes at the last Paralympics, aged just 16, and has since twice broken the world record for 100m backstroke.
Last year, Hannah enrolled on the University of Salford’s Sport Science degree and juggles studies and training with aplomb, passing her first year exams while becoming World Champion in Glasgow.
Ability matters, not disability
She trains at the High Performance Centre in Manchester and admits combining being a student and an elite athlete is challenging but achievable with plenty of help and support from her lecturers and the disability team at Salford.
Remarkably, for someone who cannot even see her opponents in a race, let alone the end of the pool, Hannah is a hugely confident young woman who lives by the motto: ‘It’s ability not disability that matters’.
She is now looking forward to the big one – the Rio Paralympics this summer: “It's been one of my dreams since I was very young. I can't wait to see what happens. I'd love to win gold, to come away as a Paralympic champion. I've become a World and European champion. It would be the cream on the top,” she told the BBC.
To read more about Hannah's extraordinary life, read the blog she recently wrote for the #this salfordgirlcan campaign about females who inspire. http://www.salfordstudents.com/articles/thissalfordgirlcan-guest-blog-hannah-russell-rio-2016-paralympian
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