WA para-athlete Ella Pardy 'pumped' to run lightning fast alongside Usain Bolt at Nitro Athletics event
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Ella Azura Pardy is one name you need to know before Usain Bolt's Nitro Athletics event in Melbourne next month.
Pardy, 26, is one of Australia's best para-athletes — holding the current Australian and Oceanic records in both the T38 100 metre and 200m events and standing fifth in world rankings.
She lives with autism and cerebral palsy and said she was on a mission to remove the stigma and negativity surrounding the word disability.
Pardy, who won bronze in a relay at last year's Rio Paralympics, is also determined to be a success and said winning medals was what kept her motivated and on the track, where she trains a minimum of 25 hours a week.
Born in south-west London, Pardy was recently selected by team selector and former Olympian Tamsyn Lewis to fill one of the two para-athlete slots on the Australian team for the upcoming Nitro Athletics event in Melbourne.
The event is spearheaded by the world's fastest man, Usain Bolt — one of Pardy's idols.
"She's really pumped and motivated, the Nitro Athletics [opportunity] has really boosted her training," her mother Priti Pardy said.
"To meet Asafa Powell, Usain Bolt and the All-Stars team is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
"Just to be on the same track as guys of that calibre is not something that happens very often for any athlete."
Pardy first got in to athletics at age 16 before debuting at the 2007 Special Olympics Shanghai World Games, where she won gold in the 100m sprint.
She began in the T20 category, which covers athletes who have an intellectual impairment, before undergoing testing and changing her classification to T38, for athletes who have coordination impairments like cerebral palsy.
Ms Pardy said February 14 was the turning point for her daughter's athletics career.
On that day, Pardy ran for the first time since breaking her ankle and came within 0.06 seconds of the world record for the 100m.
Pardy said her proudest moment as an athlete was when she was flooded with fan mail following her bronze medal in the 4x100m relay at the Rio Paralympics.
Her team is currently looking into motor planning and processing, with the aim of improving her reaction times and helping her reach her goal of running the 100m comfortably below 13 seconds in 2017.
She said her goal was to become the number one runner in the world.
The Nitro Athletics event in Melbourne begins on February 4 and runs across three nights, finishing on February 11.
The team-based event will see six international sides, including Australia, the Bolt All Stars, China and England, compete for points in 12 events.
Topics: paralympics, sport, athletics, cerebral-palsy, autism-spectrum-disorder, perth-6000, wa, melbourne-3000
