Australian bike owner Paige Greco, a Paralympic gold medalist, has died. She was 28.
A joint assertion by the Australian Paralympic Committee and Australian Biking Federation stated that Greco “handed away in her Adelaide residence after experiencing a sudden medical episode” on Sunday.
“Paige meant the whole lot to us,” her mom Natalie Greco stated in an announcement. “Her kindness, her willpower and her heat touched our household each single day. She introduced a lot pleasure and pleasure into our lives, and the ache of her passing is one thing we are going to carry without end.
“Whereas we’re devastated by her loss, we’re extremely pleased with the particular person she was and the best way she represented Australia.”
Greco, who was born with cerebral palsy, received the primary gold medal of the pandemic-delayed Tokyo Paralympics in 2021, breaking her personal world document within the ladies’s C1-3 3,000-meter particular person pursuit. She went on so as to add bronze medals within the highway race and time trial.
CHARLY TRIBALLEAU/AFP by way of Getty Photos
In August, she received one other bronze medal on the para-cycling World Championships in Belgium, this time for the C3 highway race occasion, BBC Information reported.
Greco additionally received a number of world championship titles and World Cup medals, after bursting onto the para-cycling scene with three world information, two gold medals and a silver on the 2019 observe world championship — only a 12 months after switching to biking from para-athletics.
Cameron Murray, chief government officer of Paralympics Australia, stated the lack of one of many brightest younger stars of the Australian Paralympic motion was devastating.
“The disappointment being felt throughout Paralympics Australia right now is a mirrored image of the big regard through which she was held,” Murray stated. “Paige was a rare athlete, however extra importantly, a exceptional particular person.
“Her achievements on the worldwide stage have been distinctive, but it surely was her kindness, her quiet willpower and the best way she uplifted individuals round her that may stick with us all. She had a uncommon capacity to make individuals really feel included and supported, and her affect will little doubt go away a long-lasting impression on so many.”
AusCycling’s Chief Govt Officer Marne Fechner known as Greco an “extraordinary athlete who achieved excellent accomplishments on the highest ranges of [the] sport.”
“Far more than that, she touched the lives of everybody round her together with her optimistic spirit and brave outlook,” Fechner stated.
