 Wheelchair racer Jessica Cooper Lewis and Boccia athlete Yushae DeSilva Andrade were the only competitors from Bermuda at the Paris 2024 Paralympics.
Representing Bermuda, Lewis still remembers how surprised she was when she entered the Para athletics stadium at London 2012, her first Paralympic Games.
“I was in the stadium, and I think there were 80,000 people there, which is more than the population of Bermuda as a whole. It was just insane to know that my whole country could fit in the stadium, plus some,” Lewis said.
“For me, that was like, ‘WOW’. That was such an amazing feeling and definitely a lot of goose bumps. You could just hear the roar of the crowd, even when you were outside the stadium.”
In London, Lewis was the only athlete competing for Bermuda, an archipelago of 181 islands with a population of about 64,000. But at the Paris 2024 Paralympics, there are two – Lewis and her long-time friend and Boccia athlete DeSilva Andrade.
“We had a 100 per cent increase on our team, so it’s great,” Lewis, who competed at her fourth Games, said with a laugh.
Bermuda made its Paralympic debut at Atlanta 1996 and is seeking its first medal on the biggest stage. DeSilva Andrade, who competed in Paris with pink and blue braids – the colors of Bermuda, was making her second appearance after Rio 2016.
“It has just been awesome, especially to share this moment with Jessica again,” DeSilva Andrade said.
Lewis, 31, and DeSilva Andrade, 30, have known each other since they were around five years old. They met at an organization that offers programmes for people with disabilities, and they both fell in love with sport.
They started by riding horses, then they took up wheelchair Basketball. But after that, they went on separate ways, with Lewis finding her passion in wheelchair racing and DeSilva Andrade starting Boccia.
“I loved the speed. I love to go fast,” said Lewis, who currently lives and trains in Canada.
“In Bermuda because we didn’t have a lot of Para athletes at the time - hopefully that will change in the future - I had to pick a sport that was an individual one.”
“My first love was actually Basketball, but I wanted to represent Bermuda.”
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