In two weeks, the Paralympic Games begin in Paris. Three Spokane track and field athletes, including sprinter/jumper Lindi Marcusen will be there to compete for the U.S. team.
Marcusen has been an athlete all of her life. She competed in track and field for a year in middle school.
“I was a sprinter and a high jumper, not a long jumper, because I didn't want to get sandy," she said.
But gymnastics was Marcusen’s real love. She competed for 14 years and reached the top division at the club level.
In 2017, her gymnastics career ended abruptly when she was in an accident that led to the amputation of her right leg above the knee. It was a blow for someone who had always been active.
"Movement has always been so important to me," she said. "As an individual, it's just how I've really enjoyed connecting with myself. And I like the daily grind. I like being doing something that pushes me myself and to work on that mental part as well. And so I just wanted to get back first to being active.”
With gymnastics no longer an option, Marcusen reconsidered track and field. She went back to being a sprinter, this time with a prosthetic leg.
“I saw the opportunity I had to potentially run for my country and to run it for in the Paralympic Games. And so I was ecstatic about that. And I had to work from a 44 second 100 meter first time.”
Five years later, “I'm the only female above knee that has ever run under 15 seconds in North and South America.”
14.95 seconds, to be exact. She ran that last month at the U.S. Paralympic Trials in Florida. She also qualified for the U.S. team in the long jump.
Paris will be her first Paralympics. She feels well prepared "because I have done so much work emotionally and mentally processing that, you know, I am a disabled athlete, but that doesn't mean I'm any less of an athlete. And so just reclaiming that identity and just showing up like as my whole self in Florida and was able to put it together at the right time.”
Now she’s preparing to peak one more time in France with the eyes of the world on her.
“I had to crawl out of the grave with my accident. And so I'm just really, really proud of myself. I'm proud of my family for everything that we've been through and what we've come out of and just make an alchemizing, you know, catastrophe into something absolutely beautiful that I can show, that I can show the world and share with so many people," she said.
There is one person who won’t be there to share her experience. That's her coach, David Greig from ParaSport Spokane. Greig is also the high performance chair for the National Wheelchair Basketball Association. He'll spend some of time in Paris with the U.S. team.
“Lindi's final is during the men's gold medal wheelchair basketball match. So yeah, so I will be at the gold medal match because that's, that's my commitment when I'm there. I've spoken to Lindi about it already. I will have my device going. I will eat whatever data package I will have to do to watch it," he said.
The Paralympic Games begin August 28. NBC and Peacock will air many of its sports.
Marcusen and her ParaSport Spokane teammates will host an August 18 event for the athletes. They'll leave for Europe on August 20.
Tomorrow, we’ll talk to Spokane sprinter Taylor Swanson.
