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Paralympics 2024: These Maryland athletes are headed to Paris

At the first Paralympic Games in Rome in 1960, there were 400 athletes representing 23 countries. Sixty-four years later, participation has multiplied 11-fold, as 4,400 athletes are set to compete in 22 sports at this year’s Paris Paralympic Games.

The opening ceremony will begin at 2 p.m. Wednesday along the iconic Champs-Élysées avenue and the action runs through Sept. 8. Here’s every Maryland athlete competing in the 2024 Summer Paralympics:

Wheelchair basketball

Trevon Jenifer, Huntingtown

A Team USA feature story likened Jenifer’s offensive mastery to “a cross between Speedy Gonzales and the Tasmanian Devil” and described his defense as a whirling dervish. The 35-year-old with congenital amputation and two gold medals began playing wheelchair basketball in 1992 with team Air Capital in Washington. He then played professionally for two years in France.

Before his junior year at Huntingtown High School, Jenifer began wrestling. The novice competed against his peers and finished third in his weight class as a senior at Maryland’s state tournament. At 17, he wrote an autobiography called “From the Ground Up” detailing his athletic pursuits and physical setbacks.

Wheelchair fencing

Noah Hanssen, Ellicott City

Hanssen was in a car accident at age 7 and has been in a wheelchair since. He grew up swinging toy swords around the house, replicating scenes from “Star Wars” and “The Lord of the Rings.” Thus, Hanssen was introduced to historical fencing — a form of martial arts that prefers to focus on the art of sword fighting. It wasn’t until his junior year of high school that a referee connected him with a coach in Catonsville to explore parafencing.

He went to Howard Community College, then transferred to University of Maryland in 2021 and became a fixture of the school’s fencing club. Hanssen will compete in the men’s saber in Paris.

Track and field

Samantha Heyison, Adamstown

Heyison comes from a family of athletes. Her mom, Tonya, played volleyball at UMBC. Her dad, Marc, was drafted by the Orioles in 1983 and played two seasons of minor league baseball. Growing up, Samantha — who was born with constriction band syndrome — tried soccer, basketball and softball but ultimately chose to pursue track and field.

She won Class 4A state titles in the discus (twice) and shot put while at Urbana High School. This past spring, she redshirted her freshman season at Wake Forest to focus on the Paris Games. She will compete in both the discus and shot put for Team USA.

Tatyana McFadden, Columbia

One of the most decorated Paralympians is from Columbia. McFadden has competed in every Summer Games since 2004 and made her Winter Games debut in Sochi in 2014. She competes in several events, most frequently dominating the 400-, 800- and 1,500-meter races. McFadden also won gold at every New York City Marathon from 2013 to 2016.

At Atholton High School, she often competed in separate wheelchair events, circling the track by herself. In 2005, McFadden and her adoptive mother, Deborah filed a lawsuit against Howard County Public Schools System that led to the eventual passage of the Maryland Fitness and Athletics Equity for Students with Disabilities Act in 2008, requiring equal opportunities for students with disabilities. It’s better known as “Tatyana’s Law.”

Daniel Romanchuk, Mt. Airy

A silver medal at the 2023 New York City Marathon with a time of 1:24:40 earned the 26-year-old Romanchuk a qualification to his third Paralympics. He competed in his first 26.2-mile race at 14 in Baltimore. At the Tokyo Games, Romanchuk won gold in the 400 behind a narrow 0.01-second victory and took bronze in the marathon.

Romanchuk was born with spina bifida, a birth defect in which there is an incomplete closing of the backbone and membranes around the spinal cord. By 2 years old, his parents got him involved in adaptive sports and he was taking part in national competitions at an early age. He’s a staunch supporter of the Baltimore-based adaptive sports program that uplifted him, Bennett Blazers.

Swimming

Jessica Long, Baltimore

The name Jessica Long has become synonymous with Paralympic success. She was born to a teenage mother in Siberia. She had fibular hemimelia, a congenital defect in her legs requiring a double amputation below the knees. And she was adopted from a Russian orphanage a month after her first birthday, which led to Long growing up in Baltimore and training at the wildly successful North Baltimore Aquatic Club. She’s now 32 with 29 medals (16 gold) — among the most decorated athletes in Paralympic history — competing in the 100-meter backstroke, breaststroke, freestyle and butterfly as well as the 400 freestyle and 200 individual medley.

Long made her Olympic debut in 2004 in Athens. At 12 years old, she became the youngest athlete on the U.S. Paralympic swim team. ESPN named her “Best Female Athlete with a Disability” four times. Sports Illustrated included her on a list of “The World’s Best Female Athletes.” There was a Super Bowl commercial about her. Oh, and she’s a leap-year baby.

Lawrence Sapp, Waldorf

In the top corner of Sapp’s website is a simple quote: “I am great at being me.” The Waldorf native, who has autism, joined the highly regarded Nation’s Capital Swim Club in 2013 and broke five school records during his freshman year at North Point High School. He’s been swimming with Team USA since 2017.

At the Tokyo Games, he competed in the 100 butterfly, 200 individual medley and 100 backstroke but did not medal. He does, however, have two golds and a silver in butterfly and backstroke events at the world championships. Sapp is currently a Division II swimmer at University of Missouri-St. Louis.

Zachary Shattuck, Mt. Airy

Shattuck was born with dwarfism and competed in team sports for much of his upbringing. It wasn’t until he got to Frostburg in 2015 that he started swimming. The 27-year-old was named an alternate at the 2016 Rio Games and made his Paralympic debut in Tokyo, where he finished eighth in the 200 individual medley and ninth in the 100 breaststroke.

At the 2021 U.S. trials in Minneapolis, Shattuck broke two American records: the 100 breaststroke (1 minute, 23.76 seconds) and the 50 butterfly (33.33) — the latter by one-hundredth of a second.