On August 29, at Bercy Arena in Paris, France, Bethany Johnson, a lifelong resident of Riverview and a 2019 graduate of Collége Churchill, will make her Paralympic debut as a wheelchair basketball athlete.
Bethany’s journey to these games began in the summer of 2014 when she suffered a broken hip, leading to three surgeries over four years. In the spring of 2015, following the encouragement of her physiotherapist, Darren Bittner of South Osborne Physio, and an introduction to the sport in Dan Sylvestre’s Gym Class at Collège Churchill, Bethany joined the Wheelchair Basketball program run by the Manitoba Wheelchair Sports Association. In short order, she demonstrated a natural athletic ability and intense competitive spirit, and her new passion was born.
Since then, Bethany has played Wheelchair Basketball for Team Manitoba at the Canada Games in Red Deer in 2019 and then again in Charlottetown, P.E.I. in 2023. She’s also represented Team Saskatchewan at Women’s National tournaments (there are not enough female athletes in Manitoba to make up a provincial team). In 2022, she represented Manitoba at the Canada Games in Niagara in canoe-kayak.
After high school, Bethany attended the University of Manitoba in pursuit of a degree in their Kinesiology and Recreation Management program, which was put on hold as Covid came along. In the spring of 2023, Bethany was offered a Wheelchair Basketball scholarship at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where she is now studying Sports Management.
This is when things got really busy for her. She began her studies at Urbana-Champaign in August 2023. In October, she was part of the Canadian U25 national team that placed 6th at the U25 World Championships in Bangkok, Thailand. A few weeks later, she was promoted to Canada’s Senior Women’s National Team and participated in her first Parapan American Games in Santiago, where she won a silver medal as Team Canada lost to the U.S. in the gold medal match. In April, she competed in Osaka, Japan, at the last qualifying event for Paris, where Team Canada went undefeated. In May, she completed her first year of study at the University of Illinois. Since then, she has balanced her time at home in Winnipeg with a rigorous training schedule, which has included team training camps in Winnipeg, Ottawa, Toronto, Quebec City, and Manchester, England.
And now, in a few short days (ten years and one month after her first surgery), she will find herself at the pinnacle of her chosen sport. All thanks to a life-changing injury that looked to limit her happiness but instead has opened up a world of positive opportunities, passion, and potential—all positives that, like her athletic ability and competitive spirit, would have otherwise remained hidden.
Photo above: April 20, 2024, Bethany Johnson at the Paralympic Qualifying Tournament in Osaka
Quick Facts about the Paralympics:
Paralympics stands for Parallel Olympics, not Paraplegic Olympics. The Paralympics run from August 28 to September 8. Only two Manitoban athletes are attending this year’s games. The other one is Para Triathlon athlete Leanne Taylor of Oakbank. To watch the Paralympics, check out CBC and CBC Gem.
