Five Paralympics. Seven golds, six of them earned back to back across two events over three Paralympics - Rio, Tokyo and Paris. And oh yes, let's not forget the silver. Her name is Yip Pin Xiu, and she is a phenomenon like no other.
Watching on television this weekend, as Singapore’s little mermaid grooved to the music on her airpods, the seventh gold medal on her lap, I laughed aloud as she threw out this typically understated response to a journalist’s question on how she felt after her second gold at Paris. With a typically impish smile, she said: ‘I think seven is a really nice number.’
Talking to Yip Pin Xiu, I can testify, is an experience in touching the heights of human spirit and resilience. Watching her fly across the water without arms and legs playing a significant role, shoulder movement propelling her faster than her competitors, an indescribably joyful emotion. Reflecting on her deep insights, is akin to a deep dive into a manual of high performance. Listening to her is understanding that it takes a special kind of person to be a Paralympian. A journey that starts in the mind.
London 2012. Boris Johnson, then Mayor of London had requested residents not to go into the City so that the transport system remained unclogged for the Olympics and Paralympics. WFH, in the absence of today’s digitally connected world, was for many of us Londoners an excuse to indulge in once-in-a-lifetime Olympic (and paralympic) experiences. Which is how I ended up one day that summer in the first couple of rows next to the athletics track, just across the finishing line, watching the finals of the Paralympics track events.
The 200m T44 event had just been completed and a Brazilian athlete, Alan Oliviera, a double below-the-knee amputee had, against all expectations, beaten Oscar Pistorius to second place. Oliviera had both legs amputated at the age of 21 days, after an intestinal infection led to sepsis, and had taken to sports at the age of 13.
The post-race TV interview was being conducted a few metres away from where I sat. As the interview wound to a close, Oliviera was asked a question about how he mentally dealt with his lack of limbs to perform as he had just done. The Brazilian smiled, pointed at his prosthetics, and uttered the words I shall never forget: ‘I am blessed, for I have one disability, but many abilities.’
Eight years later as Covid ravaged the world, Yip Pin Xiu and I sat across zoom screens separated by a few miles, sharing mutual concern over the pandemic that had already claimed loved ones from so many of us. Singapore was in lockdown, the 2020 Paralympics had just been postponed, and with the swimming pools closed, daily practice was not possible. Pin Xiu had time on her hands with little to do. A very unusual experience for her. So we talked about her journey, life outside the pool, and what makes her the champion she is. It would be the first of many conversations. But like Oliviera’s words, there was something in that first interaction with Pin Xiu that remains with me.
Yip Pin Xiu was afflicted at the age of four with a rare irreversible neurological condition called Charcot Marie Tooth that leads to deterioration of muscles over time. By twelve, she was confined to a wheelchair, with minimal strength in arms or legs. Remarkably, at exactly the same age, she was swimming competitively for Singapore. At sixteen, she was a multiple Paralympic medalist in the S3 category - the prefix S covers freestyle, butterfly and backstroke events. There are ten different sport classes for athletes with physical impairment, numbered 1-10. The lower the number, the more severe the activity limitation. At the Beijing Olympic pool she won a gold in the 50 metres backstroke event, and a silver in the 50 metres freestyle. She picked up a second and third gold medal at Rio eight years later in the S2 category, setting a world record in the 100 metres backstroke.
Yip cannot use her hands and legs while swimming and has to be helped down into the water and held until the race starts. She gets her power and speed purely from shoulder rotations, prevailing over competitors who have partial use of one or more limbs. It is a remarkable sight watching her cut through the water and propel past relatively less physically challenged swimmers. So my question to her was - how does she do it?
It was a fascinating discussion on goal setting, process and performance, all of which she would eventually talk about with our clients at Two Roads in the coming years. But what stuck with me was the discussion on mindset.
Like Olivier, Yip is a hugely positive person who truly believes that we as human beings can achieve far more than we think, and our abilities need to be harnessed for they far outnumber our disabilities. For that, the mind needs to take control. ‘I have no control over how fast my competitors swim. I do however have control of how fast I swim. Shutting out the focus on the uncontrollable and concentrating on what I can do is what I do,’ is what she had told me.
Fast forward four years. 17-year old Sheetal Devi is a Para-archer from India competing at the ongoing Paris Paralympics. She is the only woman archer in the world, and one of a handful overall who shoot arrows and compete at the highest level despite having no hands. Watching her calm unruffled visage as she shoots perfect 10’s over and over again with a subtle movement of her jaws with the bow held between her feet, is a sight that changes one’s perspective on what we able bodied folks label ‘difficult’.
In an interview to RevSportz last week she spoke about what makes it all possible: ‘It is essential to keep believing in what you stand for, and keep wanting what you need to achieve really badly. Just want it as badly as you can, for only then will you get it.’ Words far wiser than her years would suggest.
And then there is Preethi Pal. No Indian woman had won a track and field medal at the Paralympics. Until at Paris' Stade de France, 23-year old Preethi did it...twice. Born with cerebral palsy and all the neurological issues that accompany the condition, Preethi took to athletics a few years ago, and at her first Paralympics went where no Indian woman had ever gone - whether able-bodied or Para - two track and field medals - 100m and 200m, at the same Olympics.
What makes an Oliviera, a Yip, a Preethi and a Sheetal exceptional? It is not their actual successes in the arena of sport. They crave not the round piece of shiny metal as proof of their athletic prowess. They have no need for such validation. They already know they have abilities that far outnumber the disability that afflicts them. For them, that is enough.
They do what they do for your sake, and mine. They run without legs and despite neurological issues, shoot arrows without hands, swim without limbs, so that they can make our spirits soar that otherwise would bemoan the absence of wings. Celebrate them for they are a mirror to our tethered souls.
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