Milano Cortina 2026: French team hope to continue golden tradition
France looks poised for a strong campaign in the standing class with Aurelie Richard and Arthur Bauchet topping the overall rankings this season.
It was the first overall globe for Richard who now finds herself in a position to continue the legacy of the great Marie Bochet, who retired in 2024 with eight Paralympic gold medals to her name.
For Zhang Mengqiu, the only legacy to continue is her own. The 23-year-old became a well-recognised face after winning five medals at the home Paralympics four years ago and went viral for showing off a different hairstyle on each podium.
Ebba Årsjö won Sweden’s only two gold medals at Beijing 2022 and is looking to add to her collection, this time with family on hand to cheer her on. The skier has appeared on multiple TV shows since her Paralympic breakthrough and also became the first Paralympian recipient of the Victoria Prize, a scholarship from the Swedish Royal Family.
Over in the men’s standing, Bauchet remains the skier to beat. The French athlete already has eight medals across two Games, including three gold from Beijing 2022. He has also won 12 world titles, five of which came since the last Paralympics – a testament to his consistency over the years.
Théo Gmür, a three-time PyeongChang 2018 champion and Switzerland’s only medallist at Beijing 2022, made a recent comeback after more than a year of being sidelined with injuries and could also challenge for medals.
But Switzerland’s best medal hopes lie with Robin Cuche. With five silver medals at the world championships but no Paralympic medal on his resume yet – Cuche will be eager to make up for it at Milano Cortina 2026.
Meanwhile, Adam Hall is set to return to Italy to extend his own record for the number of Paralympic appearances. Milano Cortina will be his sixth, more than for any other New Zealander. The 38-year-old competed at his first Paralympics at Torino 2006, won his first Paralympic medal at Vancouver 2010, and added two more bronze medals at Beijing 2022.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.olympics.com ’
