Get to know these five remarkable para rowers

It is the final hours before the start of the para rowing regatta at the Sea Forest Waterway for the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games. Meet some of the athletes that you will have to follow at the Sea Forest Waterway.

Moran Samuel (ISR)

Since bursting onto the international rowing scene ten years ago with a bronze medal in the arms and Shoulders women’s single at the 2011 World Cup 1 and World Rowing Championships a few months later, Samuel has become one of the sport’s most recognisable faces on the podium.  Finishing fifth at London 2012 in her first Games appearance, she won her first and only World Rowing Championship gold in 2015. She then took Paralympic Bronze at Rio 2016. Then came silver, silver and bronze at the 2017, 2018 and 2019 World Rowing Championships in the PR1 women’s single. Samuel was honoured as one of Israel’s flag bearers at the Paralympic opening ceremony.

Kingsley Ijomah (NGR)

Kingsley Ijomah is slated to become Nigeria’s first ever Paralympic rower when he races this week in Tokyo in the PR1 men’s single sculls. While he has spent most of his life in the UK, where he learned how to row, fell in love with the sport and was identified for his phenomenal ability, Ijomah will be racing for the country of his birth. Left without the use of his legs due to polio as an infant, Ijomah has been an increasing force on the para rowing scene in recent years. When the current pandemic put his Paralympic dream on hold, Ijomah did the next sensible thing and became the first male PR1 athlete to attempt and successfully complete a 100,000 metre piece on the indoor rower. He accomplished this feat in 10h 27m and 10.2s.

Michel Munoz (MEX)

Mexico’s Michel Munoz is a new face in international rowing. Making his World Rowing debut with a 19^th place finish at the 2019 World Rowing Championships, Munoz really began flexing his rowing muscles in the PR1 men’s singles in Latin American competitions. This formed a steady course for Tokyo 2020 qualification when the pandemic hit. In March of 2021, he finally had his chance at the Americas Continental Qualification Regatta for the Paralympic Games. He took gold and secured a Paralympic berth.

Munoz has a history of setting and achieving lofty goals. He has completed a Spartan Race and also an Ironman – the first Latin American athlete with no legs to accomplish this.

Brenda Sardon (ARG)

Like Michel Munoz, Brenda Sardon finally punched her ticket to Rio a year later than expected with a win at the Americas Continental Qualification Regatta in March 2021.  A year and a half earlier, she had placed 9^th at the 2019 World Rowing Championships in the PR1 women’s singles. It was her first World Rowing competition, but not the first international competition for Sardon. Before switching to rowing, Sardon trained and raced for several years with Argentina’s national para canoe team.

Sardon will be using her canoe experience to race with the best in the PR1 women’s single at her first Paralympic Games.

Rene Pereira (BRA)

Rene Pereira will be lining up to race in his second Paralympics, five years after competing on his native water at the Rio 2016 Games. Pereira joined the Brazilian national para rowing team in 2015 and raced to 5^th place at the 2015 World Rowing Cup II and then 7^th at that year’s World Rowing Championships in the arms and shoulders (now PR1) men’s singles.

The following year he finished 6^th at the Rio 2016 Paralympics. In the years since, Pereira has consistently finished 5^th at the 2017, 2018 and 2019 World Rowing Championships, earning a berth for Tokyo 2020 with this last result. Pereira, who outside of rowing is a doctor, also earned his first World Rowing podium at the 2019 World Rowing Cup III where he took silver. The 40-year-old is one of only four with Paralympic Games experience in his boat class and he will be hoping to use this to his advantage.