Ellie Cole

When Ellie Cole left her room at the Australian Institute of Sport and headed for the airport on her way to the London 2012 Paralympic Games, she told herself she would return home a gold medallist. Not only did she win gold, she did it four times over, touching the wall first in the Women’s 100m Backstroke and Freestyle S9, and the 4x100m Freestyle and Medley Relays 34 points. Ellie also collected two bronze medals in the 50m and 400m Freestyle.

After a successful second Games campaign, she took an extended break from Para-swimming to undergo and recover from double shoulder reconstruction surgery. Then, in a stellar return to the international scene at the 2015 IPC Swimming World Championships in Glasgow, Scotland, she twice broke the 100m Backstroke world record, on her way to winning three gold and two silver medals.

A favourite in the lead-up to Rio 2016, Ellie claimed medals in each of her six events, but it was not until her final race on the final night of competition that she surged to individual gold, finishing 0.39 seconds ahead of silver medallist Nuria Marques Soto from Spain. Shedding tears of joy on top of the podium, the win remains one of Ellie’s proudest sporting moments to date.

She also returned home from Rio with gold in the 4x100m Freestyle Relay, silver in the 50m and 400m Freestyle and 4x100m Medley Relay, and bronze in the 100m Freestyle, with her six-medal haul securing her the title of Australia’s top medallist from the Games, alongside Dolphins teammate Lakeisha Patterson.

When the Commonwealth Games arrived on the Gold Coast in April 2018, Ellie was eager to improve on her dual bronze medal haul from Delhi 2010. Undeniably the fastest of the three Australians in the pool for the 100m Backstroke, she finished nearly five seconds ahead of her bronze medal winning teammate Ashleigh McConnell to claim silver.

Hailing from Frankston, Victoria, Ellie was diagnosed with sarcoma, a rare form of cancer, at the age of two. After a round of treatment that did not reduce the cancer, her parents made the decision to amputate her leg.

Two days after the surgery, Ellie was standing on her new prosthetic leg, and with the encouragement of her mum Jenny, she was walking steadily in a matter of weeks. Not long after, she started swimming lessons as part of her rehabilitation, and defied medical staff when she began swimming a straight line 50 weeks sooner than expected.

Ellie wore national colours for the first time as a 15-year-old at the 2006 IPC Swimming World Championships in Durban, South Africa. Making a splash on the international scene almost immediately with a silver medal in the 50m Backstroke, she cemented her status as a future star of the Australian Paralympic Team when she returned home from Beijing 2008 with one silver and two bronze medals, marking the first and last time she missed gold at a Paralympics.

Outside of her own hectic training and competition schedule, Ellie can often be found poolside coaching junior swimmers. She also enjoys cooking, playing wheelchair basketball and working out at the gym.