ParalympicsGB rose to the occasion at Paris 2024, said the team’s chef de mission Penny Briscoe as the Games closed on Sunday.
GB’s 215-strong squad finished second in the medal table behind China with 124 medals (49 golds, 44 silvers and 31 bronzes) – comfortably achieving the UK Sport target of 100-140.
“Paris has been an incredible Games for ParalympicsGB, both on and off the field of play,” Briscoe told BBC Sport.
“The athletes and staff have had an incredible Games experience here in Paris. I don’t think we could be going home any happier.”
BBC Sport has rounded up some of the best stats from the Games.
GB ‘punch above weight’ to match Tokyo tally
Great Britain matched their overall medal total from Tokyo three years ago, but won eight more golds in Paris.
In fact, 49 gold medals is ParalympicsGB’s highest tally since Rio 2016 – where they won 64 golds – and second-highest since Seoul 1988 where they collected 65.
Great Britain have finished second in the medal table in every summer Paralympics this century second except for London 2012, where they finished third.
More than half of the team’s 215 athletes made the podium at some point during the Paris Games.
Briscoe said GB “punch above our weight”, adding: “We’ve had a comfortable gap [to] that chasing pack but we’re not complacent, we’ve got to reach out and find new talent.”
Swimming most successful sport for GB
Great Britain were represented in 19 sports in the French capital and won medals in 18 of them, just as they did in Tokyo.
Only wheelchair rugby failed to win a medal after the mixed team lost in their bronze-medal match.
ParalympicsGB had a brilliant Games in Para-swimming, collecting at least one medal every day of competition. Great Britain won 32 medals in the pool, including 18 golds – 10 more than they managed in Tokyo.
It was in Para-canoeing where Britain were truly dominant. GB’s eight medals were double the total of next-best nation Brazil.
Who won the most Paralympic medals for GB?
Three members of the ParalympicsGB team – Para-swimmers Poppy Maskill and Alice Tai, and wheelchair racer Sammi Kinghorn – left Paris with five medals.
Nineteen-year-old Maskill won three golds on her Paralympic debut, the most of any Britons in this summer, triumphing in the S14 100m backstroke, 100m butterfly and mixed 4×100 m freestyle relay.
Tai’s golds came in the S8 50m freestyle and 100m backstroke, while Kinghorn took four silvers behind Catherine Debrunner in T53 events, but beat the Swiss star in the 100m.
Storey extends record with 19th gold
Maskill, Tai and Kinghorn still have a long way to go to match Sarah Storey’s medal total.
Great Britain’s most-decorated Paralympian won two more titles this summer to take her overall medal tally to 30 – including 19 golds.
The 46-year-old, who made her Paralympic debut in 1992, won 16 medals in Para-swimming before switching to Para-cycling for Beijing 2008.
Remarkably, Storey had already won 17 medals before 13-year-old Para-swimmer Iona Winnifrith – GB’s youngest medal winner in Paris – was even born.
Paris 2024’s final Paralympics medal table
China topped the medal table for the sixth consecutive summer Paralympics.
USA led the Olympic medal table at Paris 2024, but only matched their third-place finish from Tokyo at the Paralympics.
The United States have not won the most golds at a Paralympics since Atlanta 1996.
Hosts France ended the games eighth in the medal table, with 19 golds and 75 medals – improving on their 14th-placed finish three years ago where they won 20 fewer medals.
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