Ready for Rio: Dimitri Coutya

Credit: PA

In the run-up to the Rio Paralympics Games, ITV News speaks to four hopefuls from ParalympicsGB. In the first in our series Ready for Rio, we profile wheelchair fencer Dimitri Coutya.

Aspiring paralympic wheelchair fencer Dimitri Coutya is a three-time national champion and the current U23 World Champion - and he's only 18.

That means alongside training for Rio, Coutya has had to juggle this with preparation for his A-Level exams. Now just over a week before the start of the Paralympic Games, Coutya is one of ParalympicsGB's brightest hopes for a first fencing gold medal in 30 years.

  • Age: 18

  • Sport: Fencing

  • Condition: Paralysed from chest down as a result of spinal injury

  • Trains: London

  • Games history: Yet to compete

  • Rank: World no. 3 (Ranking B - Foil)

Born in 1997, Coutya was knocked down by a car when he was just two years old.

He sustained a spinal cord injury, meaning he now can't feel or move anything below his chest area.

Since then sport has played an integral part in his life. Previously he played wheelchair basketball, tennis and swam before settling on fencing.

Having fenced for the first time at school, Coutya won bronze medals at his first competitions - the 2009 Chichester Open and 2011 UK School Games.

By then he'd gained enough attention to be offered the chance to train with the GB squad.

At this point in time Coutya is a triple national champion (2014) and U23 World Champion (2013), while recently he claimed his first World Cup gold medal.

Now his eyes are firmly set on Rio.

Competing at the 2014 School Games Credit: PA

With all of these hours of training put in, it's clear what Coutya now hopes to achieve.

"I know what I want to do: I want to get two gold medals. I don't train hours and hours a day to come second", he says.

But fencing hasn't just had a positive impact on Coutya's health - it has helped develop him as a person.

Dimitri Coutya's mother says she is very protective of her son Credit: ITV News

Coutya describes the years of support from his parents as "essential".

But while his mother, Nelly, admits it was hard for her to come to terms with her son's accident, she says Coutya would "just get on with it".

"I always worry about him - I am very protective", she says.

"But when I see him achieve - even the slightest thing - I feel he's going to be all right".

But for Coutya, it is not the worry that is driving him, but the incredible journey he is already on.

"[It's] just the knowledge that what I am doing is an extraordinary experience - that a very small percentage of people are ever going to experience", he says.

"Just the knowledge that all these hours of training and exhaustion I'm putting myself through is in order to give myself the best possible life I can and to win medals for my country at the Paralympics Games".