Combative and inspiring: the incredible journey of Bebe Vio, Paralympic athlete who became the new face of L'Oréal

Sitting on her wheelchair, she greets her opponent, then the referee, with her foil screwed onto a prosthesis attached to her arm.

His mask covers his face and while it is almost impossible to see his eyes, you can sense his intense concentration.

"On guard!

Ready?

Come on!” shouts the referee in French.

The fight can begin.

Since the age of five, Beatrice Vio, aka Bebe Vio, has known these sequences by heart.

Becoming a disabled athlete at the age of 11 after having her legs and arms amputated following meningitis, the young athlete was crowned Paralympic champion thanks to her perseverance and her passion for the art of fencing.

Icon of her generation, Bebe Vio has just been named international spokesperson for the L'Oréal Paris brand.

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courage and perseverance

Beatrice Vio was born in Venice in 1997. Her passion for sport began at a very young age when, at the age of 5, she began fencing.

For six years, she appeared in the national rankings with one goal in mind: the Olympics.

"When I was very young, my coach told me: 'There is a paradise and its name is the Olympics,'" she explains in the Netflix documentary,

.

"You have to work hard every day, every hour as best you can to get to the Olympics."

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Bebe Vio has been named international spokesperson for the L'Oréal Paris brand.

L'Oreal Paris

But at the age of 11, his life changes and his hopes of participating in this prestigious competition are almost destroyed.

The young girl is suffering from meningitis: “I felt a violent headache and when I came back from fencing, I had a big bruise on my forehead”, explains Bebe Vio.

The young woman goes to the hospital and falls into a coma.

“A part of my body was trying to kill me.

It was like a match, I had to fight the disease”.

A few days later, the doctors had to amputate his arms.

But the virus is still present and attacks his legs.

It is she who will speak to the doctors, who announce to her that she may die of it.

“My parents were so scared that I made the decision for them.

If there is a 1% chance that I survive, amputate the legs”.

relearn everything

After three months of hospitalization, Beatrice Vio must undergo a year of rehabilitation.

"It's like being born again, you have to relearn everything, step by step," explains the athlete in the Netflix documentary.

“Walking, eating, brushing your teeth, everything is new because we have forgotten the movements”.

But during this year of learning, an idea runs through his head: to resume fencing, at all costs.

She then discovered the possibility of practicing her passion while having a disability.

At first, his father tapes his foil to him by hand, then manufactures, with specialists, a prosthesis which allows him to screw his foil like an extension of his own arm.

I realized that I liked wheelchair fencing even more than standing fencing.

Beatrice Vio

She then became the first woman equipped with this type of prosthesis.

“I realized that I liked wheelchair fencing even more than standing fencing.

In a wheelchair, it is impossible to escape.

Impossible to be afraid,” she explained in a press release.

With the disease, his dream of participating in the Olympic Games seemed impossible to achieve.

But when she resumed fencing, she then saw a chance to be able to return to competition: "I dreamed of the Olympic Games, then the Paralympic Games, but it's almost the same".

This rebirth and this determination earned him the nickname "Rising Phoenix" (the resurrected phoenix, editor's

), by his group of scouts: “The phoenix can live, die, burn and be reborn.

They saw me every step of the way, alive, burning, dying and reborn.

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Bebe Vio takes on Haiyan Gu at the Tokyo Olympics.

(August 29, 2021.) AFP Forum

A dream come true

At the age of 19, she finally realized her dream by participating in the Paralympic Games in Rio, during which she won a gold medal.

Same scenario in 2020, when she was crowned Paralympic champion at the Tokyo Games.

Her fighting spirit inspires many athletes and, alongside her fencing competitions, she is involved in Art4Sport, an association created by her parents which promotes sport as physical and psychological therapy for children with external prostheses.

The 25-year-old sportswoman now wishes to become the president of the CIP (Italian Paralympic Committee) and of the CONI (Italian Olympic Committee), in order to be able to bring these two institutions together in a large Italian Sports Committee.

“Sport prepares you for all eventualities: to bounce back,

to give the best of yourself and to recover even when you had bad luck”.

Here he allowed her to be reborn.