Paralympic Games: France finishes 14th nation with 54 medals

It is the end of more than a month of hardships, medals, joys, tears and efforts in Tokyo. After the Olympics, the Paralympics are coming to an end this Sunday, with the closing ceremony scheduled from 1 p.m. in France. The sporting events, they ended in the night with a few last medals, including two for the only Lucas Mazur in badminton. The Frenchman was crowned Olympic champion in singles before winning silver with Faustine Noël in doubles, bringing the counter to 54 medals, which will therefore be the final total of the French delegation. A good overall record, much better than in Rio, where France had brought back only 28 medals.

And yet, in Brazil, France finished 12th in the medal table, where it only finished 14th in Tokyo. The explanation? In large part because if it has almost doubled its number of medals in total, the blue delegation has won "only" two additional gold medals, mainly making a razia on the bronze medals (28). It therefore finishes behind nations such as Azerbaijan (19 medals in total including 14 gold), Japan (51), Germany (43) or Iran (24) who have gleaned less charm than they.

"We have room for improvement to transform a few bronze medals into gold," Tony Estanguet explained in our columns on Saturday. The strength of this French team is the sharing of experience. There are tauliers like Marie-Amélie Le Fur, with four Paralympic Games, or Sandrine Martinet. The new generation is fully integrated, with Alexandre Léauté

Ugo Didier

… They are already on their way to Paris 2024. "