Santiago 2023 Parapan American Games: Another big stop in the road to Paris 2024

The road to Paris 2024 will have another major stop next week, when the Parapan American Games start in Santiago, Chile, on 17 November.

The biggest Para sport event in the Americas region will put together almost 2.000 athletes from 31 countries in 17 different sports through 11 days of intense action, emotions, and sporting feats.

World records could be broken, but, maybe more importantly for the athletes at this stage of the Paralympic cycle, qualification opportunities will be available in Santiago.

NPCs can obtain direct qualification slots to the Paralympic Games next year in sports such as blind football, goalball, wheelchair basketball and wheelchair rugby. Meanwhile, in other sports such as Para athletics, Para swimming and Para powerlifting, the athletes can achieve ranking points or performance that count towards qualification for Paris.

“Santiago is a beautiful and modern city that hosted the first Para South American Games in history (in 2014) and will with no doubt deliver again great Games in 2023”, said Andrew Parsons, president of the International Paralympic Committee (IPC), when the Chilean capital was selected as host.

This was the first time the Parapans’ host city is selected under the terms of the APC-PASO agreement, which states a joint bid must be done for the Pan American and Parapan American Games.

It employs the principle of “a host city for both Games” along the lines of the “One Bid, One City” agreement signed between the IOC and IPC in 2000 for the staging of the Olympic and Paralympic Games.

The Santiago 2023 Pan American Games ended on 5 November.

A history of consistent growth

This will be the seventh edition of the Parapan American Games. The first one happened in 1999, in Mexico City, Mexico, with 1.000 athletes from 18 countries. From there on, the growth has been consistent and substantial.

Other cities that hosted the competition have been Mar del Plata (2003), Rio de Janeiro (2007), Guadalajara (2011), Toronto (2015) and Lima (2019). 

Historically, Brazil has been the powerhouse of the region, leading the medals table since Mar del Plata onward. United States, Canada and Mexico have also put huge numbers on each edition.

The Games in Santiago come just two weeks after the end of Hangzhou 2022, the Asian Para Games, which served a similar purpose in that particular region.  The fourth edition of the Asian Para Games were held in the eastern Chinese city of Hangzhou from 22 to 28 October.

A month and a half before, from 3 to 12 September, the African Para Games were held, in Accra, Ghana. It was the first edition of this event, therefore, only three sports happened.

On the other hand, the European region had its turn earlier in the year, with the European Para Championships in Rotterdam, Netherlands, from 8 to 20 August. It was also the first edition of the event, which saw 42 countries and several neutral athletes compete in 10 sports.

Oceania does not have a regional competition.

The Paris 2024 Paralympic Games will be held from 28 August to 8 September. Tickets can be purchased here: Paris 2024 Official Ticketing – Olympic and Paralympic Games