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Anastasia Pagonis: Blind teen swimmer from Long Island wins Paralympic gold
Long Island’s Anastasia Pagonis Wins Gold At Tokyo Paralympics. In the news today is the story of Blind teen swimmer from Long Island who won Paralympic gold.
Anastasia Pagonis won the gold medal in a 400-meter freestyle which was hosted at the Tokyo Paralympics and also beat her own world record.
According to her coach she says “I was beside myself my heart rate was over 120,”.
Danin, of Islander Aquatics, is Anastasia’s coach.
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Because of COVID-19 safety protocols, he couldn’t travel with her to Japan, but he’s coaching from afar and knew she’d prevail.
“I said from the beginning when she said that this was her goal I told her ‘you’re going to win the gold,'” Danin said.
Marc was the only swim coach who agreed to take on Anastasia who is blind.
Agenetic disorder coupled with an autoimmune disease caused her to lose her sight at 14 and swimming became her salvation.
“Right when I got in the water I fell in love with it I was like ‘this is for me,'” Anastasia said.
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She’s also a TikTok star and uses the platform to raise awareness.
“Just showing everybody, ‘hey, this is what blind is, what blind looks like and this is the things I can do being blind,'” Anastasia said.
Like being a competitive swimmer.
“My job as a coach for almost 30 years is to make my swimmers happy. To see the joy on her face gave me complete joy,” Danin said.
Already a champion of character, Anastasia is now also a gold medal Paralympian.
