Joany Badenhorst

Joany Badenhorst (born 10 August 1994) is a South African-born Australian Paralympian who was selected to compete in Para-snowboard cross at the 2014 Winter Paralympics in Sochi. She would have been the first female snowboarder to represent Australia at the Winter Paralympics, but was forced to withdraw from her event after injuring her left knee on the morning of the event. In February 2018, she was selected in the Australian team to compete at the 2018 Winter Paralympics.

Personal Joany Badenhorst was born on 10 August 1994 in Harrismith, South Africa. Her mother Petro is a teacher and her father Peter is an architect. She has two brothers, Garrett and Peter. She attended Harrismith Primary School. Her family moved to Australia in 2009 so she could receive better medical assistance. she lives in Griffith, New South Wales, and resides in Jindabyne during the Australian ski season.

Australian Paralympic snowboarding coach Peter Higgins identified Badenhorst as a likely snowboarder after the London Games, and she commenced training in this sport. In taking up snowboarding, she needed a new custom-made leg. Badenhorst said: "I need a special leg that has to be engineered differently to accommodate the different pressures and angles of snowboarding".

In the lead-up to the 2014 Sochi Games, Badenhorst competed and trained in the Netherlands, Austria, and the United States.

In February 2015, at the IPC Para-Snowboard World Championships in La Molina, Spain, she won a silver medal in the Women's SB-LL2. She competed with one arm in a cast due to a fracture caused in a training accident a week before the Championships.

At the 2017 IPC Para-Snowboard World Championships in Big White City, she won bronze medals in the Women's Snowboard Cross Banked Slalom and Women's Snow Board Cross Lower limb 2 impairment.

Badenhorst was selected on the Australian team for 2018 Winter Paralympics but was injured in a training run just prior to the day of competition and was declared medically unfit to compete. She was also the Australian flag bearer at the Opening Ceremony.

Badenhorst says that her career highlight is being Australia's first, and to date only, female representative in Para-snowboard. In addition to this, Joany states that the greatest moment in her career was winning the 2016/17 IPC World Cup Crystal Globe in Snowboard Cross.

Recognition 2018 – Co-captain with Mitchell Gourley of the Australian Team at 2018 Winter Paralympics 2018- Winter Paralympics Opening Ceremony flag bearer, the first female Australian Winter Paralympian to be given this honour.