News & Updates

Danielle Aitchison finds it a little hard to comprehend the journey she has undertaken since making her international debut at the 2019 Para Athletics World Championships in Dubai.

Aged just 18 at that time, the Waikato-based sprinter surprised herself by winning women’s 200m T36 silver to make a seismic imprint at her first global event.

Since then Danielle has gone on to secure Tokyo Paralympic 100m T36 bronze and 200m T36 silver medals and now she returns for her second crack at the Para Athletics World Championships a very different athlete to the nervous and excited teenager who lined up in the Dubai four years ago.

“I think I have the experience now of having gone through the four different seasons of racing,” explains Danielle. “I’ve now had chance to reflect and review four times and look for ways of moving forward. It has allowed me to reach to a higher level.”

In “utter disbelief” at winning 200m silver at the 2019 Para Athletics World Championships she nonetheless did not have a perfect experience four years ago, as she also finished fourth and just outside of the medals in the 100m.

“It was so cool to be on the stage, doing what I love and it was great to celebrate that success with my mum,” she recalls. “But I did have to deal with the disappointment of fourth in 100m. I had great highs in Dubai but I also experienced my first disappointment with the 100m. It taught me that things don’t always go my way.”

Enjoying more success over the 200m than the 100m in the early phase of international career – post the Tokyo Paralympics, Danielle and her coach, Alan McDonald, set about focusing more energy on the 100m.

Identifying the shorter sprint as where the Kiwi could make the greatest improvement she has focused on her blocks work and drive phase in an effort to find extra speed.

Benefiting from an uninterrupted winter training periods in 2022 – because of the postponement of the Para Athletics World Championships in Kobe, Japan – she emerged for the 2023 domestic campaign fitter and stronger than ever.

Danielle enjoyed a good domestic campaign highlighted by winning the women’s 100m and 200m Para double at the Jennian Homes New Zealand Track & Field Championships in time 13.95 and 29.46, respectively.

Since then she has further improved her performance level and in Townsville in June, she rocketed to a new national women’s T36 record of 13.81 and equalled her national 200m record with 28.98 to offer clear evidence of her current shape.

Currently ranked number one in the world in both the women’s 100m and 200m T36 events, Danielle, is wisely, however, not counting any chickens. And she still regards Yiteng Shi of China, the three-time Paralympic sprint champion and defending 100m and 200m champion as the athlete to beat.

“I’m super happy to be ranked number one but I don’t know how Shi has been training, so I don’t try and base my feelings off the rankings,” explains Danielle. “It really comes down to how you perform on the day. I think back to last World Championships when a Russian girl who was placed in second in her heats tripped and fell and missed out on the final. It all comes down to what I can do on the day.”

Having recently graduated in a Bachelor of Social Science majoring in Education and Society post the Paris World Championships she plans to take up an internship at Paralympics NZ as part of their ‘Seeing is Believing’ project.

However, before returning back to New Zealand from her European adventure she said: “I feel confident based off previous performances and I’m just trusting in the process.”