'I bought my Paralympics village bedroom' - Nicholls

Mel Nicholls is competing at her third Paralympics this summer but her first in the para-triathlon event

When Mel Nicholls made her Paralympics debut at London 2012 in wheelchair racing, the experience was so special she unsurprisingly wanted to mark it.

Athletes are known for collecting memorabilia from the Games and Nicholls was no different, although she needed more than a suitcase to get her collectables back home.

"In London they were selling off the furniture from the rooms in the village so I bought my bedroom - my spare room is made up," Nicholls told BBC Radio Gloucestershire.

"I have my bed, the duvet, sideboard, flags and various posters from around the Games.

"You've got the memories but collecting the memorabilia is something great to keep hold of."

The Paris Games will be Nicholls' third Paralympics but will be significantly different, not least because the 47-year-old is competing in the new para-triathlon event.

Nicholls ended up in the sport "by accident" after competing in her first event only two years ago.

"Wheelchair racing is an element of triathlon but it's very different," she said. "It's not on the track, it's at the end of a full-on swim, transition, bike, transition, it's on the cobbles of Paris, it's not flat.

"Training for one discipline and now the last two years training for three is something else, but what an opportunity [it is] that I didn't plan, that I didn't see coming. I'm just taking it and doing everything I can."

Nicholls' spare room is full of furniture and items from the London 2012 Games athletes' village

Nicholls' Paralympics introduction in 2012 came on the track as a sprinter. She moved to middle-distance racing in Rio four years later.

However, her heart was really in endurance racing and after deciding to switch to marathon events - where there was no classification for her at the Paralympics - she thought her time at the Games was over.

"I knew that was going to be goodbye to the track and racing [at the] Paralympics in that sport," she said.

"I remember quite clearly being on the track and saying goodbye to it. I hadn't been on the track again since the last few months."

'Learning as you get older is brilliant'

Nicholls turned to ultra-endurance events and in 2021 - while the Tokyo Paralympics were taking place - she was completing a 4,800km handcycle around the UK.

She had an ultra-cycling event planned in the United States for 2022 when she decided to join her local triathlon club purely to socialise - an innocuous decision that has led to a new sporting chapter in her career.

Nicholls was picked up by British Triathlon after her first international competition and has won nine medals in her 13 races since.

Of the three para-triathlon's disciplines, wheelchair racing and handcycling were familiar to Nicholls, but swimming was something she has had to work on.

"Still not comfortable calling myself a swimmer, there's a long way to go but that's been such a huge challenge and one that I've loved," she said.

"Learning things as you get older is just brilliant."

A series of strokes earlier in her life meant Nicholls is unable to walk and use much of the left side of her body.

But since her last Paralympics appearance, Nicholls has overcome more health issues, including further strokes and the removal of a 5kg ovarian tumour in 2020.

"Four years ago I didn't know if I'd ever be able to ride my bike again, I didn't know what the future was going to be, if there was a future or anything," Nicholls added.

"Never would I have imagined in a million years I'd be here doing this."

With a spare room decked out in Paralympics memorabilia, one item Nicholls said would be "amazing" to add to it is a Paris medal.

"We all want to win gold - there's only one gold, we all want to get a medal - not everybody can get a medal," Nicholls said.

"But I can promise I will give everything and hopefully make Tewkesbury proud, and bring back amazing stories, memories. Anything else is a bonus."