TOKYO — The first week of the Paralympics yielded several breakthrough moments, including a first for an ostensibly mixed-gender sport, a gold medal for a country that had never claimed one, and a five-time swimming champion who switched sports and struck gold again.
The wheelchair rugby tournament had four female athletes, more than ever before, and one of them won the first gold medal ever awarded to a woman in the sport. The woman, Kylie Grimes, played for Britain’s first Paralympic championship team in the sport, which appeared as a demonstration sport at the 1996 Atlanta Games and debuted as a full medal sport in 2000.