GİZEM GİRİŞMEN
Athlete
Gizem Girişmen was born in Ankara in 1981. In 1992, at the age of eleven, she suffered T5 paraplegia as a result of a traffic accident. After the surgery and rehabilitation, she continued her education. She completed her secondary education at Ankara Private Tevfik Fikret High School and her higher education at the Business Department of Bilkent University. She graduated from Bilkent University with honors in 2004. She graduated from Middle East Technical University, Social Policy master’s program in 2017. She started archery in 2004. For two years she was only interested in archery. She became a member of the Paralympic National Team in 2005. In 2005, she became a national athlete for the first time at the IPC World Archery Championships held in Italy. She finished third at the EPC European Archery Championships in 2006. She finished first in the 2007 International Paralympic Committee (IPC) World Rankings. Competing at the 2008 Paralympic Summer Games in Beijing, Girişmen won the gold medal in the Individual/Olympic category, defeating her Chinese rival Fu Hongzhi with 91-85 points. With this medal, she became the first female athlete to receive a gold medal in the history of the Paralympic Games in Turkey. She was ranked first in her category in the IPC World Archery rankings between 2007-2010. She won first place in the world recurve bow category in the 7th Paralympic Archery World Championships, held in the Czech Republic in 2009 . In August of that year she was chosen the athlete of the month by the International Paralympic Committee (IPC). In 2010, she was nominated for the Laureus Sports Awards in the category of athletes with disabilities. She carried the Turkish flag at the opening ceremony of the 2012 Paralympic Summer Games. She served as a member of the board of the European Paralympic Committee (EPC) from 2012 to 2017. She continued her career in the public sphere at the Ministry of Youth and Sports. She was elected as a member of the Athlete Council of International Paralympic Committee at 2012 London and 2016 Rio Paralympic Games. In 2017, together with Taha Akgül, she was deemed worthy for the Mustafa V Koç Sports Award.
http://afsadengelsizcumhuriyet.blogspot.com/2010/01/
Presentations