Wheelchair racer Sammi Kinghorn says OBE is ‘cherry on top’ of Paralympic medals

Paralympic gold medallist Sammi Kinghorn has said that being made an Officer of the British Empire (OBE) is a “cherry on top of the cake”.

Wheelchair racer Kinghorn, 29, from the Scottish Borders, who won five medals at the Paris Paralympics in 2024, including gold in the 100m T53, was honoured by the Princess Royal at Buckingham Palace on Thursday.

She told the PA news agency: “It’s amazing, it’s such a strange thing.

To go to Paris and have a full stadium and all my friends and family there was incredible and to win my first Paralympic gold medal and then to be honoured was a cherry on top of the cake

“I guess in sport you train every day hoping that one day you’ll win a medal and you can kind of see that happening, but to actually be honoured it doesn’t even seem achievable until it happens.

“To know that other people are watching you and they want to give you something for your achievements is quite nice.

“Paris was incredible, I went to Tokyo and won my first Paralympic medal in front of a completely empty stadium which was actually genuinely heartbreaking.

“But to go to Paris and have a full stadium and all my friends and family there was incredible, and to win my first Paralympic gold medal and then to be honoured was a cherry on top of the cake.”

Kinghorn said that later this year she will compete in marathons, including one in Sydney in August.

She added: “I’m more just doing it for fun this year, I have been under so much pressure – I’ve been doing this sport at this level since I was 17.

“So I want to do something where there’s no pressure and it really doesn’t matter, just more to enjoy sport again.”