When Team Canada made their entrance on the Place de la Concorde in Paris on Aug. 28 for the Paralympics 2024 Opening Ceremonies, one of the athletes gliding along the famed boulevard was BOHS graduate and Ladycats legend Tara Llanes (’95).

Llanes, who competes for Team Canada’s womens’ wheelchair basketball team, was a member of a Ladycats team that won back-to-back state titles in 1993 and 1994, went 55-2 in her two seasons on varsity, and was ranked number one in USA Today’s Super 25 national high school poll. 

It was a transformative time for Llanes, who joined the Ladycats as a sophomore in 1993. 

“Playing for [Brea Olinda] and for Coach [John Hattrup] taught me a lot about discipline and who I wanted to be,” Llanes told Triumph Mobility, for whom she’s a brand ambassador, in an interview in 2020. 

Pam Valenti, BOHS girls’ athletic director, remembers Llanes as being “a fierce competitor and so, so strong.”

But Llanes’s journey to competing for Team Canada’s wheelchair basketball team was as circuitous as the mountain bike tracks she made her second home after stepping away from the hardwood during her senior year in the fall of 1994.

This pivot from the Wildcat gym to the treacherous tracks of competitive bike riding wasn’t totally unexpected as the West Covina native had many competitive interests. “I ran track, rode horses, played softball, basketball and raced BMX and mountain bikes,” Llanes said.

In 1995, Llanes shared in an interview with the Wildcat, that when she was eleven, she “became interested in racing when she passed a track on the side of the freeway and suddenly decided she wanted to be a part of the action.” 

Soon, “she was hooked.” And soon, she was ascending the ranks nationally, from number two in the nation for 12 and under girls in 1989; to 13 and under Girls Grand National Champion in 1990; to 15 and under Girls Grand National Champion in 1992. 

Her success led to sponsorships with Aussie Wear and Haro Designs. 

In 1993, while a sophomore at BOHS, Llanes switched from BMX racing to mountain bike racing (MTB). 

In the interview with the Wildcat, Llanes expressed, “My future plans will hopefully lead me to become a pro mountain biker.”

Llanes achieved that dream in 1996 when she turned pro with the support of her sponsor, Haro Bikes, after winning the 1995 Junior National Downhill Championship.  

Like her BMX career, Llanes soon ascended to the heights of MTB, with a gold medal at the 1999 Winter X Games; a slew of medals at World Cups from 1999 and 2006; and the title of USA Cycling National Champion in 2006.  

In 2007, tragedy struck.  

During the semi-finals of the Jeep King of the Mountain series in Vail, Colo., Llanes hit an obstacle and was thrown over the bike’s handlebars. The accident resulted in a “C-7 fracture and L-1 damage to her vertebrae” and paralysis below the waist.

“I remember being in the gate, and nothing felt right. My goggles were sitting funny in my helmet, and my pedal — where I normally start it — it felt like I couldn’t get it in the right spot. [I was] having this debate in my head. Jump it or don’t jump it. I need to make a decision. I made the decision to jump it, which was the wrong decision,” Llanes told Wheelchair Basketball Canada in 2022. 

Llanes’s road to recovery — both physically and mentally — was a long one.  

“I didn’t play sports for probably five or six years,” Llanes said. “It was the longest I’d gone in my entire life without sports. I felt so lost.” 

In 2009, Llanes moved to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada to live with her girlfriend. 

It was around this time that the former champion Ladycat, BMX rider, and MTB competitor was introduced to wheelchair tennis and Canadian First Nations wheelchair basketball player Richard Peter, who encouraged her to play wheelchair basketball to help her gain speed on the tennis court. 

Llanes also met Amanda Yan, a former Canadian wheelchair basketball player, who inspired the former Ladycat to continue her basketball journey. 

Once again, Llanes was hooked on a new sport.  

In 2016, Llanes competed for the BC Royals and BC Breakers, and in 2018, Llanes was selected for the Canadian national team, which competed — and finished fifth — at the 2018 World Championships in Hamburg, Germany. Llanes grabbed seven rebounds in a 77-38 win over France.  

Llanes made her Paralympic debut in Tokyo in 2020. 

“I was going to retire after Tokyo, [but] after growing up watching the Olympics I had an idea or sense of what it should feel like. When we got to Tokyo it was absolutely not [like] that, after training so hard. I came home from there and I took a month and a half to think about it. Then I made the decision [to continue],” Llanes said in a 2024 interview with the Dropping In podcast.

Shortly after, in 2022, Llanes was enshrined in the BMX Hall of Fame. 

Now, Llanes’s journey has led her to Paris and the 2024 Paralympic Games.

Team Canada’s womens’ wheelchair basketball team advanced to the semifinals after finishing second in their group by beating Great Britain, 63-54, on Aug. 31, and blowing out Spain, 81-49, on Sept. 1.

In the quarterfinals on Sept. 4, Team Canada defeated Germany, 71-53, advancing them to the semifinals against the Netherlands, the 2020 gold medalists in the Tokyo Paralympics. 

Netherlands defeated Canada, 72-61, on Sept. 6, ending the team’s dream of gold, but not their dream of medaling. Llanes and her teammates will play China, whom they lost to in pool play, on Sept. 8 for bronze.

Valenti, who coached Llanes in the high jump at BOHS, said, “It is exciting to see Tara reach her dreams of competing in the Paralympics. It is a true testament to her determination, will power, resilience, and strength to see her reach this level.”

As a senior, Llanes expressed to the Wildcat that she believed she “will always have the desire to be a great competitor in a sport she loves so much.” 

What was true 29 years ago is still true today, as Llanes competes at the highest level in a sport she loves.