After graduating Londonderry High School, back in 2015, Noelle Lambert has been quite busy in the world of sports and in helping those around her with overcoming adversity.
Two years after graduating, while playing Divsion I lacrosse at UMass Lowell, Lambert suffered a life-threatening injury during a moped crash on Martha’s Vineyard in which she lost a leg.
Since then, she has excelled in a great many things and this week, Lambert will be competing in her second Paralympic Games.
Lambert, who now lives in Manchester, is scheduled to compete in two events at the 2024 Paralympics in Paris, France for team USA. She will be running in the 100-Meter T63, scheduled to start at 5:20 a.m. on Saturday, Sept. 7.
She will also be competing in the Women’s Long Jump starting at 1 p.m. on Thursday Sept. 5.
The T-63 Division is an athlete competing with a single leg amputation above the knee who is running with a prosthesis.
In Tokyo of 2021, she placed sixth in the 100-Meter and also broke her own American record.
She is also hoping to compete in snowboarding at the 2026 Paralympic Winter Games in Milan-Cortina.
Lambert represented the United States in Para snowboard at the 2022 World Championships in Lillehammer, Norway.
Noelle has stated that her accident has been the best thing that has ever happened to her, she’s been able to help others by sharing her experience and is determined to spread the message of hope, determination and perseverance through “The Born to Run Foundation” she started and through speaking engagements.
Noelle is a recipient of the Myra Kraft Community MVP Award, the Wilma Rudolph Student Athlete Achievement Award, the New England Women’s Leadership Award by the Boys and Girls Club of Dorchester, Mass., and was honored by the Boston Celtics as a “Hero Among Us” for her commitment to helping others and received the L’Oreal Women of Worth Award for her charitable work in her community.
Lambert graduated cum laude from UMass Lowell in 2019 with a Bachelor’s degree in Criminal Justice, Noelle was determined to continue using her athletic abilities and tried out for the U.S. Paralympic team to compete in the 100-meter in Track and Field, a sport in which she had never competed. In the fall of 2019, Noelle made the team and broke the U.S. women’s record at the World Para Athletics Championship in Dubai.
She took up Para athletics in May 2017 at Fortitude Health and Training in Manchester, after she was fitted with her first running prosthesis in April of 2017, she began running with coach, Kirstin Kochanek, as a form of rehabilitation, in order to return to playing lacrosse for her college, and soon went on to her Paralympic pursuits.