Meet United States Paralympic Couple: Oksana Masters and Aaron Pike

The 2018 Paralympic Games in Pyeongchang, South Korea are just a little over two months away. Thousands of athletes from all over the world will compete in adaptive athletic events, and two of the stars will be couple Oksana Master and Aaron Pike. The pair met at the 2014 opening ceremony in Sochi and will both be looking to bring home gold medals for the United States this March.

Aaron Pike was injured in a hunting accident at the age of 13, resulting in a T-11 spinal cord injury. He quickly began to learn about the world of adaptive sports and excelled in wheelchair track and field. He attended the University of Illinois-Champaign, where he raced alongside one of the most famous Paralympic US athletes, Tatyana McFadden. Similar to Oksana, Aaron also picked up Nordic Skiing later on in life, and made his winter Paralympic debut in Sochi. Since that time, he has earned three top-15 finishes in world cup competition.

In a recent article, TeamUSA.org named Oksana and Aaron “Least Likely to Forget” as the couple prepares for their second winter Paralympic games. They claim that having a grueling, yet similar schedule makes their relationship even stronger, in part because they know what each other are going through. When they are not busy training or working out, the couple enjoys getting coffee together and travelling as much as possible.

Over the next several weeks we will be posting blogs featuring US Paralympic athletes as they prepare to travel to Pyeongchang. Good luck Aaron and Oksana!