Paralympics 2016: Meet Shropshire's heroes as the 'Superhumans' return

And while next month's games are perhaps unlikely to recreate the magic of four years ago, they are now firmly established as one of the big events of the sporting calendar.

The 15th Summer Paralympic Games opens with the traditional ceremony on September 7, followed by 11 days of sporting activities.

It will be the first time the summer Paralympics has been held in this host city's wintertime, and the first time the event has been held in South America.

Kelda Wood - canoe

From: Aston Pigott near Worthen.

Your specialist sport: Paracanoe – sprint kayaking.

What are your earliest memories of playing sport? "Playing netball at a national level as a teenager.

"I played goal attack and at 13 to 14 years I used to go into school at 6.30am every morning and make myself score 100 goals in a row. If I got to 99 and missed one I'd start again. I was often late for lessons."

Who were your childhood role models and inspirations? "My dream was to ride for my country in three-day eventing and to compete at the Olympics, so at the time my role model was Virginia Leng."

Why did you choose your chosen sport? "It happened by chance.

"I was on Facebook one day and saw an advert for a talent ID day with GB paracanoe.

"I clicked on the 'like' button and the next thing I knew I'd got an invite to attend. The rest, as they say, is history."

At what age did you realise you had potential to become a top performer? "I don't think I ever did but I've always loved training hard and refuse to give up, so I just keep going, keep working hard and keep striving to be the best I can possibly be."

What sort of characteristics does it take to reach and then succeed at the highest level? "I think determination and commitment are the two main things I would say. It's not easy and you've got to be able to take the knocks but if you're focused and keep working hard every day, even when things aren't going well, then you will get there eventually."

Tell us a bit about your training regime? "I train six days a week, with two to three sessions a day.

"In our sport there's a big focus on strength and power so we spend a lot of time in the gym.

"We then do three days with two sessions on the water.

"It's pretty brutal."

Biggest triumph in sport? "Finishing 10th at the World Championships this year. It's still just a stepping stone to where I want to be but it was fantastic to be competing on an international stage and to represent GB."

Biggest disappointment? "Not being selected for Rio this year."

Mel Clarke - Archery

From: Shrewsbury.

Your specialist sport: Archery.

What are your earliest memories of playing sport? "I used to be a county runner and high jumper when I was in school before becoming disabled. I loved it. Loved playing anything. Football, rugby, etc. When I became disabled at 11, I didn't enjoy sport as very few opportunities for me at that time."

Who were your childhood role models and inspirations? "Parents and family."

Why did you choose your chosen sport? "It was something I could do in a wheelchair and was being run near where I lived so could get there on my own and be independent.

"It was a good summer sport with a local friend neither of us were good at but really enjoyed."

What age did you realise you had potential to become a top performer? "I won my first competition aged 16 and the person teaching said to my dad 'she's good, one day she may be good enough to represent the county'.

"I got into the disabled squad in 2002 and in my first international won the European championships, shooting six world records, so knew I was okay at what I was doing."

What sort of characteristics does it take to reach and then succeed at the highest level? "Patience, dedication, commitment, passion and heart. Giving up everything to make your dreams happen requires belief."

Tell us a bit about your training regime? "When fully training it's up to nine hours a day, including shooting, gym, equipment maintenance, physio and physiology. Competition days can last for nine to 10 hours so it's good to practice a full day shooting sometimes too."

Biggest triumph in sport? "Silver medal in 2012 Paralympics and ranked world number one."

Biggest disappointment? "When you hear things about drug cheats in sport. If you want to play the game, play properly, play fairly."

Toughest challenge? "Shooting in London 2012 against a team mate and with family and friends there."

Danielle Brown - archery

From: Telford.

Your specialist sport: Archery.

What are your earliest memories of playing sport? "I had a very active upbringing and my parents encouraged me to try every sport I could.

"I did running, cycling, swimming and golfing and whilst I was terrible at all of them, I still really enjoyed them."

Who were your childhood role models and inspirations? "I have never really had a role model or hero.

"There are plenty of inspiring people out there, but I never wanted to be like anybody else and I'm more internally motivated."

Why did you choose your chosen sport? "I became disabled and I could no longer take part in all the sports I loved doing as a child.

"I didn't know anything about Paralympic sport so I figured I was down to archery or swimming.

"Playing with bows and arrows seemed way cooler than bobbing up and down in a pool so I did a beginners' course on my 15th birthday."

At what age did you realise you had potential to become a top performer? "I won the junior national championships a year after I started archery and I knew that I still had a lot more in the tank."

What sort of characteristics does it take to reach and then succeed at the highest level? "Self-awareness, self-confidence, focus, determination and resilience."

Tell us a bit about your training regime? "Full time sport is a lifestyle. Every decision you make you ask yourself whether it is going to help you win the gold medal.

"When you go to bed, what you eat, when you eat are all important factors to making sure you are in the best physical and mental condition to perform.

"Your whole life revolves around training, which is exhausting but rewarding when it pays off."

Biggest triumph in sport? "Winning the gold medal on home soil in London 2012."

Biggest disappointment? "A rule change that meant I am no longer eligible to compete at Paralympic events."

There will be athletics competitions throughout the Games, and the other sports range from archery to wheelchair rugby. Boccia, a precision ball game similar to bowls, will also feature, along with cycling, football and wheelchair tennis.

The 2016 games will also see the introduction of two new sports to the programme – canoeing and the paratriathlon, where participants will be asked to swim, cycle, and either run or take part in a wheelchair race.

The Paralympics were the brainchild of Dr Ludwig Guttmann, a German-born Jewish doctor who had fled Nazi Germany in 1939.

In 1943 Guttmann was asked by the Government to establish a spinal injuries unit at the Ministry of Pensions Hospital – now Stoke Mandeville Hospital – in Aylesbury. The unit was intended to treat soldiers and civilians injured during the Second World War, and as part of the rehabilitation process Guttmann encouraged patients to take up sport.

The first sport was a hybrid form of wheelchair polo and hockey, played informally on the ward against the physiotherapists and then developed into a proper team game.

In 1948 London hosted the Olympics, and Guttmann organised an archery demonstration to coincide with the opening ceremony. The event saw patients from from Stoke Mandeville competing with those from the paraplegic ward of the Star and Garter Home for Injured War Veterans in Richmond, Surrey for a Challenge Shield.

Following the success of the event, Guttmann decided to make an annual spectacle of the Grand Festival of Paraplegic Sport which soon became known as the Stoke Mandeville Games.

The following year wheelchair netball was added to the programme, and in 1952 Dutch war veterans were also invited to take part.

By 1960, the event had become a truly international affair.

That year's competition, held at the end of the Rome Summer Summer Olympics, saw 400 athletes from 23 countries take part in a total of 57 events.

The event was rebranded as the 1st Summer Paralympic Games, and established the pattern where the event would be held after the Olympics and would use the same venues.

The event grew rapidly over the next few years. In 1964, when the Paralympics was held in Tokyo, the programme was widened to include 144 events in nine different sports, and more than 5,000 spectators turned out for the opening ceremony.

Four years later, 750 athletes from 29 nations took part, and new sports including lawn bowls, women's basketball and the men's 100-metre wheelchair race were added to the schedule. But it was the 1972 Paralympics in Heidelberg which truly saw it take off, with 984 athletes taking part in a nearly 1,987 different events. Events for quadriplegic athletes were added for the first time, along with demonstration events for the visually impaired.

By now the Paralympics was established as a serious fixture on the sporting calendar.

While the 1976 games did not quite replicate the sheer number of events, it did see amputees and visually impaired athletes compete for the first time.

It also saw the introduction of shooting and standing volleyball, as well as the now-familiar high-speed racing wheelchairs.

Today, given the wide variety of disabilities that Paralympic athletes have, there are several categories in which the athletes compete.

There are 10 main categories of disability: impaired muscle power, impaired passive range of movement, limb deficiency, leg length difference, short stature, hypertonia, ataxia, athetosis, vision impairment and intellectual impairment.

These categories are further broken down into classifications which vary from sport to sport. These have led to some controversy within the Paralympic movement, with some athletes accusing their rivals of exaggerating their impairment to compete against those with more serious disabilities.

The 2012 Paralympics were hailed as among the greatest of all time, with some commentators saying it more than lived up to the Channel 4 slogan, and was at least as exciting as the Olympics themselves.

However, people have been advised to temper their expectations for this year's Paralympics following last week's announcement of cuts to the budget. International Paralympic Committee president Philip Craven said: "Although the situation is pretty precarious, rumours that the games may not go ahead or that sports may be cut are totally unfounded and not true.

"Our aim right now is to bring in additional funding and resources in order to deliver the games at the service levels expected by all stakeholders, most importantly the athletes."

A promised bailout of £60 million was not sufficient to plug the shortfall in the cost of staging the event, leading to claims that funds intended for the Paralympics were being diverted to plug gaps in the Olympics.

Paralympic legend Baroness Grey-Thompson and chief executive of the British Paralympic Association Tim Hollingsworth called for every option to be explored – including financial assistance from the International Olympic Committee – to avoid next month's event being viewed as an afterthought.

The games will now be held at three main venues, with Diadora being dropped from the programme.

Barra da Tijuca will host the majority of the events, with the rest split between Maracana and Copacabana beach.

In many respects, the Paralympics has in recent years returned to its roots, with a large number of veterans from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq competing.

Among them will be Shrewsbury's Nick Beighton, who lost both legs after being blown up by a roadside bomb while serving in Afghanistan in 2009.

The former captain with the Royal Engineers will next month take part in the canoeing event.

Great Britain will have a team of 257 competing in the Paralympics, in sports ranging from archery to wheelchair tennis.

Not all countries, however, are taking part this year.

The International Paralympic Committee has banned all Russian competitors, with the ruling being officially upheld by the Court of Arbitration for Sport. It follows a shock report that revealed Russia has been carrying out out state-sponsored doping at the games.

The Paralympic ban is in contrast to what happened earlier at the Olympics.

More than 270 Russian athletes were allowed to attend after the International Olympic Committee decided against a blanket ban.

Another change is the coverage with Channel 4 broadcasting the Paralympics in the UK.

The BBC, which covered the Olympics, will provide radio coverage of the Paralympics. The Paralympic Games starts with the opening ceremony on September 7, which will be broadcast on Channel 4 from 9pm.

Channel 4's coverage of the games begins the following day, at 1pm.

In the UK, we're four hours ahead of Brazil, so the local time of the events will be screening later than usual on our televisions.

Meanwhile, Breaking Bad actor and co-host of the Channel 4's Paralympic Games coverage, R J Mitte, is calling on broadcasters to boost the number of disabled people on our screens.

Mitte has cerebal palsy and his character, Walter White Jr, in the cult series also had the condition.

But a 2014 study of more than 250 of the most popular programmes found only 2.5 per cent of people on screen were disabled.