Jessica Gallagher

Jessica Gallagher has a rich and varied career in many sports, having represented Australia in alpine skiing, athletics, rowing and track cycling.

Gallagher grew up in Geelong, Victoria. She is legally blind, having been diagnosed with cone dystrophy during high school.

Gallagher was selected for the Beijing 2008 Paralympic Games for athletics. However, on the eve of the Games she was ruled ineligible to compete due to being 0.1 degrees too sighted in her right eye.

In 2010, she became the first Australian woman to win a medal at the Winter Paralympic Games, winning bronze in the slalom. She would win another bronze medal in 2014 in the giant slalom.

At London 2012, Gallagher participated her first Summer Paralympic Game in track and field.

In 2016, she made her international debut in track para-cycling with Madison Janssen as her pilot. At the UCI World Championships in Montichiari, Gallagher and Janssen won gold in the tandem B sprint and bronze in the 1km time trial.

Later that year, Gallagher returned to the Summer Paralympics, this time as a track cyclist. In Rio, she and Janssen won bronze in the 1km time trial. In so doing, Gallagher made history again, becoming the first Australian to medal in both a Winter and Summer Games, whether Olympic or Paralympic.

Over the next seven years, Gallagher won seven silver medals at UCI Para-cycling Track World Championships: in 2018 and 2019 with Janssen, and in 2022 and 2023 with Caitlin Ward as her pilot. Gallagher and Ward also won two bronze medals in 2024.

In 2022, Gallagher and Ward became dual Commonwealth Games champions when they won gold in the tandem sprint and time trial in Birmingham. That came four years after Gallagher won silver at both events on the Gold Coast with Janssen.

Although Gallagher had taken up competitive rowing for several years, at the end of 2023 she decided to focus on track cycling with a view to racing at the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games.

That goal came to fruition when Gallagher competed in track cycling at the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games. There, she and Ward won the silver medal in the 1000m Time Trial. The duo also placed seventh in the 3000m individual pursuit.

Outside of sports, Gallagher is an osteopath and motivational speaker, based in Melbourne.