Bebe Vio, with her story, her smile and her energy, has become a point of reference for sport in Italy and around the world. The wheelchair fencing champion returned from an unforgettable summer in which she claimed her second Paralympic gold in the individual foil event at the Tokyo 2020 Games, following her Rio 2016 title, and the silver medal in the team event alongside teammates Loredana Trigilia and Andreea Mogoș.

It was a hard-won result, by no means a foregone conclusion. The past year for Bebe Vio had in fact been a rollercoaster, marked by an elbow injury and a Staphylococcus aureus infection that early in the year put the fencer's life in danger and brought her face to face with the risk of amputation. "I was absolutely terrified, because my dream was being taken away from me again," Vio reflects, just a few weeks after her triumph in Tokyo.

We spoke with her the day after her meeting with Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, who had invited Vio to Strasbourg to discuss the issues she cares most about. "She is super pro-disability and pro-sport in terms of inclusion," Vio says. She had attended von der Leyen's State of the Union address, which the latter concluded by speaking of "Bebe as an example of inspiration … this is the soul of Europe and its future."

Yet another confirmation that Bebe's star shines both on and off the fencing piste, and of how the young champion has become an international spokesperson for the transformative power of sport.

Your success in Tokyo came after a very tough year. What has this experience left you with?
Once I was there it was really difficult. Every match, it felt as if my body just couldn't cope anymore; after every match the doctor would come over and say, "look, you need to stop here because it hurts too much." And with adrenaline going full tilt I'd say, "no, I can do it, come on, it's the last one," and they'd tell me no, it wasn't the last one because it was only the start of the morning. And I'd go: "it's the last one, let's go, let's go, let's go!" So tough, but wonderful — the greatest satisfaction of all was managing to be there with the team. In Rio we won bronze; now winning silver was something magical. We have to get to Paris (at the next Games, in 2024, ed.) because we want gold one hundred per cent.

How do you see the issue of athletes' mental health?
Anyone who makes it to the Olympics or Paralympics started playing sport from a very young age. I started at five with my obsession about the Olympics, then what happened happened, and at 11 I started with my obsession about the Paralympics. For us, a year doesn't really exist — our lives run in four-year cycles. Every four years I know I have to do that thing, which then isn't just yours, it belongs to everyone around you. My dream is also my family's dream, my coach's dream — my coach's children's dream, because I know he spends practically his whole life with me, so I know I have to do it for his children too. It's a duty towards all the people around you. The pressure is enormous, and your good fortune has to be having people who support you.

What does it mean to be a great team in wheelchair fencing?
If you look at us individually, we're not a strong team. I'm category B, the other girls (both category A, ed.) are ranked 13th and 15th in the world, so compared to China, which has the world number two in category B — because she's the one I always end up in the final against — and then has the number one and two in category A… take those athletes, take us, and we look like a bunch of amateurs. What gets us the result is the fact that we are a family. Our way of competing is: you don't fence for yourself but for the girl who comes after you. For me, Loredana and Andreea are truly a second mother and a second sister.

As well as the fencing team, you're also a member of the Toyota team. What does being part of it mean to you?
The really great thing about the Toyota team is that we're all completely different: men, women, disabled, able-bodied, every sport — and it's wonderful because you realise you're part of something much bigger. Going to watch the artistic gymnastics with Vanessa (Ferrari, silver medallist in the floor exercise at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, ed.) and falling in love with it and crying alongside her because in some way you feel part of that same thing — to me, that's something truly beautiful. What Toyota represents for me is precisely the love they have for what they do, and for the people they do it for.

Tell us about Art4sport, an association founded in 2009 and inspired by your story, which aims to improve the lives of children and young people with limb prostheses. What projects are you currently working on?
We're managing to help a lot of young people. At the moment there are 38 of us, ranging from three to 30 years old, and four more are about to join. The aim isn't to reach the Olympics but to start having fun through sport. We're now working on a wonderful project, We embrace, and the goal is to embrace every kind of inclusivity through sport — whether in terms of disability, social inclusion or even the environment. We embrace sport is coming up on 25 October in Milan. We'll have two mixed teams of Olympic and Paralympic athletes, and it'll be a kind of relay across four sports (fencing, basketball, football and volleyball, ed.) where the athletes aren't amateurs but of the very highest level — people who have just come back from Tokyo. The great thing about sport is that over the years it has changed the mentality and culture around disability and sport in Italy. We embrace sport will be exactly that: showing how Paralympic sport has grown so much that it can rival Olympic sport.

What future do you see for yourself after fencing at a competitive level?
Physically I'm in a bad way, and my "afterwards" could come as soon as tomorrow, so I think about it constantly. I'm at university (John Cabot University in Rome, ed.) and my aim is to do a Master's. Columbia University in New York has accepted me, so I should be moving to New York. My dream is to become president of the Cip, the Comitato italiano paralimpico, because there is a huge amount of work to be done — work that Luca Pancalli (president of the Cip, ed.) is doing brilliantly, and I am studying everything he does, step by step.

My ultimate goal would be to merge the Olympic and Paralympic committees — that is, the Coni (the Comitato olimpico nazionale italiano, ed.) and the Cip. My dream within five years is to walk into any Italian gym and see an amputee training alongside someone running on two feet. In a fencing gym, I expect to see an Olympic piste right next to a Paralympic one — not to ghettoise the Olympic side in one corner and the Paralympic side in another. Everything can be done together.