I've written about a few icons now, and I suppose I was hoping to see some common traits - some personal characteristics that set these iconic individuals apart from their contemporaries. 

There's always excellence in their sport, for one thing. There's determination, there's huge talent and there's a lot of hard work. Often there are medals, but not always. There's normally failure or struggle, as well as success - if winning were easy then it wouldn't be as impressive or the quest for it so driving.

Nowhere is this clearer than in the Paralympic movement. There's the fairly well-known statement from the 1996 Games in Atlanta that the "The Olympic Games are where heroes are made. The Paralympic Games are where heroes come."  And this sentiment hits home when you see astonishing elite Paralympic performance, like Ajibola Adeoye winning the 100m final at the ’92 Games in just 10.27 seconds. 

Natalie du Toit is an extraordinary swimmer from South Africa with a great story. She almost qualified for the Sydney Olympic Games aged just 16, so there was no questioning her innate ability. 

The next year, after swimming practice, she was involved in a car accident which meant her left leg was amputated from the knee. 

Every Paralympian sets out on their own path to success, but she seemed to settle on hers pretty sharply - within 3 months she was back in the pool.

In 2002, Natalie went full-throttle - competing in the UK at the Manchester Commonwealth Games where she won and broke world records for the 50m and 100m multi-disability freestyle. Not content with that, she was the first athlete with a disability to qualify for the final of a non-disabled event. No surprise, then, that she went on to win the award for ‘Outstanding Athlete’ of those Games. 

Before long she was competing and winning medals of all colours at international events, and at the 2004 Athens Paralympic Games she swagged a medal haul of 5 golds and 1 silver to secure her place in the history of the Paralympic movement.

But in my mind she attained Iconic Status last year, in Beijing. 

As the Olympic Games opened, she led South Africa into the Olympic Stadium - the first disabled athlete to be a flag-bearer. 

Later she showed the breadth of her distance range by competing amongst 25 of the world's best in the first ever Olympic 10k open water swim, finishing just 2 minutes behind the winner in a 2 hour race. I remember watching the broadcast of the event and being just as fascinated by Natalie’s speed as I was by the battle for gold between the Russian Larisa Ilchenko, who pipped Brits Keri-Anne Paye and Cassandra Patten.

A couple of weeks later, she was back in Beijing for the Paralympic Games. In the Water Cube she won the 50m, 100m and 400m freestyle gold medals. Oh, and the 200m medley and 100m butterfly, too.

So why is Natalie iconic? 

I think in her case it's the total package. Her home is full of medals across more than one Paralympic Games; she is one of the world's fastest distance swimmers; she’s an elite athlete so capable as a Paralympian that she beats non-disabled contemporaries in the Olympic Games a fortnight beforehand, as part of her warm-up; and she’s a woman who carried the hopes of her nation into the Beijing Olympic Stadium and waved them aloft. 

Simply put, she was made a hero, but she came as one too - and who knows what she will do in 1,000 days' time in London? 

Paralympic and Olympic Icon, Natalie Du Toit, I salute you.