On Friday, June 13, at 11:30 a.m., LGBTQ+ world champion paratriathlete and gold medalist Hailey Danz is slated to join The Hartford at the Lake Forest High School Field House for the annual GLASA Great Lakes Games to give custom-fit equipment to three adaptive athletes.
Also, one athlete will receive a human achievement award and scholarship.
Adaptive sports equipment is often a barrier to people’s participation in sports. Adaptive athletes pay approximately 15 times more for equipment than non-adaptive athletes. Over the past six years, The Hartford has gifted more than 5,500 pieces of adaptive sports equipment.
The Games are taking place June 11-16 in Lake Forest.
Last year in Paris, Danz—a left-leg amputee—won an elusive first Paralympic gold medal in the paratriathlon, per Team USA. She is also a two-time silver medalist at the Olympics, Outsports noted in 2024. Regarding being part of the queer community, “For a long time, I didn’t feel pride in being gay,” she wrote in an essay for Team USA in 2022. “On the contrary, the primary emotion I felt was shame.” Now, “sometimes I want to shout from the rooftops about how much I love [girlfriend Hayley Bevan].”