Sorry, Larry: Meet the Dancing With The Stars contestant you'll be cheering for.

She is an absolutely phenomenal Australian figure, and we think it’s about time she received more recognition.

Kelly Cartwright is a gold-medal winning paralympian and the kind of inspiring young woman we hope our daughters will look up to.

Recently we learned Kelly — who has only one leg — will be dancing up a storm on thus season of Dancing With The Stars AND she will be doing it while pregnant.

So in light of her big announcements, we thought we’d help the world get to know this phenomenal 26-year-old…

At the age of 15, Kelly Cartwright was diagnosed with a rare and highly aggressive form of cancer in her right knee.

Without action, this cancer would have eventually claimed her life.

Ultimately, Kelly was left with two options: 1. Undergo a risky operation, which may or may not succeed in stopping the rapidly spreading cancer, or 2. amputate her leg at the knee.

Kelly chose the latter.

“At the beginning, when I had the choice, I definitely didn’t want the amputation. I thought I would rather die than have it, not knowing about the cancer,” she told Mamamia.

“But as soon as I did my research and realised it didn’t have a very good survival rate I made the choice.”

After her surgery, it took Kelly more than four months just to learn how to walk again.

Read more: Losing 75 per cent of her leg put this woman on the world stage.

However, after getting back on her feet she wanted something more.

“A year later [just walking] wasn’t enough,” she explained. “I wanted to learn how to run.”

Kelly started running outside her Geelong home with the assistance of her dad.

“It really wasn’t much of a run — a bit more like a skip, sort of a hop.  I didn’t realise you needed a specially designed carbon fibre blade.”

Within a year of training with her normal prosthetic leg, Kelly was accepted into a paralympics training squad where — with some fundraising help from friends — she finally started using a prosthesis.

She eventually became one of the fastest women on the athletics track — setting a world record of 16.26 seconds in the 100m sprint.

By the end of 2012, Kelly set two world records, won two Paralympic medals — a gold in the long jump and a silver in the 100m — and climbed Mount Kilimanjaro, which she calls one of her greatest achievements.

Post continues after gallery.

But in 2015, Kelly has set herself a new challenge: to conquer the dance floor.

“I’m so excited, but I’d be lying if I didn’t say I wasn’t nervous,” she says of her upcoming DWTS appearance.

“This is mentally challenging as well as physically challenging. There’s a lot of things I can’t do in dancing. It’s so much about balance. I would never attempt to do spins or twirls in my real life — but that is my life now.”

If the dancing wasn’t hard enough, two weeks ago Kelly announced she was pregnant.

She says she will only be four or five months along during the show’s filming — and that certainly won’t slow her down.

While Kelly has put her running to rest for now — she’s still doing five hours of dance training every day.

She says she’s lucky to have a supportive partner, Ryan — “often I’ll come home and lunch and dinner will be made” — as well as an incredible dance partner in Damien Whitewood.

Whitewood has previously appeared on DWTS as a partner to Danielle Spencer, but as Cartwright points out partnering a pregnant amputee will certainly present a new challenge.

“He’s amazing and this is a new challenge for him. But he’s learning as I’m learning. He’s very patient.”

Kelly will be joined by celebs like TV presenters Larry Emdur and Emma Freedman, Aussie music legend John Paul Young and supermodel Samantha Harris on the upcoming season of Dancing With The Stars.

Will you be tuning in to watch Kelly on Dancing With The Stars?

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