Thursday, September 11, 2008

More records tumble as Paralympians excel

The Bird's Nest saw several world records broken yesterday.

China's Zhu Pengkai claimed a gold medal in the men's javelin, F11/12, with a new world record, followed by Branimir Budetic of Croatia and Miroslaw Pych from Poland.

"My third throw was 63.07m and that was my best throw ever," Zhu said. "I performed much better than expected. I felt the gold was in my hands when I made it."

Canadian veteran Dean Bergeron finished his last Paralympic Games with a gold medal in the men's 200m T52. Beat Bosch from Swizerland and Peth Rungsri from Thailand finished, respectively, second and third

Abraham Cheruiyot Tarbei from Kenya broke the men's 1,500m T46 record to win gold, while Abderrahman Ait Khamouch from Spain and Samir Nouioua from Algeria finished second and third.

In the field events, Darko Kralj from Croatia set a new world record in the men's shot put F42 and Arnaud Assoumani from France was crowned champion in the men's long jump F46, also with a new world record.

At the water cube, in the men's 4100 freestyle relay 34pts, the British team grabbed gold in the first swimming relay event of the Games and broke the world record with a time of 3 minutes 51.43 seconds. The silver medal went to Australia and China was third.

The 12 gold medals on offer on the fourth day of competition were shared by nine countries, with Britain, the United States and Russia the leading forces, winning two golds apiece.

In the women's 100m backstroke S8 class, Heather Frederiksen of Britain won the gold in 1:16.74 and rewrote the world record marks twice in one day.

Charalampos Taiganidis won Greece's first gold medal at the Games in the 100m freestyle S13 and set a new world record of 53.37, shaving 0.59 seconds off the former record mark.

In track cycling Britain continued to dominate by winning three out of four gold medals on the last day of competition, which helped the country lead the track cycling medal tally by a remarkable 12 golds and 1 silver.

The first gold of the day went to American cyclist Barbara Buchan in the women's individual pursuit, LC3-4/CP3 category.

Britain's Sarah Storey claimed the women's individual pursuit title, LC1-2/CP4 category, with a new LC1 world record of 3:36.637. China was guaranteed a bronze medal by Dong Jingping.

Anthony Kappes and his pilot Barney Storey took Britain's second gold of the day in the men's sprint, B&VI category.

In the last event of the day, a British team brimming with gold medals and world records overcame finalists China in the men's team sprint, LC1-4 CP3/4 category.

In weightlifting, three women set new records one after another at the Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics gymnasium.

The show began with Lucy Ejike from Nigeria, who set two world records in a row in the women's 48kg category.

Coached by her husband, 35-year-old Mexican Amalia Perez ended her gold medal drought by winning the women's 52kg, setting a new Paralympic record with 128kg. Egypt's two-time Paralympic champion Fatma Omar, in the women's 56kg category, broke her own Paralympic record with her second and third attempts with 135kg yesterday, then went on to set a world record, also held by her, at 141.5kg.

Source: China Daily/Agencies

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