Sunday, 2 September 2012

Paralympics day #3

Walsall's Ellie Simmonds lit up the aquatics centre with a barn-storming swim against controversially classified rival Victoria Arlen.

Simmonds played a beautifully crafted race, letting the American do the pace-setting for all but the last 70 metres where the Black Country swimmer burst ahead, claiming the gold in a new world record time.


She shaved five seconds off the current world record, going five seconds faster than her Paralympic Record, which she had set earlier in the heats.


Ellie Simmonds had stormed through the water this morning in her 400m Freestyle race - setting a new Paralympic record in the process.


Fastest man on half legs


Richard Whitehead - wow. The 36-year-old Nottingham man - who was built up to be able to fall over, get up and still win gold, delivered.

And he delivered in some style.


It was simply amazing to see an athlete with straight, above knee prosthetic legs at the starting blocks. The athletes using these type of prosthetics tower above their traditional, kneeling in blocks opponents. And that towering was a precursor for Whitehead's dominance.


He languished behind for the first 120 metres; his choice of prosthetic slowing him down. But once he hit that straight he really stormed through the pack - setting a new world record in the process.


The less good...


Houssein Omar Hassan. He may not be a household name, nor might he ever be. But we've all been in a contest where we're out of our depth and most can empathize with this, Djibouti *checks spelling* athlete.

He ended up finishing 7 minutes behind the main pack, in excess of 11 minutes. The heat winner had already left the track 


Working for ITN - logging the events and getting to watch some top-notch sport in the process.

No comments:

Post a Comment