It was a magnificent day for ParalympicsGB in Paris – their most successful of the 21st century, with 12 gold medals to slide into the team tracksuit pocket. And if it has not gone to plan for all Britain’s former champions this Games, it did for Hannah Cockroft, who collected her fourth consecutive T34 100m title and her eighth Paralympic gold on Sunday night at an electric Stade de France.
Cockroft’s face was focused under her visor as she waited on the line and she accelerated away after 20m, head down, powerful shoulders pounding, beating her teammate Kare Adenegan into second by 1.19sec.
Cockroft was still grinning when she spoke to reporters after being roared across the line. “That’s what we do it for,” she said, “that support, it’s amazing. I can’t wipe the smile off my face, my wheels were vibrating from the noise, I knew Paris could do it and I’m so glad they did.”
Cockroft’s face was everywhere in London 2012, her expression as she crossed the line first on that first night of athletics stamped all over the Games. But being a champion year after year brings its downsides – namely pressure.
“I’m making my life well hard doing this. It is scary – at the start line one kid was just saying: ‘Cockroft, Cockroft,’ and you know you’re the one people are watching and you don’t want to let people down – but that’s why you do it.
“The standard is getting better and better. This is the first time since London that we’ve had heats in the 100m, this morning Lauren Field, the girl from the USA, said: ‘I watched London 2012 and that’s why I’m here,’ and I just really, really hope there are some girls at home saying: ‘I can do that,’ because that’s what it’s all about.
“I had a little tear in my eye as I crossed the line as I honestly didn’t know if I would win it today. It means so, so much to just be able to hold on for a fourth Paralympic Games. Honestly on the start line, they said: ‘On your marks,’ and it didn’t go quiet and I had a little panic: ‘What if I don’t hear the set?’ My wheels were buzzing and I was trying to find my grip, it took me back 12 years because the last time I felt like that was London 2012.”
Cockroft just missed collecting Britain’s first Paralympic medal of the track, that honour going to the Countryfile presenter Samantha Kinghorn. She took silver in the first race of the evening – the T53 800m. She was the only woman anywhere close to the winner, the world-record holder, Catherine Debrunner of Switzerland.
Kinghorn, who was paralysed from the waist down when she was crushed by the main arm of a forklift as a teenager, was thrilled with the medal after coming fourth in Tokyo – especially after having a problem with her axle just before the race.
“It’s amazing, that crowd was insane, even when we had a little warm-up lap, and a French girl was being announced on to the track and she was roared and I was like: ‘This is mad.’”
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Sabrina Fortune took gold in the F20 shot put. The Rio bronze medallist and a three-time world champion, she broke her own world record with a throw of 15.12m, and said: “I can’t believe it, especially to throw so far with the first throw. I wanted to jump up and down but then I remembered I still had five throws to go.
“I didn’t expect a girl like me to be able to do an event like this, on the world stage … It was magical, like walking into a world that is crazy. I was so, so scared after watching it on TV but I am so so happy got that I got that experience.”
Away from the track, British athletes had another bumper day. There were five medals at the velodrome, three of them gold, including one for Kadeena Cox, who had been inconsolable on Thursday after crashing in the final of her C4-5 500m time trial. She, Jody Cundy and Jaco van Gass won the final race at the velodrome, the C1-5 750m team sprint. There was also a silver and a bronze for the married pair of Neil and Lora Fachie. On the water, the Brits rowed away with three golds and one silver – Lauren Rowles becoming the first woman to have won a rowing gold at three Paralympic Games, and the mixed coxed fours and Ben Pritchard in the PR1 men’s sculls was also triumphant.
In the pool Maisie Summers-Newton took gold in the SB6 100m breaststroke, there was gold for Grace Harvey in the SB5 race over the same distance, while Brock Whiston and Alice Tai collected gold and bronze in the 200m SM8 individual relay and Britain closed the night when Olivia Newman-Baronius sealed the win in the final leg of the mixed 4x 100m S14 relay.
