Key events
In the women’s T12 marathon, Fatima El Isrissi of Morocco, already a silver medalist in the T13 5000m, leads by a way from Meryem En-Nourhi also of Morocco; she’s just passed the halfway mark but is she tiring a little?
But back to the powerlifting, Gharibshahi is going for 252 … and look at that! It’s easy for him, and he retakes the gold-medal position with another PR; let’s see what happens next.
In the men’s T12 marathon, El Amin Chenntouf of Morocco and Wajdi Boukhli of Tunisia have broken away from the field.
Here comes Enkhbayar to try and improve the Games record one kilo to 248 … and he bangs it out! Now then. Ghaaribshahi to go next…
Jose de Jesus Castillo Castillo, sitting third. noises up the crowd as he addresses 231 … and he can’t quite get it up.
Also going on is the men’s up to 107kg powerlifting. Aliakbar Gharibshahi of Iran leads with 247kg, a Paralympic record, and given we’re in round three, it’ll take something significant to stop him claiming gold. But Sodnompilkee Enkhbayar of Mongolia will shortly attack 248; if he nails it, he’ll move in front.
Jin Hua of China has gone by Tomoki Suzuki of Japan; they take silver and bronze respectively.
In the women’s race, another Swiss legend, Catherine Debrunner, leads by a way; Susannah Scaroni of USA lies second with Madison de Rozario of Australia third.
Marcel Hug of Switzerland wins men’s T54 marathon gold for the third time in a row!
Yet another terrifyingly, affirmingly brilliant performance. What a man!
Hug comes around the final corner and the line awaits him! He’s destroyed the field!
Hug rides over cobbles, and that must be horrible – I know how eager people in regular chairs are to avoid them, but on these racing affairs it must be something else. He’s nearly there, though – the gold will soon be his.
Marcel Hug, who took four golds in Tokyo but so far here has had to satisfy himself with two silver and one bronze, is well in front in the T54 men’s marathon. Second is Tomoki Suzuki of Japan with Jin Hua of China third and David Weir of GB fourth, but none have a prayer of catching the leader.
As per LEXI, T12 classification “is for runners with a visual impairment. Their vision is constricted to a radius of less than five degrees and/or the ability to recognise a moving object at a distance of one metre.”
And T54 “is for wheelchair track athletes who have full function in their body with moderately or highly affected movement in the legs or the absence of legs. All generate power through the full range of body and arm movements, providing good acceleration from the start and highly responsive manoeuvring during the race.”
Preamble
Salut! It’s been an incredible Games … and it’s not quite finished yet. Before we have to contemplate what we might do tomorrow, we’ve got one more day of intense and moving competition.
The T54 and T12 marathons are already under way and we’ve also got some powerlifting and basketball for you – most particularly the women’s gold-medal match between the Netherlands and USA – so let’s get on with it. On y va!
