Aviva Parallel Success Athletics – Bedford
A group of 6 DSA athletes travelled to Bedford to join 100 other disabled athletes and compete in the APS Athletics competition at the weekend. The APS event was run alongside the Senior English National Championships and was sanctioned by the IPC, giving athletes from all disability classifications the opportunity to achieve minimum qualifying standard performances for the London 2012 Paralympic Games.
In quite poor weather conditions, Sophie Hancock was first into competition in the women’s shot event, winning the Gold medal with a throw of 7.42m.
The men’s shot event followed immediately with a total of 11 multi disability athletes competing including Sean Clare, Mike Pope, Thomas Burton and Andrew Martin. In a multi disability competition, the placings are decided by a points score system based on each athlete’s disability and the distance thrown. Sean came out the overall Gold medal winner with a throw of 9.01m and Andrew secured the Bronze medal with a season’s best throw of 7.59m. Mike came in 5th place with 7.43m followed closely by Tom with a new PB of 7.22m.
The men’s discus event was again a multi disability competition and again Sean Clare brought home the Gold medal with a throw of 24.97m. A good battle for 2nd and 3rd place was fought out by Thomas Burton and an F37 (CP) athlete, Joshua Bain, with their placings changing 3 times during the competition. Tom eventually came away with the Silver medal and his second PB of the weekend at 23.36m. Mike Pope gave a gutsy performance to finish in 5th place with 19.08m.
In the Javelin competition, Andrew Martin put in a tremendous performance, winning the Gold medal with a throw of 26.39m. More importantly, with this performance Andrew has now achieved the IPC ‘B’ qualification standard for 2012 and has put himself in a good position to push on for the ‘A’ standard. Jack Gambrill put in a solid performance to finish in 4th place with a throw of 22.90m.
Some of our DSAuk athletes will be competing at an Open Disability Athletics competition hosted by the BWAA at Stoke Mandeville Stadium, Aylesbury on the 30th and 31st July. If you live nearby, why not come along and give them some support in their bid for 2012 selection.
