Irishman celebrates 21st birthday in style at IPC Athletics

Ireland’s Michael McKillop celebrated his 21st birthday in style with a gold medal and new world record in the men’s 800m T37 in 1:58.90 on the seventh morning of the IPC Athletics World Championships in Christchurch.

Having set a world record in the 1500m earlier, McKillop was only looking for the gold medal, but once he had kicked at the 400m the world record became a reality.

“In Beijing I waited to the 250m, but today I decided to go early and catch them out. It worked perfectly.

“Back in Ireland it is still my birthday (born January 27, 1990) so I have a wee bit of celebrating to do,” he said.

There were four other world records during the morning, including three in one event, the men’s F54/55/56 discus. Leonardo Diaz (Cuba) took gold with a throw of 43.10m (1030pts), which shattered his own record by three metres. The silver went to Serbia’s Drazenko Mitrovic (31.35m, 1027) from Mustafa Yuseinov, of Bulgaria (39.42m).

The other world record was in the F33/34/52/53 where Birgit Kober (Germany) was even more impressive in setting a world mark of 23.54m (1227), an incredible nine metres longer than the old record in the F34 section. Lucyna Kornobys (Poland) 14.09m 988pts took silver and Louadjeda Benoumessad (Algeria) 16.79m 955.

The big surprise of the morning was the defeat of triple gold medal winner Michelle Stilwell, of Canada. She was upstaged in the T52 800m race by Kerry Morgan (USA) in 2:29.33secs. Lyudmyla Danylina of the Ukraine was third in 2:41.38secs.

Poland were first and second in the women’s T20 1500m with Arleta Meloch winning in 4:39.33secs from Barbara Niewiedzial (4:41.78) with Ukraine’s Lyudmyla Danylima (4:44.18) third.

Japan made a clean sweep of the 800m T52 with Ito Tomoya setting a new championship time of 2:01.05 from Hirokazu Ueyonabaru (2:02.04) and Toshido Takada (2:02.19sec).

The triple jump F46 went to Huseyn Hasanov of Azerbaijan with a new championship leap of 13.56m with Irag’s Fadhil Al-Dabbagh (13.31m) getting silver and Japan’s Hiroyuki Yasui the bronze (13.11m).

Bulgaria’s Ihar Fartunau took gold in the F13 high jump with a leap of 1.92m ahead of Ukraine’s Ivan Kytsenko (1.89m) and Braedon Samuel Dolfo (1.83m).

Gold in the T13 800m went to Lukasx Wietecki (Poland) in 1:56.17secs from Morocco’s Abdelillah Mame (1:57.05) and Venezuela’s Jose Luis Sanchez in 1:58.92.

A new championship record was set by Artem Arefyev (Russia) in the 800m T36 in 2:11.42, just ahead of Great Britain’s Paul Blake (2:11.88sec) and Spain’s Jose Manuel Gonzalez (2:14.47sec) taking bronze.

The last three field events of the morning all produced new championship marks. Jackie Christiansen (Denmark) led the way in the F44/46 shot put with a throw of 17.79m (995pts) from Greece’s Miltiadis Kyriakidis (14.12m 747) and Croatia’s Josip Slivar (14.05m 740pts).

Azerbaijan got its second gold of the morning plus bronze in the F12 triple jump with Oleg Panyutin’s leap of 15.09m. Ukraine’s Ivan Kytsenko (14.88m) was second and Vladimir Zayets was third.

Poland’s Pawel Piotrowski, with a throw of 38.65m (1004) was the gold medal winner in the F35/36 discus from Namibia’s Reginald Benade (38.37m 997pts) and Volodymyr Zhaivoronok of Ukraine (38/09m 990 pts.

In total 47 World records and 117 Championship records have been set over the five days.