Murray’s double gold lands him Allianz Athlete of the Month for April 2015

Nigel Murray’s strong performance at the 2015 Boccia European Continental Cup helped him garner enough votes to be named April’s Allianz Athlete of the Month.

At the Continental Cup in Spain, the British athlete captured two gold medals after winning all 11 of his matches. Murray helped Great Britain defeat Spain 10-1 in the final to capture the BC1/C2 team medal, cementing the British as No. 1 in the world in the category. He also went on to win gold in the event’s BC2 individual side.

Following those performances, Murray, who won gold in the Sydney 2000 Paralympics, showed signs of returning to form just in time for Rio 2016.

Murray received 34 per cent of public votes. It was a tight race for second between South Africa’s T13 sprinter Ilse Hayes (24 per cent), who became the world’s fastest Paralympic female, and Mexico’s record-setting 61kg powerlifter Amalia Perez (24 per cent).

Also nominated in April’s poll were New Zealand swimmer Sophie Pascoe (14 per cent) and US wheelchair racer Tatyana McFadden (4 per cent).

The previous winners from 2015 were:

January – Andrew Soule, USA, Nordic skiing

February – Chris Vos, the Netherlands, Snowboard

March – Maksym Nikolenko, Table tennis