GB had a remarkable evening at the IPC Swimming World Championships at Tollcross International Swimming Centre last night winning four golds, a silver and a bronze to take their medal haul to 24 overall.
Ellie Simmonds and Oliver Hynd were the stand-out performers, both setting new world records, with Tully Kearney and Sacha Kindred also winning gold.
Simmonds, the four-time Paralympic gold-medallist and poster-girl for para-sport, obliterated her own 200m individual medley SM6 world record by three seconds on her way to winning her first gold of the meet in a time of 3 minutes 1.02 seconds.
“I’m so happy with that and I’m shocked with the time to be honest, I can’t believe it,” she said. “I wasn’t thinking about a world record, I was just hoping for a medal so this is brilliant. The whole team is doing so well and there’s such a great team spirit, it’s great to be a part of it.”
20 year-old Hynd won his second gold medal of these championships when he took almost two seconds off his previous 400m freestyle S8 world record, but Scot Andrew Mullen could not add to the three medals he has already won this week.
Mullen finished in fourth place in the 50m freestyle S5 which Brazilian Daniel Dias won – his fifth world title of the event.
Mullen was not disheartened at missing out on a spot on the podium though. “I’m happy with that, it’s the first time I’ve ever gone under 35 seconds so that’s great,” he said. “I’m not too disappointed not have got a medal tonight. Coming into this meet, I didn’t have any medal targets, I just wanted to swim my best so the medals have been a real bonus. The good thing is that I’ve been swimming good times every time I race.”
Elsewhere, New Zealander, Sophie Pascoe won her second gold of this World Championships in the same pool that she won two Commonwealth Games gold medals at Glasgow 2014.
The six-time Paralympic gold medallist lost both her legs as a three year-old when her father ran over her with a lawn mower and the 22 year-old has some strong views on whether para-sport events should be combined with able-bodied events having experienced both.
“Swimming in the Commonwealth Games last year was great – the atmosphere was electric and it was a brilliant Games to be at,” she said. “But combining able-bodied and para events –
no, I really don’t think that should happen. I think we’ve earned the right to have our own event and the recognition that comes with that. We work just as hard, if not harder than able-bodied athletes and both the media and society need to realise that."
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