One of the eight debutants on the Australian team Robyn Lambird gets her chance to push her claims for the Tokyo Paralympics, when Day 4 action begins at the 9th World Para-Athletics Championships in Dubai.
The 22-year-old has played wheelchair basketball and rugby but since switching to athletics full-time in 2016 she is climbing the ranks quickly.
She competed in three Grand Prix events in Switzerland last year in various track events but is concentrating on the 100m (T34) in Dubai for her cerebral palsy class. The final is raced in Sunday morning’s session.
English-born but raised in Western Australia, Lambird’s goal is the 2020 Paralympic Games.
Another athlete with dreams to become a Paralympian is the only female discus thrower on the Dubai team, Sarah Edmiston.
The bronze medallist from the women’s discus (F44) at the 2017 London world championships, Edmiston wants to not only repeat that podium finish but force her way onto the Tokyo team for her first Games. Her discus final is also on Sunday morning.
Three Rio Paralympians – Rheed McCracken, James Turner and Madison de Rozario – make their first appearances on the Dubai track today.
McCracken, a dual silver medallist in Brazil, has the heats of the 100m (T34) this morning and hopefully the final Sunday night depending on his qualifying time.
Turner, one of Australia’s three gold medallists in athletics in Rio, has the heats of the 100m (T36) with the final also scheduled for later Sunday night.
De Rozario, another two-time silver medallist in Rio in the 800m and 4x400m relay, starts her Dubai campaign in the 1500m (T54) heats tonight with teammate Eliza Ault-Connell.
The Louise Sauvage-trained de Rozario took gold in the this middle-distance event at the 2018 Commonwealth Games and bronze two years ago at the London world championships.
The 26-year-old will also compete in the 800m and 5000m in her wheelchair class over the next five days before the world titles wrap up on Friday, November 15.
-ENDS
Michael Angus
michael.angus@athletics.org.au
Margie McDonald
mcdonaldmargie58@gmail.com
