World Para Athletics Ch’ships:
Iranians excel with 12 medals
Iranian girl Elham Salehi bagged a javelin throw bronze at the World Para Athletics Championships on Friday to the take the country’s medal count in the Japanese city of Kobe to 12 medals.
A shot put gold medalist in last year’s Asian Para Games, Salehi registered 16.61m in her fourth throw in the F54 final to finish behind Uzbekistan’s Nurkhon Kurbanova, who set a new world record of 20.73m for the ultimate prize, and Nigerian silver medalist Flora Ugwunwa (19.33m).
This was a third medal for Iranian women in Kobe, after Hajar Safarzadeh had walked away with a historic sprint gold while Hashemiyeh Mottaqian took the silver in the javelin throw F56 contest.
Safarzadeh made history in the 400m T12 final as she clocked an Asian record of 57.56 seconds to become the first Iranian girl to win a gold at the World Championships.
Meanwhile, Mottaqian enjoyed a season’s best performance with 22.74m but still had to settle for the runner-up finish behind Brazilian Raissa Rocha Machado – a third world silver for the 38-year-old Iranian, who will be chasing a second successive Paralympic gold in Paris in the summer.
In the men’s competitions, high-profile Iranian and reigning Paralympic champion Saeid Afrooz flexed muscles ahead of his title defense in the French capital by grabbing a javelin throw gold.
Stepping into the event as the defending champion, Afrooz was in a league of his own in the F34 final as all his attempts – topped by the fifth of 40.14m – were enough to secure the gold, with Colombian duo Mauricio Valencia (37.07m) and Diego Fernando Meneses Medina (36.54m) standing next to the Iranian on the podium.
Amirhossein Alipour had won a first men’s gold for Iran, thanks to a dominant performance in the shot put F11 final, which saw him shatter the two-decade standing championships record.
His third attempt travelled 14.61 meters, 99 centimeters further than neutral athlete Igor Baskakov’s throw, while Alipour’s fellow-Iranian Mahdi Olad – also a reigning Paralympic gold medalist – took the bronze with 13.28m.
Olad won his second medal in Kobe when tallied 42.36m for the discus throw silver – 40 centimeters adrift of Italian gold medalist Oney Tapia.
There were more javelin throw medals for the Iranian men in Thursday’s F13 final, where Ali Pirouj (63.15m) and Sajjad Nikparast (62.30m) claimed the silver and bronze medals, with Team GB’s Daniel Pembroke winning the gold with 66.96m.
Elsewhere on Thursday, Ali-Asghar Javanmardi won the men’s shot put F35 silver, courtesy of a 16.06m throw in the final.
Saman Pakbaz had won a first medal for Iran in Kobe, finishing third in the men’s shot put F12 event, and Alireza Mokhtari made it two for the country with a bronze in the F53 final.