Welsh para-athletes achieve best medal in 20 years

As the curtain falls on the Paris 2024 Games, Welsh Paralympians celebrate their best medal haul in 20 years.

Wales, along with Great Britain, sent a contingent of 22 para-athletes to the Games and 14 of them returned with a medal around their necks.

A total of 16 medals were won – seven gold, five silver and four bronze – across 10 different sports.

That is the highest number of medals since Athens 2004, when Welsh athletes won 22.

It is also the best Welsh performance at the Paralympic Games since Beijing 2008, when 10 gold medals were won from a total of 14 medals.

The youngest winner in Paris was 17-year-old swimmer Rhys Darbey, who won gold and silver, and the oldest was 40-year-old table tennis player Rob Davies, who won silver.

GOLD

Matt Bush (Para Taekwondo Men K44 +80kg)

Ben Pritchard (Para-rowing PR1 men's singles sculls)

James Ball and Steffan Lloyd (Para-cycling Men B 1000m time trial)

Sabrina Fortune (Para-athletics women F20 shot put)

Rhys Darbey (Para-swimming mixed S14 4x100m freestyle relay)

Jodie Grinham (open mixed team para-archery)

Laura Sugar (Para canoe ladies kayak single KL3 200m)

SILVER

Rhys Darbey (Para-swimming Men SM14 200m Medley)

Rob Davies (Para table tennis men's singles MS1)

Georgia Wilson (Para equestrian grade II individual freestyle)

Aled Sion Davies (Men's Para-athletics F63 shot put)

Phil Pratt (Men's Wheelchair Basketball Team)

BRONZE

Paul Karabardak (Para table tennis men's doubles MD14)

Jodie Grinham (Para-archery women's individual compound)

Georgia Wilson (Para-equestrian individual competition grade II)

Hollie Arnold (Para-athletics women F46 javelin throw)

The gold rush

The first weekend of the Games will be remembered long in the memory of Welsh sport, with five athletes standing on the podium in less than 24 hours.

Matt Bush was the founder of the gold rush and made a little history along the way by first man to win Para-taekwondo gold for Great Britain.

It was the third time lucky for the 35-year-old after an injury prevented him from participating in the competitions in Rio and Tokyo.

Ben Pritchard rowed to victory The next morning the Mumbles skiff convincingly defeated the reigning champion and old rival Roman Polianskyi from Ukraine.

Pritchard, who finished fifth in Tokyo, won by more than 10 seconds.

Meanwhile on the last day of the action in the cycling stadium, James Ball achieved the biggest victory of his cycling career.

In the time trial he beat his teammate Neil Fachie, which meant Ball finished second behind the Scot in Tokyo three years ago.

Ball was helped to the title by his pilot and compatriot Steffan Lloyd.

In athletics, Sabrina Fortune claimed gold in shot put.

The 27-year-old won bronze in Rio as a teenager, but an injury meant she only finished fifth in Tokyo.

Since then she has won two world titles and broken the world record twice en route to victory in Paris.

Swimmer Rhys Darbey completed the golden weekend and did so in style.

He won gold in his very first Paralympic race, the 4x100m freestyle relay, and remarkably did so together with three other teenagers.

Two more gold medals would follow later in the Games, and a few more memorable than Jodie Grinham in the Para-archery. She won the mixed team title with Nathan Macqueen, but her champagne will have to remain on ice as She participated while she was seven months pregnant.

Laura Sugar had to be patient for her chance at gold, but she did so with style on the final day.

The 33-year-old not only retained her singles kayak title from Tokyo, but he also set a new Paralympic record.

The pain of defeat

While some were excited, others were disappointed. That's the nature of the sport.

Aled Sion Davies had gone to Paris as the big favourite after setting a new shot put world record in May this year, but the 33-year-old had to settle for silver after what he called a hugely disappointing performance in the final.

Her fellow athlete Olivia Breen also left the Games disappointed.

After winning gold in the Commonwealth 100 metres, Breen missed the final after finishing ninth.

Medal hopes then shifted to the long jump, but the 28-year-old was defeated in the final. bronze medal by the smallest margin.

Breen had jumped the same distance as the third-place finisher, but her next-best jump was shorter.

Three-time Paralympic boccia champion David Smith also hoped to extend his winnings, but he was defeated in the individual bronze medal fight and also failed to win a medal in the team event.

The 35-year-old said afterwards that he had “simply run out of gas”.

However, the Games must be seen as a huge success for the athletes in Wales and for ParalympicsGB as a whole.

They finished their 2024 Paralympic Games with a total of 124 medals, 49 of which were gold.

Only China won more during the 11-day event, with 94 gold medals and a total of 219 medals.

The final honours for Wales in Paris went to Matt Bush, who was given the task of carrying the flag for Great Britain, along with para-swimmer Poppy Maskill.

The ceremony at the Stade de France starts at 19:30 BST.