On the final day of competition on Tuesday (25 February) at the IPC Athletics Grand Prix in Dubai, UAE, Switzerland's Marcel Hug won a thrilling 5,000m T54 race which saw the top three finishers all within 0.35 seconds of each other.
Hug, who claimed five world titles in Lyon, France, last year won the race in 10:11.62, fractionally ahead of the Thai pair of Prawat Waharam (10:11.84) and Rawat Tana (10:11.97).
Waharam's time smashed the Asian record set last July by Japan's Masayuki Higuchi by more than nine seconds and showed that after missing last year's World Championships the 32-year-old is back to the form that won him 5,000m Paralympic titles in 2000 and 2008.
Tuesday's competition also saw Uzbekistan's Yokutkhon Kholbekova (4:59.09) break the 1,500m T12 Asian record by more than 18 seconds. The previous record of 5:17.67 had been set by China's Hongying Xie in August 2003 at a meeting in Quebec, Canada.
In the field, Ireland's Yvonne McCloskey set a new javelin F40 European record with a throw of 17.28m, breaking British athlete Kim Minett's six-year-old record by 2.27m.
Strong winds prevented Tunisia's world and Paralympic champion Walid Ktila in breaking his fourth world record of the meeting. The 28-year-old finished the 100m T34 in 15.31, 0.38 seconds inside his own world record, however a tail-wind of 2.6m/s means his time did not stand.
Brazil's Terezinha Guilhermina (25.45) continued her blistering form with victory in the 200m T11, finishing well ahead of teammates Jhulia Santos (27.21) and Jerussa Santos (27.66).
Over four days of competition at the first IPC Athletics Grand Prix of the season, nearly 500 athletes from 39 countries took part in 86 different events, breaking seven world and 22 regional records.
The next Grand Prix will take place in Beijing, China, between 14-16 April. Meetings will then be held in Sao Paulo, Brazil; Arizona, USA; Nottwil, Switzerland; Grosseto, Italy; Berlin, Germany; and Tunis, Tunisia. The series will climax in late August with the IPC Athletics Grand Prix Finals in Birmingham, Great Britain.
For further information, please contact Lucy Dominy, IPC Public Relations and Campaigns Manager on e-mail: lucy.dominy@paralympic.org or call +49-228-2097-159.
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