Fencers’ big Tokyo haul
Superb trio bringing home nine medals
The Paralympicsgb wheelchair fencers who train at the University of Bath capped an outstanding week of competition at the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games by winning a superb silver in the men’s team foil.
Dimitri Coutya, Piers Gilliver and Oliver Lam-watson, who are coached by Peter Rome, will be bringing home a magnificent nine medals between them from six events.
Their brilliant form in the team foil event was inspired by an incredible fightback in their opening pool fixture against the Russian Paralympic Committee that saw Gilliver save four match points before securing a 45-44 victory.
They went on to beat Ukraine 45-21 and Italy 45-37 before, following a delay for technical problems, overcoming France 45-23 in the semi-finals.
The final against top seeds China proved to be a close-fought affair with the lead changing hands several times before the GB side were eventually edged out 45-38.
It was a second team medal of the week for the Brits, following their epee bronze on Friday. Gilliver was also crowned as Paralympic Champion in the Category A epee, while Coutya bagged individual bronze in both the Category B epee and foil.
The trio are all members of the EIS World-class Wheelchair Fencing Programme which has been based at the Team Bath Sports Training Village since 2015 and continues to go from strength to strength, with the latest crop of medals adding to the epee silver won by Gilliver at Rio 2016 and the four World Championships titles claimed by Coutya and Gilliver.
Rome’s work with the squad earned him the accolade of High Performance Coach of the Year at the 2020 UK Coaching Awards.
In the swimming pool, Team Bath AS swimmer Stephanie Millward made her first appearance at her fourth Paralympic Games in the 34pts 4x100m freestyle relay final.
She led off a GB quartet that also featured Zara Mullooly, Grace Harvey and Toni Shaw. They touched the wall in fourth but, like the United States who originally won gold, were unfortunately disqualified for a takeover infringement.
Sadly fellow GB swimmer Suzanna Hext, who does her strength and conditioning training at the University of Bath, had to pull out of her final Paralympics events on medical advice after suffering three asthma attacks during the Games.
The first came just after she had finished fourth in the S5 200m freestyle but incredibly she was able to return to the pool the following day and went within six-hundredths of a second of a 100m freestyle medal.
Visit www.teambath.com/ Tokyo2020 for more details about University of Bath-based sportspeople at the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games.