OBAKENG MELETSE
Sheryl James’ eighth place finish concluded what was a day filled with mixed emotions for Team South Africa as they ended the day without any medals despite having gone into Thursday with two finalists.
South Africa are standing on four medals with one gold and three bronze, leaving them in 51st position.
James, a winner of a bronze medal in the 2021 Tokyo Paralympics Games, struggled to keep up with a star-studded field and finished in a time of 13.90. Chinese Xiaoyan Wen burst out of the blocks and set a new Women’s 100m T37 Paralympic record of 12.52 to back up her world record set earlier this year at 12.27 in Kobe, Japan.
Elsewhere, Alani Ferreira’s time of 1:21.95, carried South Africa’s hopes in the pool after qualifying fourth quickest in heat one of the women’s 100m breaststroke.
Ferreira, who already broke the African record in the S12 400m freestyle twice on Saturday, backed up her performance by breaking the 100m breaststroke African record with her third place finish. She will be in the tough company of first place finisher Elena Krawzow from Germany, who won in a Paralympic record time of 1:13.19.
Meanwhile, Nathan Hendricks could not live up to his own standards.
He was involved in heat one of the Men’s 100m breaststroke SB13, and after having reached four finals without being able to claim any silverware, the 19-year-old’s seventh place finish was not enough for him to advance to the final.
His time of 1:13.04 placed him 14th overall, 11.20 seconds off the world record time of German Taliso Engel (1:01.84).
Danika Vyncke’s time of 1:24.91 was good enough for a fourth place finish in the Women’s 100m breaststroke SB13 race. Vyncke’s time was the eighth fastest time of both heats but it was 9.68 seconds behind Great Britain’s Rebecca Redfern who finished fastest overall at 1:16.40.
Cyclist Pieter du Preez could not complete in the 42.6km long Men’s H1-2 Road Race. Du Preez, a winner of a bronze medal in the men’s Individual time trials final on Wednesday, was one of four athletes to not complete a race won by Frenchman Florian Jouanny.
The 44-year-old followed up his gold medal win three years ago in Tokyo with a bronze medal on Wednesday.