More medals for Loughborough on electric day at the Paralympics

by Admin
September 1, 2024

Great Britain’s Sophie Unwin and pilot Jenny Holl (right) celebrate winning gold in the Women’s B 3000m Individual Pursuit Final at the National Velodrome on day four of the Paris 2024 Summer Paralympic Games. Image provided by PA / Alamy.

More medals for Loughborough on electric day at the Paralympics
1 September 2024

Loughborough-linked athletes continued their fine start to the Paralympic Games after winning both gold and silver medals on day four in Paris.

Loughborough Lightning Cycling rider Jenny Holl piloted visually impaired Sophie Unwin to a stunning gold in the Women’s B 3000m Individual Pursuit to add to the team’s impressive bronze earlier in the competition.

The duo, who also broke the world record in qualifying, looked in incredible form from the start. A determined and pacey ride in the final saw them hit the top of the podium after clocking 3:19.149.

Ireland’s Katie-George Dunley (Pilot: Eve McCrystal) took silver, with Great Britain’s Lora Fachie (Pilot: Corrine Hall) winning bronze.

Speaking to BBC Sport, Holl said: “We’ve completed the set, when you include our Tokyo medals, we’re done!

“It’s been three or four months and it’s been well hard, it started horrifically and we’re like ‘it’s going to be a disaster’ but we needed to do something new.

“We came second at the World Championships this year and we had nothing more than that, that’s what we had then, and we didn’t want another silver medal.”

Over in athletics at the Stade de France, Loughborough University-based Brent Lakatos won a brilliant silver for Canada in the Men’s T53 Final. The wheelchair racer’s gutsy performance saw him cross the line second in a season’s best 47.24 seconds.

The 44-year-old now has an incredible 12 Paralympic medals to his name following a sterling career in the sport. Earlier in the year, he spoke to Loughborough Sport regarding his hopes for Paris, and with more events to come that medal tally may well grow even higher.

For all the latest Loughborough news around major global sporting events, visit the University’s dedicated website here: https://www.lboro.ac.uk/sport/athletes-global-stage/

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Notes for editors

Press release reference number: 24/146

Loughborough is one of the country’s leading universities, with an international reputation for research that matters, excellence in teaching, strong links with industry, and unrivalled achievement in sport and its underpinning academic disciplines.

It has been awarded five stars in the independent QS Stars university rating scheme and named the best university in the world for sports-related subjects in the 2024 QS World University Rankings – the eighth year running.

Loughborough is ranked 6th in The UK Complete University Guide 2025, 10th in the Guardian University League Table 2024 and 10th in the Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide 2024.

Loughborough is consistently ranked in the top twenty of UK universities in the Times Higher Education’s ‘table of tables’, and in the Research Excellence Framework (REF) 2021 over 90% of its research was rated as ‘world-leading’ or ‘internationally-excellent’. In recognition of its contribution to the sector, Loughborough has been awarded seven Queen’s Anniversary Prizes.

The Loughborough University London campus is based on the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park and offers postgraduate and executive-level education, as well as research and enterprise opportunities. It is home to influential thought leaders, pioneering researchers and creative innovators who provide students with the highest quality of teaching and the very latest in modern thinking.