Brent Lakatos wins Canada’s first gold, 10th medal at World Para Athletics Championships

PARIS – Brent Lakatos of Dorval, Que., won Canada’s first gold and 10^th medal this week on Saturday with a victory in the men’s 800m wheelchair race at the 2023 World Para Athletics Championships.

Lakatos clocked a championship record of one minute and 34.31 seconds for this third medal of the competition. Pongsakorn Paeyo of Thailand was second in 1:34.39 and Brian Siemann of the U.S. was third in 1:36.65.

‘’I always knew it was going to be between the two of us (Paeyo), we are the strongest in this category,’’ said Lakatos, 43, a five-time Paralympian at his seventh worlds. ‘’I thought I had more speed endurance so I wanted to make it a hard, fast, honest 800m to test that. I did that and I held him off the last 100 metres and I’m really pleased that it worked.’’

Lakatos also took silver in the 400m and 1500m this week. Canada’s medal count now stands at one gold, five silver and four bronze for its best showing since winning 11 medals in 2015. There are still two days of competition.

In other finals, Sarah Mickey of Red Deer, Alta., was eighth in the women’s F57 shotput and Jesse Zesseu of Toronto 10^th in the men’s T37 long jump.

Anthony Bouchard of Quebec City was fifth in his heat in the T52 400m to advance to the final while Nandini Sharma of Brampton, Ont., clocked a season’s best 59.00 but did not advance in the women’s T54 400m.