LONDON 2017 THROWBACK: KADEENA COX RULES THE T38 400M

Following her success in two sports at the Paralympic Games in Rio, Kadeena Cox returned to the track for the World Para Athletics Championships in London with her eyes set on securing a first global title over 400m in the T38 classification.

Cox won the T38 400m Paralympic title in Rio in 2016 in a world record following a bronze medal over 100m and success over in the velodrome, so she arrived in London as one of the favourites for gold.

Prior to the 400m final, she had already captured silver behind Sophie Hahn in the 200m earlier in the week, so she arrived in good form in her favoured event.

On the second Friday of the championship, Cox lined up for the 400m and wowed the crowd with an exceptional display of running over the next 62 seconds.

As the gun went off, the Yorkshire-born athlete commanded the contest, attacking the first bend and then extending her lead down the back straight. As she arrived in the home straight, the advantage was significant, but with legs tiring, the job wasn’t over just yet.

Despite the best efforts of Yuka Takamatsu (JPN) and Torita Blake (AUS), Cox had the better of her opponents after her aggressive start to the race, pushing on to claim the gold medal in 1:02.87.

She said afterwards: “The 400m is hurting me right now but I think I have still got adrenaline pumping from that race. The plan was always to go off hard for the first 300m and the rest would feel like death! I was meant to go hard for the first 50m and sit in, but I didn’t do the sit in part so at 200m, I had no idea how far ahead I was. I just kept running because I knew there was no going back after that. It wasn’t a world record which I would have liked to have done but I’ve not had the training really to do that, only three months, so I have to be pleased.

“It was amazing to get back out there, the noise was just incredible. I got through that race because of them. At 300m mark, I was not feeling it. The roar did lift me and that is probably why I went off a little too fast.”

Cox returned to the track the following evening to secure bronze in the T38 100m to complete a successful championship winning the full set of medals across all of her events.