Islamabad, Sep 6: Pakistani Paralympian Haider Ali has secured the bronze medal in the F37 Category Discus Throw event at the ongoing Paris Paralympics. Remarkably, this is his second bronze medal overall and his fourth at the Paralympic Games. Tolibboy Yuldashev of Uzbekistan won gold, and Jesse Zesseu of Canada came in second.
Haider got off to a great start, throwing the farthest in the first round at 52.28 meters. He led until the third round, when the Canadian passed him with a throw of 52.81 meters, despite fouling.
Tolibboy gradually gained momentum with bigger throws, eventually passing the Pakistani and the Canadian in the fourth round with a throw of 53.48 meters, but Haider was unable to establish a rhythm until the very end.
In the final round, the Uzbek would go on to solidify his gold medal position with throws of 56.03 and 57.28 meters. With his last throw, Haider Ali increased to 52.54 meters, while the Canadian also improved to 53.24 meters.
Haider Ali had already won gold in the F37 Discus throw at Tokyo 2020, silver in the F37/38 Long Jump at Beijing 2008, and bronze in the T37 long jump category at Rio 2015.T
here’s a chance that one of Haider Ali’s four missed free shots would have kept him from winning the gold. But there’s no denying that the Gujranwala guy has once again succeeded in inspiring pride in the nation.
