It’s the penultimate day of our Tokyo 2020 coverage, and the Paralympics are going out with some incredible competitions and match-ups, particularly in Athletics, Football Five-a-Side, Wheelchair Basketball, Wheelchair Tennis, Badminton, Canoe….well, pretty much the entire day was fantastic to watch!
Plus, we’ve got our “Feed Beef” segment – or is it Feed Praise today? And “What Officiating/Volunteer Job Would We Do.”
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Thanks so much for listening, and until next time, keep the flame alive!
TRANSCRIPT
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Tokyo 2020 – Paralympics – Day 12
Jill: [00:00:00] Konnichiwa, Paralympics fans and lovers of TKFLASTAN, and welcome to day 12 coverage of the Tokyo 2020 Paralympics on Keep the Flame Alive, the podcast for fans of the Olympics and Paralympics. I am your host. Jill Jaracz joined as always by my lovely cohost, Alison Brown. Alison, Konnichiwa!.
Alison: Konnichiwa. This is not a repeat broadcast or an encore performance. We’re live. And when we say live, we mean we’re actually doing it right now.
Jill: Yes. Although you’re listening on tape.
Alison: Don’t confuse them.
Jill: Oh, we’ll get to new feed beefs in a minute. We have a little bit of follow-up. I heard on the broadcast just really quickly, Amanda Dennis from the US goalball team had a pregame injury, which is why she wasn’t playing in the gold medal match. So hopefully we can find out a little bit more about that, but that’s a really tough blow to have, but, hope she is doing well and will recover soon.
Jill: Feed beef.
Jill: I thought once again, I kept hoping not going to have a beef today, but the first hour of NBC’s promised coverage was devoted to an auto auction show, which is one of my least favorite things on NBCSN. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a little bit more revenue opportunity in having the auto auction on than it would be to have the Paralympics. Not, not kidding, but that’s, that’s a little rough. I’m really sad that they did that.
Jill: It did also mean that I could watch the same swimming events three times within the 24 hour span. Love that. We thought, oh, they are going to repeat swimming that cause they showed it live yesterday. They showed it at the end of the broadcast, and we knew that it was coming today for potentially the primetime audience. But it didn’t start until like 11:30. Yeah.
Alison: So I guess that’s west coast prime time.
Jill: Yeah, maybe. Okay. There you go. Thanks for that argument. Unless they started the west coast show at the same time as Eastern time.
Alison: Oh, that they it’s delayed.
Jill: I wonder if it’s nine to nine [00:02:00] wherever you are in the country, that I don’t know. Anyway, what’s your feed beef.
Alison: I have nice things to say about the feed today,
Jill: Oh, that’s nice. I do have some nice things.
Alison: So yesterday Ahmed Fareed and Carolyn Manno both did a much better job of saying “Encore presentation,” ” We showed this earlier today, but we want to show it again,” indicating that you’re about to see a race you may or may not have seen again.
Jill: Yes. I noticed that too. It’s sad that it took them almost the whole Paralympics to figure that out when they could have learned from the Olympic coverage, how it’s done.
Alison: And the other compliment I want to give is to Tanith White. This woman was an ice dancer and they brought her into the booth, I think for 2014 Sochi to do the ice dancing commentary.
Alison: And she was not very good. Man, has she worked her butt off to be a good announcer, cause she’s doing sitting volleyball and random things and clearly not anything that’s in her wheelhouse. And she is just really good at her job.
Jill: I would second that. She is just really sharp. She’s studied up. I also want to compliment Kari Miller-Ortiz, who gets my most improved Paralympian commentator, cause they all came in, and this is all I think pretty much the first time that they’re in the booth, and they’re brought on to be analysts and give the color commentary.
Jill: And we said at the beginning that Kari Miller-Ortiz, not bad, just you could tell it was her first time and she was working through everything. You know, you, when you start, you’re not perfect. So she’s really taken feedback to heart. Oh, watching the men’s gold medal game for sitting volleyball today was so exciting with the two of them. They were really good together, and, and Kari Miller-Ortiz was so exciting.
Alison: Yes, and that Tanith White [00:04:00] was able to clearly help her get better. So that’s a team that, you know, bring them back and just put Tanith White in the booth with whomever. And they’re going to be better just from being around her because clearly she works hard to learn these new sports and learn how to do this.
Jill: Yes. And it’s a tough job. It really is a tough job to be educated about the sport., Be able to talk about what’s going on ,and keep up with everything and keep your whole show on the rails.
Alison: And say the names correctly.
Jill: Yeah, exactly.
Jill: Okay. It’s time for which volunteer or officiating job, what do you do? What do you have today?
Alison: So we had our last day of swimming and I don’t know how I never noticed this. So, yes, I noticed the wheelchair attendant, helping some of the swimmers come out to the deck, but then I noticed they collect them when they come out of the pool.
Alison: Which, of course they do. It’s so obvious. But so this is the first person who gets to congratulate them. They had towels on the chairs, you know, laid out just so, so the chair wouldn’t get all wet. Sometimes they had their, a robe or coat or jacket there. So it was a very nurturing, yet practical job. Right up my alley.
Jill: Excellent.
Alison: And they also had to get to right the right spot. It’s sort of like the pit crew. So wherever the athlete was coming out of the pool, they had to zoom their little chair right to the correct spot. Like this is, this has got my name written all over it.
Jill: I would like to go back to football five-a-side. We’ve talked about the court set up where there are walls on the sides, but behind the goal is open and the balls can go beyond the gold line, but they have little ball fetchers who go and get the ball and make sure that there are balls around just in case. And they get to a lot of time get to watch the game, which I would like that.
Jill: [00:06:00] Okay, before we get to today’s action, one more day left in our Kickstarter campaign. Y’all have come through so far. We’re doing fantastic. We’re at 87%, almost 88, but we’ve got one more day to get it to 100. Please do what you can. If you, if this is new to you, we are have been given media accreditations for Beijing to cover the Winter Olympics and the Paralympics.
Jill: So it’s a long trip. It’s an expensive trip that we had not been budgeting for until like 2024, 2026 potentially. And the getting the accreditations was a big surprise. We’d love to take advantage of this opportunity and to do so, our little independent podcast budget needs a little bolstering from our listeners.
Jill: So please check out kickstarter.com/profile/flame alive pod and help us cross the finish line Campaign ends Sunday the fifth at 11:59 PM. Eastern time.
Jill: Okay. Today’s action. In the archery competition, we had the mixed team recurve open. Gold, went to RPC. Silver, went to Italy, and bronze went to China.
Jill: This is one I want to try to go and find the feed for, cause it looked like a really good time. When I had archery on the other day, it was like, oh, I miss watching archery. I like watching it so much.
Jill: Over in athletics. We had a whole bunch more competition today. So starting with the throws for ShotPut, we had three men’s competitions and one women’s competition.
Jill: First off, we started with the men’s F 63 class, which is really a mixed class event. This was moderate disability or absence of one leg. And the medalists here are actually all class F 42, which is somewhat similar because that’s why they mix them. Gold went to Allen Davies from Great Britain. Silver went to Sajad Mohammadian from Iran, and [00:08:00] bronze went to Faisal Sorour from Kuwait, who got a personal best.
Jill: In the F 33 class for the men, this is a moderate disability to the whole body or a high degree of disability to both legs with an additional upper body disability or disabilities. Gold went to Zakariae Derhem from Morocco, who got a Paralympic record. Silver went to Kamel Kardjena from Algeria, and bronze went to Deni Cerni from Croatia.
Jill: In the F 34 class, this is a high degree of impairment to both legs with no or low impairment to the upper body. Gold went to Ahmad Hindi from Jordan, who got a world record. Silver went to Azeddine Nouiri from Morocco, and he got an area record, and bronze went to Abdulrahman Abdulqadir Fiqi from Qatar.
Alison: I love these podiums of countries that we almost never see at the Olympics. So fantastic.
Jill: And I would like to do a little deep diving into India’s reaction to their Paralympics because they have just been getting on podiums, doing so well. That I’m really curious to see what the country thinks.
Alison: At the beginning of the Paralympics, where they had that first medalist, and I think it was in table tennis.
Jill: Might’ve been. Yes, the woman?
Alison: The woman, and I, apologize for not remembering her name. The Indian papers went nuts. You know, prime minister Modi called her. She was all over the front pages and I hope they’ve kept that up throughout because like you said, they’re doing amazing.
Jill: Yeah. Prime Minister Modi’s phone just must be super busy with all of the people he’s had to call to congratulate.
Jill: For the women’s shot put we had the F 40 class. This is a short stature class. Gold went to [00:10:00] Renata Sliwinska from Poland, who set a Paralympic record. Silver went to Salem Nouhein Belhaj from Tunisia, who set a personal best. And bronze went to Lauritta Onye from Nigeria, who also got a personal best. I saw the, a little bit of this and it, it was impressive. Sliwinska had some really good technique.
Alison: Now, in the Olympics, ShotPut was won by a Polish woman. So now we’ve got another Polish women winning shot put. What is going on in Poland? Why are all the Polish women throwing things with such force?
Jill: They have been, but we’ve talked about hammer throw, and I’ve paid more attention to hammer throws since we’ve talked to Deanna, and there are several Polish women in that Olympic event who are very top of the world, standings kind of people. So, they’ve got a good tradition of throws, I think.
Jill: In discus, we had one woman’s competition. The F 37 and 38 classes were mixed together. This is a low degree of disability to the whole body, both legs, or one side. Gold went to Mi Na from China, who set a world record for the F 37 class. Silver went to Li Yingli from China, and bronze went to Rosa Carolina Castro Castro from Mexico who set a Paralympic record for the F 38.
Jill: In javelin. We had one competition each for the men and women. Women were in F 54, which is a seated class due to high degree of impairment to the legs and trunk. Gold went to Flora Ugwunwa from Nigeria. Silver went to Nurkhon Kurbanova from Uzbekistan, who set a personal best. And bronze went to Yang Liwan from China, who also got a personal best.
Jill: The men competed in the F 41 class, which is a short stature class. Gold went to Sun Pengxiang from China, who set a world record. Silver went to Sadegh Beit Sayah from Iran, [00:12:00] who got a personal best, and bronze went to Wildan Nukhalawi from Iraq.
Jill: In jumping, men had two long jump competitions. First we had the T 20 intellectual disability class. Gold went to Malaysia’s Abdul Latif Romly. Silver went to Athansios Prodromou from Greece, who got a personal best. Bronze went to Nicholas Hum from Australia, who set an area record. In the 13 class, which is a visual impairment class. Gold went to Orkhan Aslanov from Azerbaijan, who set an area record. Silver went to Ivan Jose Cano Blanco from Spain, who got a personal best, and bronze went to Isaac Jean-Paul from USA.
Jill: Moving over to track. We had another long slate of races there. We’ll start with a hundred meter distance. We had one race each for the men and women. The women had a mixed T 42 and T 63 class. This is moderate affectations in one leg or the absence of one leg above the knee. Italians sweep at the podium!
Alison: Break out the lemoncello!
Alison: When I saw this, it was like, oh, I need to find the track stream.
Alison: And the Italians did very well in the Olympic track as well. So there has been a switch happening in Italian track and athletics. So I want to look into that a little bit, but man, they were so– this is a party you want to be at!
Jill: Especially when your gold medalist, Ambra Sabatini gets a world record. Then silver went to Martina Caironi, and bronze went to Monica Gr aziana Contrafatto.
Jill: For the men. They had the T 36, 100 meter competition. This is a combination of low and moderate degree of disability across the entire body. Gold went to Den Peicheng from China, who got a Paralympic record. Silver went to James [00:14:00] Turner from Australia, and bronze went to Alexis Sebastian Chavez from Argentina.
Jill: Then we move up to the 200 meter distance, and it was really like 200 meter day. First we start with the women’s T, 11 class, which is total visual impairment, and the runners run with a sighted guide. Gold went to Liu Cuiqing with guide Xu Donglin from China. Silver went to Thlita Vitoria Simplicio da Silva with guide Felipe Veloso da Silva from Brazil, and bronze went to Jerusa Geber dos Santos with guide Gabriel Aparecido Santos Garcia from Brazil.
Alison: And those two Brazilians are the ones that DQ’d in the hundred. So that was nice to see them on the medal stand.
Jill: So this is a race to go back and watch because we had some yellow cards being given out, but nobody got DQ’d. First and second, both crossed the line in 24 point 94 seconds. And they had to go to the thousands of a second to determine who got the gold and who got the silver.
Jill: And that meant China crossed the line in 24.936 compared to Brazil, 24.940. So 4 one thousands of a second separated gold and silver.
Alison: Wild.
Jill: In the T 12 class, which is a moderate visual impairment. This is also a women’s race. Gold went to Omara Durand Elias with guide Yuniol Kindelan Vargas, and they are from Cuba and also set a world record. Silver went to Oksana Boturchuk with guide Mykyta Barabanovfrom Ukraine, and bronze went to on Anna Kulinich-Soro kina with guide Sergey Petrichenko.
Jill: For the T 47 class for the women. This is a low to moderate disability to arms, including absence of the arm. Gold went [00:16:00] toLisbeli Marina Vera Andrade from Venezuela, who set a personal best. Silver went to Brittni Mason from the USA, who also set a personal best. And bronze went to Alicja Jeromin from Poland, who got an area record.
Jill: I did see this race. Vera Andrade just won heavily. She was the favorite going in and she just handily won. But Brittani Mason was so happy, and I saw on Twitter how she’s so excited about how her Paralympic Games has gone. Just thrilled beyond belief at what she’s achieved.
Alison: She’s got a little collection that she’s building.
Jill: She does, and she’s so good. I cannot wait to see what she does at Paris. Or, across the coming years, I hope that we get to understand more about Paralympic sport. And I don’t know whose responsibility that is to amplify that signal, but hopefully we can follow that along maybe a little more easily than before so it’s really not something we see once every four years.
Jill: In the men’s 200 meters. First, we start with the T 35 class, which is moderate impairment to both legs. Gold went to Dmitrii Safronov from RPC, who set a world record. Silver went to Ihor Tsvietovfrom Ukraine. Bronze went to Artem Kalashian from RPC, who got a personal best.
Jill: In the T 37 class, this is moderate impairment to one side. Gold went to Nick Mayhugh from the USA, who set a world record. Silver went to Andrei Vdovin from RPC, who set an area record, and bronze went to Ricardo Gomes de Mendoca, who got a personal best.
Alison: I’m sure you won’t have to, at least in the US, go back to the feeds to receive this. I’m sure this will get aired multiple times, but if you don’t, go back and watch this. Nick Mayhugh was just amazing in this race. If you love running, you want to watch this kid run because it is just [00:18:00] beautiful to behold.
Jill: Oh, it is. And he’s the first para athlete to go sub 22 for the 200 meters in this class. So fast! And also joy to see, it was Ricardo Gomes de Mendoca. He was so thrilled with, you know, not only do you get your personal best, you get a bronze medal for it. And he was just thrilled with how he ran. This was just a really good race. And you feel like they push each other, even if it’s just a race it’s under 25 seconds, you can see how everybody’s just improving the field.
Alison: You know, one of the things that we talked about during the Olympics was because of all the restrictions there, wasn’t a lot of joy in a lot of these events. And yet in this track competition, I feel so much joy from the athletes in a way that I did not the Olympics. And conditions have not been better. I mean, the poor kids are running in the pouring rain, and yet the spirit of the Paralympics really is coming through the TV, which is, makes it so much more fun to watch.
Jill: Right. And, you know, I, I do notice that, and today that made me sad when I saw a huge empty wheelchair basketball venue. It makes me sad that, you know, even at the very least, not that many Japanese people get to see the Paralympics live and in person, I mean, they can watch it on TV and I hope they are watching because Japan is doing very well, but just the ability to watch the para sport in person and add that energy and excitement to give you that London feel or to give you that Rio feel when audiences started coming.
Jill: Remember the crowds weren’t that great in the beginning. And then people found out how cool it was and they started going and getting into it. But yeah, it’s, it is, you do feel that and you feel the camaraderie at the end of races. You know, there’s a lot of really great sportsmanship going on.
Jill: In the T 64 class, which is also a mixed class for this race. It is impairment to legs below the [00:20:00] knee. Gold went to Sherman Isidro Guity Guity from Costa Rica, who set a Paralympic record. Silver went to Felix Strent from Germany, and bronze went to Jarryd Wallace from the USA.
Jill: This was also a good race. Guity Guity was so much fun to watch. And the top three really separated themselves from the rest of the pack. And it was clear that it was going to be a 1, 2, 3 kind of thing, but it good for Jarryd Wallace for getting up in that pack because he did start to fade with what maybe 40 or 60 meters left to go. And he was just had such a strong start that the rest of the field couldn’t catch up.
Jill: Moving up to the 400 meter distance. We have two women’s races and one men’s race. First is women’s T 13 visual impairment class. And these runners do not run with guides. So gold went to Lamiy Valiyeva from Azerbaijan, who set a Paralympic record. Silver went to Adiaratou Iglesias Forneiro from Spain, who set a personal best. And bronze went to Kym Crosby from the USA who got a personal best. This one’s fun to watch too. Kym Crosby goes from sixth to third in the last hundred meters.
Alison: We love a comeback.
Jill: In the T3 eight class, which is low impairment to the entire body, both legs or one side. Gold went to Lindy Ave from Germany, who set a world record. Silver went to Margarita Goncharova from RPC, who got a personal best. And bronze went to Darian Faisury Jimenez Sanchez from Colombia, who set an area record.
Jill: For the men’s 400 meter T 47 class, this is low to moderate disability to the arms, including absence of an arm. Gold went to Ayoub Sadni from Morocco, who got a world record. Silver went to Thomas Ruan De Moraes from Brazil, who got an area record, and bronze went to Petrucio Ferreira [00:22:00] Dos Santos.
Jill: Moving up to the 800 meter. For the women– women and men both did T34 class, which is a wheelchair class with little to no upper body impairment. For the women. Hannah Cockroft from Great Britain, won gold with a Paralympic record. Silver went to Kare Adenegan from Great Britain, who got a personal best, and bronze went to Alexa Halko from the US.
Jill: In the men’s T 34 gold went to Walid Ktila from Tunisia. Silver went to Mohammed Alhammadi from United Arab Emirates, and bronze went to Wang Yang from China.
Jill: And finally, in the 1500 meters, this was for the men, their T 38 class, which is a low degree of impairment to both legs, one side or the entire body. Gold went to Nate Riech from Canada. Silver went to Abdelkrim Krai from Algeria. Oh, Nate got a Paralympic record. Abdelkrim got an area record, and bronze went to Deon Kenzie from Australia.
Jill: Moving over to badminton. We had a bunch of medal matches today. So start off with the WH1 class. This is a wheelchair class that is a high degree of impairment to one side or both legs. For the men, gold went to QU Zimo from China. Silver went to Lee Sam Seop from Korea, and bronze went to Lee Dong Seop from Korea. For the women, gold went to Sotomi Sarina from Japan. Who beat her idol Sujirat Pookkham from Thailand. And then bronze went to Yasmin Lou from China.
Jill: This was a good match to watch. They showed this on television and the singles is very interesting with the type of mobility and agility. When you think about how much effort it takes to get the wheelchair rolling, and you have very little room to do it on a badminton court and you have that effort and the shuttlecock goes [00:24:00] very quickly. And just the fact that, that they have that agility to both move the chair and hit the shuttlecock at the same time is pretty impressive.
Jill: For the WH two class, this was for the women. It’s another wheelchair class with a moderate to high degree of impairment to one side or both legs and hip area. China, won gold. That went to Liu Yutong. They also won silver, China’s Xu Tingtin, and then bronze went to Yamazaki Yuma from Japan.
Jill: Moving up to the SL three class. This was for men’s singles. They have a moderate degree of impairment to one side or both legs. Gold went to Pramod Bhagat from India. Silver went to Daniel Bethell from Great Britain, and bronze went to Manoj Sarkar from India.
Alison: Get dialing, Prime Minister Modi!
Jill: In the women’s doubles, we had the SL three and S U five competition. So this is a team that can be made up of either the SL three plus an SL S U five class. A standing class.
Alison: Yes, but they play half court.
Jill: Oh, okay. Because of, of impaired mobility.
Alison: Correct.
Jill: That makes sense. And standup is a full court as you is standup, so and well, I’m guessing it’s standard.
Alison: Yes, it is.
Jill: Okay. SU is full court. So for this class, for the doubles, you have either or two SL fours, which I’m guessing is kind of a, in the middle of both of those abilities,
Alison: Correct.
Jill: So gold went to Indonesia. The team was Oktila Leani Ratri and Sadiyah Khalimatus. And silver went to China, the team of Cheng Hefang and Ma Huihui, and bronze went to Japan, the team of Ito Noriko and Suzuki Ayako.
Jill: And then finally, we had two singles matches [00:26:00] for the S U five class. Both for men and women. These are disabilities of one arm. Gold went to Liek Hou Cheah from Malaysia. Silver went to Anrimusthi Dheva from Indonesia, and bronze went to Nugroho Suryo from Indonesia.
Jill: For the women. Gold went to Yang Qiuxia from China. Silver went to Suzuki Ayako from Japan, and bronze went to Sugino Akiko from Japan.
Jill: Moving over to Boccia, we had mixed pairs and mixed team competition. The first was the mixed pairs, BC four, which is a varying degree of disabilities affecting the arm, trunk and legs. Gold went to Slovakia. Silver went to Hong Kong, and bronze went to RPC.
Jill: The BC mixed pairs competition is also a wheelchair and sitting. They use the ramp method of delivering the ball and use a mouth pointer or a head pointer or a finger release to move the ball. Gold went to Korea. Silver went to Japan, and bronze went to Greece. And in the mixed team, BC one BC two class, teams are three players. They must have at least one BC one athlete, which who has poor trunk control and sitting balance. Gold went to Thailand. Silver went to China, and bronze went to Japan.
Jill: I was hopeful that they would have boccia on the overnight coverage, and I have to go to the feed to watch that.
Jill: Your hopes were dashed.
Jill: Well, I think we got the taste of boccia, and then because the US doesn’t really have a presence here, it’s go to the feed to watch the rest. I still want to learn more about it. I wouldn’t be surprised if boccia, and it might take a little longer, you know, how curling just kind of exploded almost when Team Shuster won gold, and just like a lot of people were following curling in this last Olympics. And they always get a bump from games to games, but it really felt like [00:28:00] PyeongChangwas big for curling in America.
Alison: Agreed.
Jill: So I wonder if more viewing of boccia will help with participation in America, and when they understand it’s kind of curling in a way and the same, you have to use a lot of strategic thinking and think moves ahead, I wonder if that will encourage more people to watch if they know it’s on. But that could be a few Games out yet. I wouldn’t be surprised though if a few games down the road, we’re looking maybe LA 2028.
Alison: I was just gonna say LA, and then you see it here, and then there’ll be the push to have facilities for this to happen.
Jill: It doesn’t take a huge court. I mean, the court is kind of specialized, but you can draw it out with chalk on a concrete floor, I think
Alison: You could probably use a basketball court with additional taping to make it work.
Jill: Exactly.
Jill: Moving over to canoe sprint. We had several races today starting with the women’s K L one, which has a high degree of impairment to the legs and trunk. Gold went to Edina Mueller from Germany, who got a personal best. Not shabby getting your personal best with a gold medal. Silver went toMaryna Mazhula from Ukraine, and bronze went to Katherinne Wollermann from Chile. You saw this.
Alison: She capsized at the very end of the race at the finish line. And this is a great race. Edina just really pulled ahead, was very definitive, but didn’t run away with it. So it was still exciting. But at the end, VoLumen was pushing so hard that she just lost the balance a little bit.
Alison: And over she went, and the announcer, the announcer was trying to sound professional, but he was also horrified for a moment. like, oh, we have a capsize. We’ll have to make sure she’s okay. But the team got out there right away and she was already above water before anybody got to her. So there was never any rest of her safety, but it [00:30:00] was a little horrifying to see a capsize
Jill: I can imagine. And I wonder, I mean, like when you learn kayak, they teach you how to roll. I wonder with the impairments, how that affects your ability to roll in the kayak to get back up.
Alison: She could not roll. She just came out of the boat and the boat was left upside down.
Jill: Interesting.
Alison: So I don’t know if that’s the preferred method ,or if it was just at that moment, that’s what she did immediately.
Jill: Yeah. Like, do they have a quick release thing in the kayak that helps you get out? That’s a good question.
Jill: In the KL two race, which has a moderate degree of impairment to legs, including absence of limbs. Gold went to Charlotte Henshaw from Great Britain, who got a personal best. Silver went to Emma Wiggs of Great Britain and her biceps and triceps, and bronze went to Katlin Varga from Hungary.
Alison: The best moment of this race actually happened after the race, when they did the medal ceremony. And Henshaw gave Wiggs her medal, and Wiggs gave Henshaw her medal. That’ll get you. And they both just sobbed. They were both crying. It was beautiful. So clearly they probably trained together. They certainly know each other very well. And Henshaw is much younger than Wiggs, so there was a little bit of the passing of the torch element to it, and just an incredible mutual love. But Great Britain has been doing quite well at canoe sprint.
Jill: It’s very impressive. For the women’s KL3 three race, which is a moderate degree of impairment to one leg. Speaking of Great Britain doing well, Laura Sugar from Great Britain won the gold. Nelia Barbosa from France won silver, and Felicia Laberer from Germany took the bronze.
Jill: In the men’s VL classes. So the men took to the va’a boat. They had a VL two and the VL three [00:32:00] for the VL two, which is a moderate to high degree of impairment to the legs and trunk, including the absence of both full legs. Gold went to Fernando Rufino de Paulo from Brazil, who got a personal best. Silver went to Steven Haxton from USA, and bronze went to Norberto Mourao from Portugal.
Jill: And the VL three class is a low to moderate degree of impairment to the legs, including absence of one, or both partial absence of one leg or both partial legs. Gold went to Curtis McGrath from Australia. Silver went to Giovane Vieira De Paula from Brazil, and bronze went to Stuart Wood from Great Britain. That boat was a nice addition to the program, I think. People really liked it. And it’s fun to watch.
Alison: I was going to say, and for no other reason that we get to say “va’a.”
Jill: The kayak has the two bladed paddle, and the va’a you have to use just the one-sided paddle like a canoe, but the va’a has a little Outrigger set up to help with balance.
Alison: And it seemed like in the va’a, the athletes were positioned more like they’re positioned in canoe. They seemed more upright. So there’s definitely a whole different body position.
Jill: Interesting. Well, I’m looking forward to watching this one again.
Jill: Moving over to football five-a-side. Oh, man. I saw what they would show of the bronze medal match, which was most of it. This was fantastic. China versus Morocco. Morocco is the first team from Africa ever to reach a medal round. Zouhair Snisla scored a hat trick of goals, which is three goals in the first half. And then he added another one in the second half to give Morocco the victory 4-0.
Alison: So he added a hat on top of his hat trick.
Jill: Yes. But it was a fun game to watch. Excellent ball handling. Good saves from [00:34:00] the goalies. The first goal that Snisla scored was one of those where he was at a, an angle pretty far from the goal, a very very acute angle to the goal, and the ball bounced off the goalpost and it looked like it could have gone back out into the field, but it went into the goal just beyond the goalie. It was really just one of those like magical goals to watch
Alison: From now on, four goals. Shall be called a Fez trick.
Jill: I love it.
Jill: In the gold medal match, it was Argentina versus Brazil, Brazil, won 1-0oh, by the way. So of course the bronze medal, not only is it the first time a team from Africa has gotten to the medal round, it is also the first time that Morocco has medalled in this tournament, which is great for the sport.
Jill: The gold medal match, Argentina versus Brazil, Brazil wins at one to zero. Low scoring game, and just great footwork all around. But you know what? Brazil has never lost football five-a-side at the Paralympics.
Alison: Are we surprised, really?
Alison: No, no. And this is Argentina’s best finish since 2004. So I do think that this is promising for the sport. It’s been a really, really great tournament, I think. I hope that the exposure on TV at least here got people excited about it as a sport. Cause I think it’s really cool.
Alison: So gold to Brazil, silver to Argentina, bronze to Morocco, and hopefully in Paris, there will be a women’s competition to go along with it.
Jill: In shooting first, we had the mixed 50 meter pistol SH1. This is, athletes can have one good shooting hand and they can either sit or stand. Gold, went to Manish Narwal from India. Silver went to Singhraj from India, and [00:36:00] bronze went to Sergey Malyshev from RPC.
Alison: I hope Prime Minister Modi has two good dialing hands. But shooting in India, it’s the tradition.
Jill: And then in the mixed 50 meter rifle prone, sh two class, these are athletes who need additional support for the rifle, and they fire from a sitting position. Gold went to dragon Ristic from Serbia, who got a world record and a Paralympic record. Silver went to Zdravko Svanovic from Serbia, and bronze went to Vasyl Kovalchuk from Ukraine.
Jill: This was the competition that our TKFLASTANI McKenna Geer was in. She finished 17th in the qualifying, so she did not move on to the finals. the match consists of a six series of rounds of shooting, I would say. And so she was scoring pretty well in the mix. And, she got four series that were in the 103 point range. And by 103, I mean, 103.0 to 102.9. And then she had one that was 102.9, but then her last one was 100.7 and that kind of dragged her down a little bit. She ended up with a score of 617.7. The lowest score of the person who last qualified for the finals, that score was 622.7.
Jill: So you see a five point difference in this sport is kind of big. Her scores were pretty much in the mix, but, the low scores didn’t help. Other people also would have series that were not great. Like somebody had a 99 and that’s a tough day for that person, but you had people who were getting like 104 and 105,and they’d get that a couple series, and when you have that multiple times, that’s where the 103’s that are pretty average, that’s not going to be enough today. So better than her last competition. Obviously not what she wanted to do, but hopefully it was a good turn for her.
Alison: We are proud of her. I hope she’s [00:38:00] proud of herself.
Jill: And I hope she enjoyed Tokyo or what they could of Tokyo. The other thing it’s just like, well, you know, you didn’t do so great today, but it’s been a weird couple of years now. You’ve had a weird time getting to the Paralympics. The whole Paralympics has probably been a kind of weird experience compared to Rio. So, it’s OK.
Jill: In sitting volleyball, we finished up the men’s team competition today. For the bronze medal, Bosnia-Herzegovina beat Brazil 3-1. And the men’s gold medal match. Found out that it has been 21 years since the gold medal game has been competed by anyone other than Iran and Bosnia- Herzegovina.
Alison: Strange combination of countries for a particular sport.
Jill: It really is. And I wonder if, it’s 21 years pretty much because that’s when Bosnia-Herzegovina came into existence. So before that, is it Yugoslavia? We might have to go back for this one and find out if a Yugoslavia has also been a powerhouse in sitting volleyball.
Alison: You know, what about sitting volleyball and these two countries go together?
Jill: I don’t know, maybe our sitting volleyball correspondent Brittany can help us out with that.
Jill: But RPC, this is their best placement since they won bronze in 2008. This game was something to watch.
Alison: So much fun.
Jill: And I think it’s more fun because of the US commentary team. So if you’re in the US and you can watch Tanith and Kari,all the better cause, Kari got so excited in this match.
Alison: I watched this match with the feed announcers, who were also fantastic. So if you get the OBS feed of it, and clearly one of the OBS feed announcers spoke whatever language the referee was speaking to the players. I don’t know if it was French. I don’t, I don’t know. I couldn’t hear it well enough to identify it.
Alison: So he was able [00:40:00] to tell us what the referee was saying to the players. At one point, RPC got in trouble because their bench was taking their masks off.
Jill: Oh wait! Cause we’ve been wondering why some of the sitting volleyball teams, particularly the US women, have been wearing their masks.
Alison: That’s a choice. The players on the court have a choice because the US and Brazil both choose to wear the mask. Actually Tanith explained that to us yesterday. But when you’re on the bench, you need to have your masks on.
Jill: Okay.
Alison: And then the Iranian players got in trouble for calling balls out themselves and not waiting for the official announcement. And it was throwing off the Russian players. So then the referee had to talk to them about that. And we would never have known that without the feed announcer being able to speak the same language as whatever they were speaking to each other.
Jill: I am definitely going back and watching this because it was an, I was running out of time, so I watched some of this on fast forward and it was you know, Iran won the first game, pretty handily. And then RPC came back at some point and they took a game, but the games were pretty close for quite some time. And it was a really, really good competition.
Alison: And this featured Morteza Mehrad who is, I think we mentioned on the air, the second tallest man in the world. He’s over eight feet tall.
Alison: And when he’s on the court, clearly you’ll know who he is, but he’s actually not just about size. He was a really excellent player. His skills were there.
Jill: Right. And the coach has said he can improve, because he’s not as good as some of the others on his team. He, Mehrad had been on a TV show about his height. So he’s eight feet tall. One day he was riding his bike, fell off, broke his pelvis. And one of his legs stopped [00:42:00] growing while the rest of him still grew. So he has one leg that’s six inches shorter than the other. And that just put him into kind of a depressive spiral where he didn’t leave the house and just didn’t want to be seen because he’d be getting a lot of taunting or staring or ogling.
Jill: But the sitting volleyball coach saw him on TV and said, you might be a really good sitting volleyball player and brought him onto the team. And he’s been working on his skills, and you can see that some of them really sharp. Some of the smart placement in –the whole team has really smart placement of the ball on the court.
Alison: And we spoke yesterday about, or correspondent Brittney found out about what your legs going under the net. His leg definitely went under the net. What was so amazing was how quickly he was able to maneuver himself and the legs that, and I’m not saying this as a joke are probably as tall as I am, moving that entire leg out from under the net so that you don’t interfere with another player. Very nimble.
Jill: Can you imagine what the drills are like? The movement drills are like for sitting volleyball? It’s gotta be brutal.
Alison: My tushy hurts just thinking about it. But it’s a great game. It was a great game. Really, really fun. And like you said, if you’re a volleyball fan and get excited about, you put the ball just in the right spot, this is the match for you.
Jill: Yes. So just to recap Iran wins gold.It is their second straight gold in sitting volleyball, and they are a seven time para gold medalists in the sport. Silver goes to RPC, which is the best ever finish from a team from Russia, and bronze went to Bosnia- Herzegovina.
Jill: We also had the women’s team bronze medal match, and Brazil beat Canada. 3-1 to take the bronze. Gold medal match is coming up on the last day of competition. So we will be watching that. [00:44:00]
Jill: In TaeKwonDo. We had the women’s plus 58 kilos class and the men’s seventy-five plus kilo class. We haven’t really talked about TaeKwonDo, the class – what the fighters are like for this classification. They have one class, its’, K 44. And these fighters have coordination affected to a low degree on one side, a high degree in one arm or one foot in one ankle or the absence of part of the arms. So these fighters adjust for uneven upper body balance by changing their stance. And those affected in the ankle have better all around balance, but they have reduced spring for kicking, which is just crucial for TaeKwonDo.
Alison: So currently in the Paralympics, there is only one class of TaeKwonDo that is competed, but I understand there are additional classes that exist in lower levels of competition.
Jill: For the women’s plus 58 kilos, gold went to a Guljonoy Naimova from Uzbekistan. Silver went to Debora Bezerra de Menezes from Brazil, and bronze went to Janine Watson from Australia, as well as Amy Truesdale from Great Britain.
Jill: In the men’s plus 75 kilo class, gold went to Asghar Aziziaghdam from Iran. Silver went to Ivan Mikulic from Croatia, and bronzes went to Zainutdin Ataev from RPC and Evan Medell from USA.
Alison: Okay. Of course he has to get a medal. His name is medal.
Jill: It could be Madell.
Alison: Well, then he won a bronze Madell.
Alison: I’m very curious to see if NBC SN mentions this because this is one of the sports that OBS decided not to film at all, or they weren’t going to make feeds available for this sport and they’d have highlights, but, but no feed, but since the USA won a [00:46:00] medal, I wonder if that will come up. Just that little brief wrap-up moment.
Alison: Maybe not. Cause they want a madell
Jill: In wheelchair basketball, we had the men’s classification playoffs for fifth and sixth place, which Australia won 74 to 58 over Turkey. And then we finished up the women’s tournament. First was the bronze medal match between Germany and the US. US wins 64 to 51. And the gold medal match was Netherlands versus China. Netherlands won 52 -31.
Alison: So, couple things I want to mention about the tournament. The USA team had only two players that came back from Rio. Six of the players were not even on the world championship team. The Paralympics are their first international tournament. So coming out with a bronze medal is number one, quite an achievement. And given that Paris is only three years away. I think we’re going to see this team stick together and really be pushing it in 2024. The gold medal match was so much fun.
Jill: I have not seen it yet.
Alison: So much fun. So here’s the two big things. First half really, really close. And I don’t know what speech the Dutch coach gave at halftime, the Dutch ladies came out and were just like, Nope, you’re not going to score anymore. Nope. We’re going to win this. It’s like the tale of two games. Totally different.
Jill: Wow.
Alison: But here’s the best part for me in the American announcing. There’s a player on the Dutch team named Bo Kramer. Okay. Nice, good Dutch name. No, the announcers kept saying “Krama! Bo Krama!”. This is not the OBS feed. These are two Americans who really wanted to put that Dutch sound into it [00:48:00] every single time, and she’s one of their star players. So she did a lot. It’s Kramah!.
Jill: You know how we really get into names.
Alison: We get excited.
Jill: Maybe “Bo Kramah” is the name that they just love saying. And just like, we have to say it correctly and with feeling,
Alison: And she’s a beautiful player. So I never minded them pointing her out to me, but every time, because they would say a lot of the other names without any kind of Dutch accent, but then it would be Bo Kramah.
Alison: So if for nothing else, first of all, it’s a fantastic game of basketball, but second watch Bo Kramer.
Alison: Okay, just
Jill: to wrap up the women’s tournament. Gold went to Netherlands, silver went to China and bronze went to the USA.
Jill: And then we have some wheelchair tennis.
Alison: I’ve been waiting all show to get to this. Oh! It was so good!
Jill: The whole tournament, any time, any game they showed was just so intense and so amazing. And the final scores do not really reflect how intense many of these games were. So we’ll start with women’s doubles, bronze medal. Did you see this one?
Alison: I did.
Jill: So we had-
Alison: I saw them all. I stayed up seeing them, and then woke up and watched more.
Alison: So
Jill: we’ve got Japan’s Kamiji and Ohtani versus China’s Wang and Zhu. Japan wins 6-2, 7-6..
Alison: Again, closer than that looks. That second set is much more indicative of what was going on.
Jill: And then the gold medal match was between Netherlands De Goot and van Koot and at Great Britain’s Shuker and Whiley. I was surprised to see the final score because every time I saw them, it was like on deuce and we had at least five back and forth through ad in [00:50:00] an ad out. Netherlands wins 6-0, 6-1.
Alison: Kind of slipped at the end. They weren’t getting the points. They weren’t finishing them off. So then they sort of said, oh, like through the middle of the second set.
Jill: Oh, that’s too bad. But some of the angles that both sides were getting on the ball were just unplayable, just really phenomenal court awareness. So for the women’s doubles, it ends up with gold going toDe Groot and van Koot from Netherlands, silver going to Shuker and Whiley from Great Britain, and bronze going to Kamiji and Otani from Japan.
Jill: In the men’s singles. Well, we are not getting a Golden Slam this year from anyone in the tennis world, because the bronze medal match was between a Great Britain’s Gordon Reid and Alfie Hewett. Reid wins 6-4, 3-6, 7-5.
Alison: And these are doubles partners who medalled in the men’s doubles. So this was a very emotional match because they know each other’s games inside and out and are very close personally. And yet they both want to win. They both want to end up on that medal stand. So it was great too. And it was a good, they were very evenly matched because they know each other’s games so well. You could see little quirks where it was like, oh, he knew where that ball was going. Cause that’s how Alfie always hits that kind of shot.
Jill: That has to be frustrating to work through or like, do you think, okay, are there shots that I can do in this match that he doesn’t know about?
Alison: The answer is no, because your doubles partner, if you are a consistent doubles team, knows your game better than you do because you, they know your little quirks that they have to adjust for that you probably never have even noticed before, especially in the wheelchair, because you do this little thing with your left hand, oh, that means your wheelchair is [00:52:00] going this way. So I have to go this opposite way. So it’s not to crash into each other. So I bet they know each other’s small movements, even better than able-bodied doubles partners and able body double partners, there aren’t a ton of teams that stay together and play the way that these two seem to. So, yeah, this was a great, a great emotional and just really great tennis.
Jill: And in the gold medal match, it was Japan’s Kuunieda Shingo versus Tom Egberink from Netherlands, and host nation Kunieda Shingo winning 6-1, 6-2 to take the gold medal.
Alison: This was a not in my house.
Jill: Oh, was it?
Alison: He was not going to lose this match. And talk about a beautiful reaction and joy and just overwhelmed. So if you want to see a big Japanese man cry, watch the end of this match. It’s beautiful. But yeah, he was not letting anybody take this from.
Jill: So to recap, gold goes to Kunieda Shingo from Japan. Silver goes to Tom Egberink from Netherlands, and bronze goes to Gordon Reid from Great Britain.
Jill: And lastly, we had the quad singles. Today, we had the gold medal match. Yesterday, we had the bronze medal match. So this was Australia’s Dylan Alcott versus Sam Schroeder from the Netherlands.
Alison: Also, the score does not reflect, number one, how close this was, and how good Sam Schroeder was playing. Just Alcott was that little bit better. Schroeder was not making mistakes. Allcott was just making shots that even the, in the announcer was saying things like I did not know that was geometrically possible to make that angle. Crazy shots.
Jill: Wow. Alcott pulls it out, 7-6, 6-1. Wow. So Dylan Alcott [00:54:00] from Australia is a repeat gold medalist. Silver goes to Sam Schroder from the Netherlands, and bronze went to Niels Vink from Netherlands. What a nice way to end that tournament.
Alison: And all those medal ceremonies were very emotional.
Jill: I got to go back. I got like 20 hours of TV to watch today.
Alison: And sam Schroeder is, we talked about Niels Vink being 18, Sam Schroder’s all of 21. And both of them are huge fans of Dylan Alcott, who’s much older. So that was, and if for nothing else, you got to check out Sam Schroder’s hairdo.
Jill: Now I’m intrigued! All right, let’s get out of here so I can go turn on some tennis. So we’d want to say a quick thank you to our Patreon patrons. These are people who give to the show on an ongoing basis, and that helps helps the show’s operating budget, and what we can do with the show. So thank you to the patrons who have come on board during the Olympics and Paralympics. Thanks to them, we are now able to offer transcripts of our show, which is fantastic because we can be more accessible. We can reach a wider audience, and we can also be horrified at just the nonsensical language we use on a regular basis.
Alison: Wait till I read my tennis recap. I don’t think I said a complete sentence that whole bit.
Jill: So if you are interested in helping out the show on an ongoing basis, please check out Patreon.com/flame alive pod.
Jill: No more TKFLASTAN Watch.
Alison: No more TKFLASTAN Watch, but you know, I’m making my list for Beijing. I’m getting ready.
Jill: Okay. I’m excited. It is kind of bittersweet to know that the end is near.
Alison: And that the true end- you know, the end of the Olympics, we said, oh, it’s okay, we’ve got the Paralympics. I guess it’s okay, we got Beijing.
Jill: Yeah, I guess so, but it will be sad to say goodbye to Tokyo.
Alison: We’re going to need new outro [00:56:00] music.
Jill: We are going to need new outro music. So we’ll say sayonara for the second to last time. As always, you can email us@flamealivepodatgmail.com, text or voicemail us at 2 0 8 3 5 2 6 3 4 8. That’s 2 0 8, flame. It we’re at, flame alive pod on social. I’m on Twitter. Alison is on Insta and Facebook. So get at us there. If you are not in Keep the Flame Alive podcast’s Facebook group, you are missing out. We’re having a good time there. So please join in the fun so that you can get ready for Beijing. As always don’t forget our Kickstarter. Not that much time left. We’re almost to the finish line. Please help us reach the goal of bringing you on the ground coverage from Beijing that’s kickstarter.com/profile/flame alive pod. As we go out to music by Mercury Sunset, thank you so much for listening and until tomorrow, keep the flame alive.