Gold double as Mansfield’s Charlotte Henshaw retains her kayak title at Paris Paralympics
Mansfield's Charlotte Henshaw completed a magnificent gold medal double at the Paris Paralympics this morning when she stormed to victory in the KL2 200m kayak event.
It was a second successive gold in the KL2 for Charlotte, having won the delayed Tokyo 2020 gold medal too in September 2021.
That followed her gold in the VL3 Va'a boat race yesterday.
Once again today Charlotte made a magnificent, powerful start to have the early edge, though was being chased hard by Hungary's Katalin Varga.
But halfway down the course Varga hit difficulties with the wind and, in trying to stay in her lane, lost traction which saw her drop back to fourth.
Charlotte's GB team mate Emma Wiggs came through to make it another GB 1-2 in the end.
Charlotte won in a time of 49.07, well clear of Wiggs in 51.56 with Germany's Anja Adler taking bronze in 52.17.
She had already made Paralympics history in Paris on Saturday as she became the first ever winner of the new Va'a boat racing event.
The Va'a – a Tahitian word – has been introduced to the Paralympics in her classification for the first time this year and she made a fantastic start to get her boat ahead of GB team mate Hope Gordon in the VL3 200m final and extended that lead along the course to finish in 55.70 with Gordon taking the silver medal in 56.58 and China's Yongyuan 57.43
Charlotte had made a winning start to both her Para-canoe events in Paris on Friday, winning both her heats which saw her go straight into both finals over the weekend without the need to compete in the semis too.
Charlotte is one of three reigning Paralympic champions headlining a nine-strong Para-canoe team that is representing ParalympicsGB in their biggest Para-canoe squad to compete at a Games since the sport made its debut at Rio 2016, Charlotte having competed in swimming in her first three Paralympics.
In her swimming career she won a silver medal at the London games, followed by a bronze in Rio de Janeiro.
The KL2 kayak is Charlotte's main event while the VL3 is the Va'a boat – a Tahitian word – she has been world champion in that for three years from 2019-2022, though didn't race in it last year.
In her KL2 200m kayak heat Charlotte enjoyed a very comfortable win in 51 seconds ahead of China's Danquin Wang in 1.00.95 with Susan Seipel of Australia third in 1:01.29.
She also won her VL3 200m Va'a event in 58.33, but the race was much closer with Yongyuan Zhong just behind in 58.67 and Monika Katarzyna Kukla third in 1.01.73.