Michael McKillop eased to his second gold of the World Para Athletics Championship with another supreme performance in London on Saturday evening.
Five days after winning the T38 800m final in a season's best time of two minutes 0.93 seconds, the 27-year-old captured the ninth World gold of an incredible career as he pulled away to take the T37 1,500m.
The Antrim man's success made it seven medals for Ireland at the championship.
He produced a sensational run in wet conditions to cross the line in a time of 4:36.38.
Taking the bell in the lead, McKillop and Canadian Liam Stanley pulled away from the chasing pack – Stanley making McKillop work hard going into the final 300m.
But McKillop found an extra gear on the home straight and crossed the line over a second ahead of Stanley (4:37.96), with Algeria’s Madjid Djemai (4:41.93) taking the bronze.
"I’m feeling fantastic," he said afterwards. "I think after five years of creating myself in para athletic sport and in this stadium at London 2012, it feels incredible. I have to enjoy these little moments.
"It’s a team effort. It’s funny because my dad still has his stop watches at about 150m to go. Obviously I can’t hear him but he is probably still shouting things, telling me to move instead of going so slow. But do you know what? I don’t really care."
Earlier, Paul Keogan booked his place in tomorrow night's T37 400m final (7pm) as he won his heat impressively.
"It's a great confidence boost and I'm looking forward to getting stuck into the final," Keogan said.
Defending champ @ParalympicsIRE @TeamMcKillop strides to second gold of #London2107 in the men's 1,500m T37, but he had to work for it... pic.twitter.com/oQtmJhVMg3
— World Para Athletics (@ParaAthletics) July 22, 2017
