Thailand’s Paralympic contingent set new medals record in history

Thailand captured one gold, one silver and one bronze in the boccia competition on Friday, while the men’s table tennis team took an additional bronze.

In the boccia event, Watcharaphon Vongsa has already handed Thailand the first gold medal in the mixed team (BC1-2) after teaming up with Worawut Saengampa, Pattaya Tadtong and Subin Tipmanee to beat Japan 9-4 in the gold-medal match earlier.

The 26-year-old Watcharaphon stunned Worawut Saengampa, who has been victorious on each of his last three outings including the World Individual Championship that were held in Beijing, China earlier this year, 5-4 (1-0 0-2 1-2 3-0) at the all-Thais final clash in the mixed individual (BC 2 class) event on Friday.

Watcharaphon got off to a flying start to lead 1-0 in the first end of the gold-medal match against compatriot, but Worawut took advantage after winning the next two ends 2-0 2-1 to lead 4-2. The fourth and last end of the competition saw Watcharaphon fare much better to blank Worawut 3-0 for an aggregate of 5-4 to capture the gold medal, the sixth of Thailand in Rio de Janeiro. Worawut picked up additional silver medal for the country.

Meanwhile, Thailand claimed two more bronze medals on Friday including one in table tennis event. Pornchok Larpyen took home the boccia mixed individual (BC4 class) bronze after overwhelming Korean Seo Hyeonseok 8-1 (2-0 2-0 3-0 1-1) in the third-place playoff. The gold and silver medals went to Hong Kong’s Wing Leung Yuk and Slovakian Samuel Andrejcik respectively.

In the tennis competition, Thailand’s Yuttajak Glinbancheun partnered Anurak Laowong to beat hosts Brazilians Knat Welder and David Andrade de Freitas  2-0 in the bronze-medal match of the men’s team event. China captured gold after powering past Germany 2-1 in the final showdown.

With only one day remaining before the curtains come down on the Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, the Thailand’s Paralympic contingent have already captured 6 gold, 5 silver and 6 bronze medals, surpassing not only their initial gold-medal target of four gold medals, which they have achieved in London four years ago, but also the highest amount of their medals haul of 5-4-2 in the Sydney Paralympic Games 16 years ago.

At press time, Thailand maintain their 20th place overall at the medal tally after claiming 6-5-6 medals, with China in the pole position after sweeping 93 gold medals. Great Britain are trailing in a distant second place with 58 gold, with Ukraine in third position following a harvest of 38 gold.