Victoria, B.C.’s Mel Pemble set a new world record on Saturday at the Paris Paralympic Games. The Canadian posted a 38.512 time in qualifying for the women’s C3 500-metre time trial.
That beat the previous record of 39.093 seconds set by Australia’s Aniek van den Aarssen in 2022.
In finals, though, Pemble’s 39.093 was only good enough for fourth. The women’s 500m was a combined C1-C3 event and, while Pemble was close to her C3 world record again, it was Australia’s Amanda Reid (C2) taking gold with a factorized time of 36.676 seconds. China’s Wangwei Qian earns silver and Germany’s Maike Hausberger bronze, just 0.3 seconds ahead of Pemble in fourth.
“It’s pretty cool to come here and realize I’m at my second Games,” said Pemble. “It felt more real coming into these Games with medal potential. The world record is going to make that fourth place sting a little less in the end, but I think it’s going to take a little while for me to get over that. I’m very happy with my times, I got a personal best by a second which is more than could hope for, but it would have been amazing to win a medal, it just wasn’t in the cards this year.”
Pemble’s world record adds to a successful run at Vélodrome national de St-Quentin-en-Yvelines for Canada. Kate O’Brien kicked off the Paralympic success with a bronze medal in the women’s C4 time trial.
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