Alexandre Léauté king of the track, Djelika Diallo in the taekwondo final… The recap of Friday’s day

Alexandre Léauté, Tanguy de la Forest, Fabien Lamirault, Julien Michaud, Hector Denayer, Alex Portal and Djelika Diallo are the French medalists on Friday at the Paris Paralympic Games.

Second day of the Paralympic Games and already nine medals secured for the French delegation. Friday, August 30, cyclist Alexandre Léauté won the second gold medal for France while shooter Tanguy de la Forest won the silver medal, as Hector Denayer in the 100m breaststroke. Djelika Diallo is in the taekwondo final and has largely let her joy explode with her coach at the end of her semi-final. The day was also marked by a first world record in athletics, and a marriage proposal in particularly comical circumstances.

French Day: Alexandre Léauté and Tanguy de la Forest showed the way

He was highly anticipated, and he did not disappoint. Alexandre Léauté put on a real demonstration on the national velodrome and thus retained his crown in the individual pursuit (C2) of track cycling. The 23-year-old Breton rider, already 19 times world champion, won his fifth Paralympic medal in his career, his first in Paris. He will aim for at least one medal in each of his four other events on the programme: the kilometre (C1-3) and the team sprint (C1-5) on the track, then the road race (C1-3) and the road time trial (C2).

An hour after the French clan’s second gold medal, Tanguy de la Forest won the fifth medal for the French delegation. In Châteauroux, the Rennes shooter won silver on the 10 m standing air rifle. Then, in the evening, following the bronze of the pair Fabien Lamirault-Julien Michaud in para table tennis, Hector Denayer in the 100 m breaststroke (SB9 category) also won silver (1’05″91). And Alex Portal took third place on the podium in the 100m backstroke (S13 category), winning a bronze medal after the silver medal in the 100m butterfly.

Finally it’s here French taekwondo practitioner Djelika Diallo who must round off the great French evening. In a Grand Palais won over to her cause, the 19-year-old athlete dominated the Chinese Yao Yinan (18-12) in the semi-final earlier in the day, ensuring herself, at least, a silver medal. In the final, she will meet the Brazilian Ana Carolina Silva de Moura, Friday evening.

Today’s performance: first day of athletics and first world record!

Before Alexandre Léauté, who beat his own world record (3’24”298) during the individual pursuit qualifications, another man distinguished himself in the same way. And it happened near Saint-Denis, at the Stade de France. The Brazilian Julio Cesar Agripino Dos Santos indeed impressed by winning one of the first gold medals in athletics, out of 5 000 m T11, intended for athletes with visual impairments. Above all, he set a new world record (14’48”85), opening the ball on the famous Dionysian track in the most beautiful way.

The beautiful story of the day: despite being soundly beaten, a Brazilian man asks his wife to marry him

“Edwarda, will you marry me?” : these are the words written on the sheet of paper held up by Rogerio Junior Xavier de Oliveira. The Brazilian badminton player took advantage of his participation in the Paris Paralympic Games to “propose” after having just suffered a huge setback (21-9, 21-7) against the Frenchman and favourite of the para-badminton tournament Lucas Mazur.

Amid cheers from the audience, his partner reacted positively by forming a heart with her hands. Rogerio Junior Xavier de Oliveira will therefore not have lost everything on Friday.