Wheelchair athlete Anthony Bouchard concluded his Swiss stay in style on Sunday at the Memorial Daniela Jutzeler, a para-athletics competition presented in Nottwil. The Quebecer placed second in the 400 meters and third in the 100 meters in the T52 category.
In the 400 meters, the 31-year-old completed his lap of the track in a time of 1 minute 1.66 seconds. At the same time, he shattered his personal best of 1 minute 2.15 seconds achieved two days earlier at the Nottwil Grand Prix, an event which had been won by the Japanese Sato Tomoki who won again on Sunday (54.54 seconds). .
“I told myself I would race in control, without trying to burn myself, because I had a 100m later in the afternoon. One shot gone, it was going well and I kept my speed until the end. I think I ran the best race possible with my current form. It’s a great representation of where I’m at in my training. »
In his other race of the day, the 100 meters, Bouchard was the third fastest thanks to his time of 17.34 seconds, ahead of his closest rival, the British Marcus Perrineau Daley by 4 hundredths of a second.
Gold went to Swiss Fabian Blum (16.96 s) and silver to Sato Tomoki (16.99 s).
“To be honest, I thought I would do a little better than that. Probably the fatigue accumulated at the 400 meters in the morning didn’t help me. The execution was good, except that it was what energy remained for me,” continued Bouchard, encouraged to have had a better reaction time at the start than in his 100m on Saturday. “I am able to constantly repeat 17.20 s – 17.30 s. »
Friday and Saturday at the Nottwil Grand Prix, the athlete from Quebec placed third in the 400 meters and second in the 100 meters.
Antony Bouchard began wheelchair racing at the turn of the 2020s. Last year, he took part in two finals at the World Championships and his meteoric progress on the international scene shows no signs of slowing down as dawn begins. of a possible first participation in the Paralympic Games.
“Obviously if I take the time to think about it, it surprises me a little, but it all comes together and I don’t really have time to sit and watch it. It can never go too fast,” he says, while we can see a smirk on his face.
The athlete will head to Paris to participate in one last European competition before the Canadian Paralympic Selections which will take place at the Claude-Robillard Sports Complex at the end of the month.