- Paralympics hero David Weir has announced his retirement from Team GB
- The 45-year-old featured in his seventh Games after making the trip to Paris
- Six-time gold medal winner Weir finished fifth in the men’s T54 marathon
Six-time Paralympic champion wheelchair racer David Weir has announced his retirement from international competition, following a momentous 28 years competing at the Games.
The 45-year-old made his debut aged 17 at Atlanta in 1996, before picking up his first two gold medals in Beijing in 2008. He followed this up with four gold medals on home soil at London 2012 as he became one of the first Paralympians to enter the wider public consciousness.
And Paris provided the perfect backdrop for the curtain to come down on the Weirwolf’s glittering career, as he raced over the line to finish fifth in front of the imposing Invalides, posting a time of 1hr 33min 27sec in the T54 wheelchair marathon.
‘It was quite emotional at the end because this will be my last race for GB,’ said Weir.
‘I’ll still do the major marathons, but it’ll be my last international. My body just couldn’t cope with it today. It’s an age thing, I was the oldest in the field.
Wheelchair racer David Weir has announced his retirement from Paralympic competition
Weir won six Paralympic gold medals during his time competing on the grandest stage
‘I am still highly competitive and still trying to beat Daniel (Romanchuk, 26-year-old American athlete who finished fourth) who is half my age, I could be his dad! I’m still doing all right. I gave it my all today.’
Weir was nearly selected for Barcelona 1992 as a 13-year-old, and his first Paralympics could have been his last after a disheartening turnout at Atlanta 1996 caused him to temporarily quit.
Reinvigorated by watching the crowds of Sydney 2000 on TV though, Weir returned for Athens 2004, where he begun his hunt for glory which reached its crescendo on the crowd-lined Mall in his hometown in 2012.
Meanwhile, chef de mission Penny Briscoe has said she expects the standard of competition to ‘continue to creep up’ after Great Britain retained second place in the medal table.
The team will return home with 124 medals — 49 gold, 44 silver and 31 bronze — and have now finished runners-up at six of the last seven summer Paralympics. The overall tally matches Tokyo 2020, but there have been eight more golds this summer.
‘I’m incredibly proud of the achievements of our athletes, who showed how competitive we are across a broad range of sports and impairment groups,’ she said. ‘The standards set at this Games were exceptional and medals and personal bests have never been more hard-fought.’
Weir made the trip to Paris with Team GB’s squad for his seventh Paralympic Games
And while Britain’s tally hit the pre-Games target of between 100 and 140 medals set by UK Sport, there were plenty of other podium places which slipped through the net.
‘We’ll be going home to reflect on those margins and start to unpick it,’ said Briscoe.
‘Sometimes the run of a ball doesn’t go your way and we accept that. But is there something else we need to make sure that we don’t take our eye off the ball as we look to LA, where standards I’m sure will continue to creep up.’