TOKYO – Susannah Scaroni (Tekoa, Wash.) pulled away from the pack with seven laps to go and found the top of the podium in the women’s 5000-meters T54 final to lead Team USA’s three-medal haul on day two of track and field competition at the Paralympic Games Tokyo 2020.
Scaroni’s training partner and wheelchair racing legend, Tatyana McFadden (Baltimore, Md.), earned bronze in the race for her 18th Paralympic medal and Team USA’s first double podium in track and field in Tokyo.
Primarily known as a marathoner, Scaroni said she took a risk by pushing out in front of the pack so early in the race, but the bold move paid off. Her time of 10:52.57 is a Paralympic record, and the gold is the three-time Paralympian’s first-ever Paralympic medal.
McFadden, widely considered one of the greatest wheelchair racers of all time, elected not to chase down Scaroni and Switzerland’s Manuela Schaer, and the move was part of what allowed Scaroni to maintain such a big lead over the rest of the field. In the final 100m of the race, McFadden squeezed ahead of Nikita den Boer of the Netherlands for the bronze.
McFadden, who was diagnosed with a blood clotting disorder in 2017 at the height of her career and was not sure whether Tokyo was even a possibility, was thrilled with the medal. She and Scaroni train together in Champaign, Illinois, alongside Jenna Fesemyer (Ravenna, Ohio), who finished seventh in the competition in her Paralympic debut. Fesemyer’s time of 11:17.24 was a personal best in the 5000m.
While Paralympic veterans Scaroni and McFadden are established stars in the sport, 18-year-old Liza Corso (Newmarket, N.H.) made her debut on the biggest stage and took home the silver medal in the women’s 1500m T13 final. Corso, who is entering her freshman year of Division I track and cross country at Lipscomb University, only discovered adaptive sports two years ago, and this was her first major international competition. Her time of 4:30.67 in the final was a personal best and was 13 seconds faster than her preliminary heat time.
In the men’s 5000m T54, Daniel Romanchuk (Mount Airy, Maryland) just missed his first career Paralympic podium. His final time of 10:30.50 was just .13 seconds behind bronze medalist Putharet Khongrak of Thailand. Romanchuk will be back on the track shortly, racing in the preliminary heats of the men’s 400m T54 tomorrow morning.
All four wheelchair racers have a packed schedule on the docket in Tokyo. Scaroni has three more events, McFadden has four, Romanchuk five and Fesemyer two. Add on the possibility of competing in the team relay, and the quartet will have plenty more opportunities at the podium.
In other Team USA action, Beatriz Hatz (Lakewood, Colorado) finished fifth in the women’s long jump T64 in her Paralympic debut, while 16-year-old Ezra Frech (Los Angeles, California) took eighth in the men’s long jump T63 and teammate Regas Woods (Dunellon, Florida) took 10th in the same event.
Track and field competition resumes on August 29 at 9:30 a.m. JST (August 27 at 8:30 p.m. EST). All races will be live streamed through NBCOlympics.com, on Peacock and through the NBC Sports app. A full schedule of events is available here.
-U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee-