Twenty-four hours after she was denied a medal in the event she had won at two previous Paralympics, Kiwi long jump specialist Anna Grimaldi has made amends, storming to victory over 200 metres for New Zealand's first gold at Paris.
Grimaldi, 27, cut a despondent figure after finish fourth in her preferred jump competition, falling one centimetre off bronze, but made the most of her last chance for redemption, clocking the fastest heat time (25.09s) over T47 200m, then hacking another three-tenths of a second off her new Oceania record to give her rivals no chance in the medal race.
Running in lane seven, she ran smoothly around the bend and emerged in the home straight a couple of metres ahead, eventually cruising home in 24.72s to head off American Brittni Mason.
"What a weird 24 hours," reflected Grimaldi. "Yesterday was so strange... it was a tough pill to swallow.
"I can't believe today went how it did. I was pretty flat after yesterday, and took some time to rest and recover.
The long jump specialist clocked a new Oceania record to win. (Source: TVNZ)
"I ran a massive PB [in the heat] and then wasn't sure what to expect in the final... could I back it up? I've never done two 200s and barely done any 200s, let alone two in one day."
Grimaldi, who was born with a withered right forearm and no right hand, had earlier claimed bronze over 100 metres, but rarely contests the longer sprint at international level. She ran 200m heats at Rio 2016, but was disqualified for running out of her lane.
The result is especially significant for the NZ team, which faced the very real possibility of no gold medals for the first time in Paralympic history.
In the pool, NZ flagbearer Cam Leslie also seemed on the verge of the podium, when he qualified second fastest from heats of the S4 50m backstroke, clocking 43.05s to finish behind only Russian-born defending champion Roman Zhdanov.
That secured him an advantageous land in the centre of the pool, but he was unable to duplicate his performance eight hours later, recording 44.20s to miss the podium by 0.24s in fourth. It was Leslie's fourth final of the meet and second fourth placing.
In her Paralympics debut, Gabriella Smith qualified for the SM10 200m individual medley final, where she finished eighth.
After winning his heat of the KL2 single 200m, kayaker Scott Martlew avoided the need to contest a semifinal, progressing directly to the medal race, but also could not recapture that form, fading to sixth, just 0.21s away from bronze.
"It was a really tough final and I did what I could out there," Martlew told TVNZ. "I didn't get the result I wanted, but I left it all out on the water an I'm proud of that.
"I wasn't fatigued, I just didn't have a great start for the first few strokes and I was playing catch-up for the rest of the race."
Back at Stade de France, Will Stedman wrapped up his campaign with a 12.35s personal best over 100 metres to finish sixth in the T36 final, a bonus performance, after taking silver over 400 metres earlier in the week. Aussie rival James Turner repeated his one-lap victory, edging Argentinian Alexis Sebastian and Chinese Yifei Yang in a blanket finish.
Later, Mitch Joynt clocked 23.16s for sixth in the T64 200m final.
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