BROMSGROVE'S Lauren Rowles made history by becoming the first woman to win three Paralympic rowing gold medals.
Great Britain celebrated its greatest day of Paralympic rowing by grabbing three golds and a silver in Paris on Sunday (September 1).
Rowles became the sport’s first female triple champion with victory alongside Gregg Stevenson in the PR2 mixed doubles.
Rowles, who was champion alongside Laurence Whiteley in Rio and Tokyo, and former Royal Engineer Commando Stevenson powered past China in the final 500 metres to win by almost 2.5 seconds.
Rowles, aged 26, said: “Out of my three Paralympic gold medals, this is definitely the best one yet! To do it for the third time in a row – history was made today. To have a bit of the Eiffel Tower in these medals and to do it with Gregg has been incredible – he’s been the best part about it.
“In our event, people go out there hard. It’s the Paralympic finals so you show up or you show out and today China showed up. They’ve been chasing us for years now and I knew today they would give it some. We wanted to push them to the absolute limit and today we knew we had that speed and surge coming into the finish line.
“We’ve never seen the audience so packed out in rowing before, and I think that really shows how Paralympic sport is going. Gregg’s got two young boys and I’ve got my son Noah who is five months old now, and it’s about a lot more than medals now, it’s about being role models to the boys.
"Our families and partners are our absolute rocks, Jude has been alone single parenting for five weeks now whilst I’ve been in a boat with Gregg.
"Our families allow us to achieve this, so it goes without saying that these medals today are for our families and for our boys.”
Military veteran Stevenson, who stood on an improvised explosive device while on patrol in Afghanistan in 2009, which led to a double leg amputation, memorably marked his Games debut at the age of 39.
“It’s just epic,” said the father of two.
“Commitment, I’ve struggled with that previously, so to turn up, work hard, be a role model for my kids and just hang about with Lauren and do what she does, which is grind and work and achieve, is the cherry on top.”
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