Crowd lifts Maria Lyle to ignore injury and take bronze

Maria Lyle overcame her nerves to take bronze at the world para athletics championships in London tonight and then revealed she'd needed to shake off injury just to reach the start line.

Dunba's Maria Lyle celebrates winning bronze at London Stadium. Pic: Victoria Jones/PA Wire

The Dunbar sprinter, 17, held on to make the podium of the 200 metres T35 final in 29.87 seconds as Australia’s Isis Holt defended her title.

But Lyle, who will race the 100m later this week, claimed the 21,000 crowd took her mind off the disruptions in the build-up.

“I walked out, I went ‘oh my god.’ I was a bit freaked out,” she said. “But I knew I wasn’t coming into the championships in the best of shape so I told myself to enjoy it. I could hear the crowd but I was thinking about what I needed to do and trying to remember there was no pressure on me to get gold.”

Jonnie Peacock headlined more British success by landing 100m T44 gold in 10.75 secs.

His success came 24 hours after a Super Saturday that brought five golds for the British team including victories for Scots Stef Reid in the T44 long jump and Sammi Kinghorn, who lowered her own world record to 28.61 secs in the 200m T54 final.

Elsewhere, Eilidh Doyle took third place behind world champion Zuzana Hejnova in the 400m hurdles at Diamond League in Rabat in 54.92 secs. Her Pitreavie club-mate Jack Lawrie was seventh in the 400 hurdles at the European Under-23 Championships in Bydgoszcz.