In the preliminary rounds, he beat five opponents giving away just 6 points in the process. He lost to Feng 5-3 but progressed to the quarter-final, where he met Maxime Valet of France and won comfortably 15-8. In the semifinal, Coutya faced an old adversary, Feng of China. Feng went into a three-point lead but Coutya fought back to level at 10-10. Feng then raced ahead again to lead 14-10. Coutya managed to come back to 14-14 before Feng took the last point to win the match 15-14.
Dimitri was hugely disappointed with the result, but he quickly put his disappointment behind him to take on the Russian, Kamalov in the Bronze medal match. He blazed away at Kamalov with speed and accuracy like a whirling Dervish, the whole experience being over in a matter of minutes, with Coutya taking the Bronze medal 15-2.
Coutya’s success brings the GB medal tally to 4 with one more day of fencing.
*Photo courtesy of ParalympicsGB
