Club Italgest Athletic Club Weight 122 kg Disability class T11 Height 1.89 m | Disability Visually impaired Role Olympic athlete Name Assunta Legnante | |
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Sport AthleticsParalympic athletics | ||
Athletics assunta legnante women s shot put f11 final 2013 ipc athletics world c
Assunta Legnante (born 14 May 1978 in Naples) is a visually impaired Italian shot putter. She has competed in both the Olympics and the Paralympics, one of the few athletes to do so. As of February 2013, she is the current F11 shot put world record holder.
Contents
- Athletics assunta legnante women s shot put f11 final 2013 ipc athletics world c
- Doha 2015 ipc athletics world championships getto del peso t12 assunta legnante ita
- Non disabled athletics career
- Blindness and Paralympics
- References
Doha 2015 ipc athletics world championships getto del peso t12 assunta legnante ita
Non-disabled athletics career
Legnante won the silver medal at the 2002 and the gold medal at the 2007 European Indoor Athletics Championships, where she captained the Italian team. She finished fifth at the 2006 European Athletics Championships. She competed at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, having missed the 2004 Olympics due to dangerously high intraocular pressure.
Her personal best throw is 19.04 metres, achieved in September 2006 in Busto Arsizio. Her best indoor result is 19.20 metres, achieved in February 2002 in Genova.
Blindness and Paralympics
Legnante was born with congenital glaucoma in both eyes. In 2009, she suddenly lost the sight in her better, right eye. Her left retina then deteriorated. She had a cataract removed in March 2012, but that did not improve her sight. She now has light perception in her left eye, but nothing more.
The 2007 European indoor champion did not lose heart and started a new career as a Paralympic athlete, training for the forthcoming 2012 Summer Paralympics.
At the 2012 Italian Paralympic Athletics Championships in Turin she set a new F11 shot put world record with a throw of 13.27 metres. On 8 June, at Memorial Primo Nebiolo in Turin, she improved the world record, three times, to 15.22 m. At the London Paralympics, she broke her own world record with a throw of 16.74 metres.
In 2014, she returned to international level throwing 17.09 on 20 June and 17.39 at the regional championships in Naples eight days later.