Sophie Kamlish
Sport: Athletics
Event: T44 100m and 200m
Date of birth: 20.08.1996
Coached by: Rob Ellchuk
Date selected for Rio: July 26
Previous Paralympics: London 2012 (T44 100m and 200m finalist)
Twitter: @Sophiekamlish
Biography:
Sophie, a lower-leg amputee, was identified as a potential athletics star through the Playground to Podium initiative and first competed on the track in June 2011. Within a year she had made her international debut at the Paralympic World Cup in Manchester, winning T44 200m bronze, and was selected for the London 2012 Paralympic Games while still a pupil at Oldfield School – one of her PE teachers was Helen Glover, now a double Olympic rowing champion.
Her parents run a business called Rosie Flo from their home in Camden, Bath, publishing colouring books for children, and Sophie is also a keen illustrator. She will begin a degree course in Illustration and Animation at Kingston University in London after the Rio Paralympics.
Sophie produced some stunning performances to race in two finals on her Paralympic Games debut in a packed Olympic Stadium at the tender age of 16.
Unfazed by the capacity 80,000-strong crowd at London 2012, Sophie finished fifth in the T44 100m final and sixth in the T44 200m final.
Rio 2016
Sophie narrowly missed out on a medal at Rio, losing out on third place by just six-hundredths of a second in the T44 100m final.
Earlier in the heats, she set the T44 world record with a time of 12.93s – the same time replicated in the final would have handed Sophie gold.
Her time of 13.16s was still her second-fastest time ever, and the sprinter still has a bright future having appeared at Rio aged just 20.
Notable achievements
2012: T44 100m and 200m finalist at London 2012 Paralympic Games; T44 long-jump silver at Sainsbury’s School Games
2013: T44 200m bronze at the IPC World Championships in Lyon, France
2016: T44 100m fourth at Rio 2016 Paralympic Games
