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Julian Finney / Getty Images
Terezinha Guilhermina of Brazil runs as her guide Guilherme Soares de Santana lies on the track after he fell in the Women's 400m - T12 Final on day 6 of the London 2012 Paralympic Games at Olympic Stadium on Sept. 4, in London, England.
Julian Finney / Getty Images
Assia El Hannouni of France wins gold in the Women's 400m - T12 Final on day 6 of the London 2012 Paralympic Games at Olympic Stadium on Sept. 4, in London, England.
Christopher Lee / Getty Images
Terezinha Guilhermina of Brazil and her guide Guilherme Soares de Santana lie on the track after falling in the Women's 400m - T12 Final on day 6 of the London 2012 Paralympic Games at Olympic Stadium on Sept. 4, in London, England.
Leon Neal / AFP - Getty Images
Brazil's Terezhina Guilhermina and her guide Guilherme Soares de Santana console each other after Soares de Santana fell just ahead of the finish line of the women's 400m T12 final at the Paralympic Games at the Olympic Park in east London, England on Sept. 4.
Update, September 6th: The night after these pictures were taken Terezinha Guilhermina and Guilherme Soares de Santana returned to the track, and this time their race had a much happier ending. Find out what happened when they competed in the 100m final.
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Did every runner have a guide? How does the guide work with the runner? Are they in contact? Did the two trip each other? Did they get up and finish the race? Are there alternatives to guides? It would be OK with me for athletes to use their guide dogs in the race. Might avoid incidents like this one.
My thoughts exactly! What if the guide can't keep up with the runner?! This seems like the perfect thing to train a dog to do. A dog can easily keep pace with a human runner (without even trying).
From the photos, it doesn't look like they got up and finished the race. It happened right before the finish line.
As Ligeti explains below, blind or partially-sighted athletes are permitted to use a guide runner in Paralympic races, but the guide is never permitted to cross the finish line before the blind runner. At the 2012 Games, guides became eligible for medals for the first time.
Take a look at this link to see what happened when Guilhermina and Soares de Santana returned to the track on Wednesday night.
All the runners have the option of using a guide (it depends on whether the runner considers they have enough sight to follow the lanes). The guide is almost always the blind runner's coach and/or training partner (or at least that's what the commentators have stated). The blind runner has to cross the finish line just before the guide. This sort of event seems very unusual. (Both Blind Runner and Guide get medals as a 'team'.)
Didn't see that comin'. j/k
How inspiring, Great example of the human spirit!