Paralympics: New silver for Pascoe

Sophie Pascoe competes in the Women's 100m Backstroke. Photo / Getty Images

New Zealand swimmer Sophie Pascoe has won her fourth medal at the Paralympics in London, equalling her haul in Beijing four years ago, but it wasn't the colour she hoped for.

The 19-year-old eclipsed the world record in the S10 100m backstroke but was Canada's Summer Ashley Mortimer went even faster, forcing Pascoe to settle for silver.

Pascoe had earlier set a Paralympic record of 1:07.77 in the heats with Mortimer more than two seconds slower as third-fastest qualifier. But Pascoe wasn't fooled.

"She's holding something back, there's no doubt about that," Pascoe said after the heats. "But tonight I'll just go out there and do my thing."

She did, setting a time of 1:06.69 but Mortimer overpowered Pascoe in the final 15m to smash the world record by more than a second (1:05.90) to claim gold.

"I backed myself from this morning," Pascoe said. "That's a new personal best for me and that's all I can do. Unfortunately she pipped me at the post again, but I had nothing left in me. I'm all cramped up and everything so I know I've given it my all.

"She had the drive to get there. I wanted it but, unfortunately, I couldn't sit on her tail."

Pascoe, who has two gold and two silver from these Paralympics, looks set to eclipse her Beijing record with two more events on her schedule but has the day off tonight (NZT) to recuperate.

Rebecca Dubber was off the pace in the S7 50m freestyle and set the 11th fastest time in her heat.

Peter Martin was short of the best in the F52/53 javelin, finishing sixth of the nine throwers in the event.

The 50-year-old farmer is a former world record holder who retired from international competition ahead of the Beijing Games but found the competition has moved on without him.

Martin's biggest throw today of 15.26m wasn't enough to trouble the podium.

"I'm pretty disappointed," he said. "I haven't had the best build up with injuries and so forth, but I just haven't been able to find the form I had at home."

New Zealand's sailors had another difficult day, firstly waiting for enough wind to race and then struggling through a series of abandoned attempts until two short races were finally sailed off Weymouth.

The SKUD crew of Jan Apel and Tim Dempsey were 11th and 10th in the official races to sit 10th overall and 2.4R keelboat sailor Paul Francis was 11th and 12th in his two races to be 13th.

Waikato's Rachel Stock couldn't compete with the classy European riders in the dressage, finishing ninth of the 12 competitors in the mixed individual freestyle test grade III with a final score of 66.85 penalties.