Paralympics: Scoring blunder causing the wrong medals to be awarded in women's discus

Paralympic Games organisers apologised today for a scoring blunder that caused the wrong medals to be awarded in women's discus.

The announcement came just hours after Ukraine's Mariia Pomazan proudly received her gold medal in a packed stadium on the first morning of Paralympic athletics.

The athlete had hailed her win as "extremely emotional" and an "unforgettable experience".

But her gold medal win dream was dashed as organisers confirmed the placings in the F35/36 were incorrect - and relegated her into silver position.

China's Wu Qing was promoted to the gold medal position from second, and her compatriot, Bao Jiongyu, dropped from bronze to fourth.

Australia's Katherine Proudfoot, initially given fifth place, was upgraded to third.

In total, seven of the top 10 and all of the top five positions were changed and a new victory ceremony for the woman's discus will be held today.

Chris Holmes, Locog director of Paralympic integration, said: "Omega have explained what the issue was in terms of the loading of the correct data, it's been worked through and resolved and obviously Omega and we also apologise for that.

"We are confident that it won't occur again."

A statement released yesterday read: "In today's women's combined class discus event (F35/36) incorrect medals were awarded following the use of inaccurate results data.

"We sincerely apologise to the athletes affected.

"The inaccurate data also affected the men's shot put F42/44, although the final medal placing was not impacted.

"Omega is currently uploading the correct data and the final results for the women's discus F35/36 event will be amended and restated. A new medal ceremony will be held during tomorrow morning's athletics session.

"All combined class field events use the Raza System - a points scoring system where final positions are determined by points rather than distance.

"It uses a statistical model based on population of each class, level of impairment and performance. Each year an analysis of results is taken and the Raza System is updated accordingly."