Lahouari Bahlaz

Bahlaz began training as an athlete at the age of 30.^[1] His first major international competition was at the 2011 IPC Athletics World Championships in Christchurch. There he entered two throwing events the club throw and the discus winning gold in both and setting a new world record of 20.30m in the latter.^[2] He followed this by representing Algeria at the 2012 Summer Paralympics in London, again competing in the club throw F31/32/52 and discus F32–24. At London he equaled his world record distance in the discus, but he was beaten into third place with world records by both Wang Yanzhang of China (F34) and Hani Alnakhli of Saudi Arabia (F33). Bahlaz took his second bronze medal of the Games with a throw of 36.31m and missing out on the gold medal by 7 points.

He followed this in 2013 with another successful World Championships, beating both Wang and Alnakhli in the discus to retain his gold medal. He also successfully defended his club throw title to leave Lyon with two gold medals.^[1]