PARA-ARCHER Vicky Jenkins secured a bronze medal for Great Britain at the Paralympics in Rio and revealed a health issue left her hospitalised until the night before her event.

Jenkins, from Malvern, achieved bronze on Saturday while Paralympics GB team-mate Jess Stretton defeated fellow Briton Jo Frith in the gold medal match.

And Jenkins, a Bromyard Bowmen member, she had been in hospital since the previous Monday.

“I had finished training and went for a sleep and then when I woke up I couldn’t move,” she said.

“My blood glucose had just plummeted out of no-where and I have a neurological condition which impacts my movement which became even worse.

“It was a scary time, but I’ve been looked after so well by the GB medics and the hospital in Rio - without them I wouldn’t have made it to the competition,” she added.

Jenkins’ gold medal bid in the women’s individual W1 event was derailed by Stretton in the semi-finals after she was defeated 141-131.

But Jenkins faced Kim Ok Geum in the bronze medal match and took control from the start, building a four-point lead as she finished the third end.

The Korean fought back, tying the fourth. Geum scored three eights in the fifth and Jenkins started with an eight.

The showdown went to the final arrow and Jenkins held her nerve to shoot a nine and take the bronze medal 125-124.

“Well this definitely helps, getting a bronze medal,” Jenkins said.

“At one point I thought, ‘oh this is all over, after all this training’,” Jenkins admitted.

“But I took it one day at a time and we got there.”

Jenkins, who was named Herefordshire Sport’s Disabled Sports person of the Year for 2014, used to be a helicopter pilot instructor until she began to suffer neurological problems.

She has had to overcome physical problems and cut out medication she used to depend on because of the strict rules on the drugs in the sport Meanwhile, Worcester-based Great Britain’s men’s wheelchair basketball team also secured a bronze medal in Rio.

Terry Bywater has now won three and lost two bronze medal matches at the Games but the home defeat four years ago hit him hard and this righted all those wrongs.

He produced a near flawless offensive display as coach Haj Bhania’s team secured a dramatic 82-76 overtime win over world bronze medallists Turkey.

The ever-reliable Ian Sagar again weighed in with 20 points while Abdi Jama, Phil Pratt and Gaz Choudhry all made telling contributions in a strong all-around performance by the 12-strong squad.

Turkey took a two point lead with just 25 seconds remaining but Bywater held his nerve to force the thrilling contest into overtime.