Encinitas native Joel Gomez claims world title in 1500-meter run at New Delhi meet ...Middle East

‘At age 16, Joel Gomez of Encinitas took 11th place in the 1,500-meter run in a visually impaired class at the 2019 World Para Athletics Championships in Dubai.

His potential was obvious. His results fell short. He was 10th at the 2021 Tokyo Paralympics, sixth at the 2023 Paris world meet, sixth at the 2024 Paris Paralympics and seventh at the 2024 Kobe world meet.

But on Day 4 of his latest global championships — the World Para meet Tuesday in the Indian capital of New Delhi — Gomez broke through.

First in the combined T12-T13 class 1500.

Now age 22, the Purdue University civil engineering graduate took the early lead in the metric mile just before 9:30 a.m. local time.

“But instead of setting a blistering pace, he controlled the race at a conservative clip relying on his kick in the final meters,” said USA Track & Field. “The strategy paid off. Gomez was able to hold off two hard-charging competitors on the homestretch and take the win.”

His gold-medal time of 3:57.71, equivalent to a 4:15 mile, was off his personal best of 3:45.76.

No matter.

“Nobody was taking the lead,” he told USATF. “And I knew that I had been working a lot more on endurance rather than speed this season. I just had to take it out and keep increasing the pace all the way to the finish.”

Via email, Gomez told me: “It was an absolutely surreal experience! Was quite the tactical race with a 70-second opening lap and then I took the lead with about 800 to go and just slowly cranked up the pace.”

His last 300 meters was a sizzling 40.1 seconds — his last 200 being 26.7 with the final 100 in 13.5.

He held off 30-year-old Aleksandr Kostin of Russia (the 2024 Paralympic champion competing as a “neutral” athlete) by nine-hundredths of a second.

Third at Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium went to Australia’s Jaryd Clifford, who wrote on Instagram: “I haven’t been on a 1500m podium for four years. It’s good to be back at this level again.”

Clifford, 26, said he “gave it everything, but it wasn’t enough. Today @joelgmusic had a coming of age run to win his first world title with a really impressive last two laps.”

Gomez qualified for Tuesday’s final by taking third in Heat 2 of the prelims Monday with an easy 4:04.17. (The top seven finishers ended up making the final, including three based on time.)

In 2019, after the Dubai world meet, I reported how the 5-foot-8, 130-pound son of Rynn Whitley Gomez and Carlos Gomez was born with a rare genetic disorder called blue cone monochromacy.

He likens it to the blindness one briefly experiences walking out of a dark theater into bright sunshine — except his affliction is constant.

As a prep, Gomez competed against able-bodied runners, representing Canyon Crest Academy and later as an online student at Classical Academy High School in Escondido,

He was the top sophomore in the county in 2019 when he took fifth in the CIF San Diego Section championships in the 1600-meter run with a 4:21.69.

Now he’s a world champion — with sights set on LA28.

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