Sarah Storey has won Great Britain’s first gold medal of the 2012 Paralympic Games.

Storey claimed an emphatic victory over Anna Harkowska (Poland) in the final of the women’s C5 Pursuit.

The 34-year-old claimed the eighth Paralympic gold medal of her career, having won five golds in the swimming pool in Barcelona and Atlanta, and two in the velodrome in Beijing.

She said: “Hopefully this race will set me up for the rest of the weekend. I suppose it did look easy but mentally you have to prepare and make it happen. I have to respect all my competitors.”

Her victory followed a silver medal for Mark Colbourne in the C1-3 1km time trial.

The Welshman, crowned world Paracycling champion in the C1 3km time trial in Los Angeles in February, was beaten in the final by Li Zhang Yu (China), who set a world record to claim gold.

He said: “We’ve done this hundreds of times in training and it’s about repeating the process. I probably only heard the crowd on lap three when I had relaxed into my stride.”

Colbourne’s teammate, and six-time Paralympic gold medalist, Darren Kenny, finished outside of the medals while bidding to defend the title claimed by Li in emphatic style.