Sam Harding’s decision to switch sports post-Tokyo Paralympics has paid dividends in Birmingham, as the West Aussie won the state’s first silver medal of the Commonwealth Games.

A year after he took to the athletics track in Tokyo, Harding scooped WA’s eighth medal of the games after finishing second in the para-triathlon.

Harding and guide Luke Harvey crossed the line in a time of 1:02:09, more than three minutes ahead of fellow Australians Jonathan Goerlach and David Manwaring.

It was the first time a West Australian has won a silver medal in Birmingham, after four golds and three bronze on the first two days.

It represents the culmination of an incredible year of training for Harding, who only began to entertain the idea of competing in the triathlon last year.

Harding and Harvey started the swim component of the race strongly, emerging from the water in third position, before establishing a stranglehold on second spot in the bike ride.

While eventual winners David Ellis and Luke Pollard from England had built up an insurmountable lead heading into the run, Harding and Harvey kept the pace up and never looked uncomfortable.

Finishing four and a half minutes off the pace of gold, Harding and Harvey wore the face of two men who had left everything out on the circuit as they crossed the line looking beyond exhausted.

Harding, who lives with choroideremia, a hereditary condition which has resulted in a loss of peripheral vision, reached the final of the 1500m T13 at last year’s Tokyo Paralympics.

It was only in the aftermath of Tokyo he was encouraged to give triathlon a go, given his background as a tandem cyclist while a teenager, before the Wesley College alumni headed to the AIS to chase his athletics dreams.