The Olympic Report: Day 10

British medal watch

There were dramatic scenes at Greenwich Park as the team show-jumping came to an end with Great Britain winning gold. The competition was held over two rounds of jumping, but Great Britain led by Nick Skelton who was clear on both rounds, and the Netherlands could not be separated. All four riders had to go again for both teams. Clear rounds from Skelton, Ben Maher and Peter Charles ensured the victory as the Dutch had two riders with fences down.

Jason Kenny defeated Gregory Bauge of France to claim the gold medal in the men’s individual sprint. Kenny won silver in Beijing in 2008, behind Sir Chris Hoy, but with new rules restricting countries to one entrant, Kenny out-qualified Hoy to take the place. He didn’t lose a single race throughout the competition, winning the final in convincing fashion. Victoria Pendleton has now reached the semi-final of the women’s event, where she will take on German Kristina Vogel. Meanwhile Laura Trott leads the omnium overnight after half of the six events. Trott won both the lying lap and the highly entertaining elimination race to sit joint first.

Beth Tweddle, who will retire from gymnastics after the Games, has won a bronze medal in the asymmetric bars final. Tweddle put in a strong performance, with the only error being a big step backwards on her dismount. Had she perfected the dismount she may have challenged for gold, but the mistake put her in second at the time. She had an anxious wait with three more gymnasts to compete, but the final two both made errors which cleared the way for Tweddle to finish third. Aliya Mustafina of Russia won the gold medal.

Nicola Adams has become the first British woman to be guaranteed a boxing medal. Adams has reached the semi-finals of the women’s flyweight division, beating Stoyka Petrova of Bulgaria in her quarter-final. In the men’s section, Luke Campbell, Anthony Joshua and Anthony Ogogo are now also guaranteed at least a bronze medal each by reaching the semi-finals of their respective weight divisions.

Great Britain’s women’s hockey team have qualified for the semi-finals of the tournament. Their place was assured before they actually faced the Netherlands today, after rivals China lost 1-0 to Japan. Great Britain would have only needed a draw if China had won. Later in the day, the Netehrlands came from behind to beat Team GB 2-1, but both teams go through to the semi-finals.

Top news

Tom Slingsby became Australia’s second gold medal winner of the Games in the men’s laser class sailing. He beat out out Great Britain’s Paul Goodison, the defending champion who was suffering from a back injury and, as a result, missed out on a medal. The women’s laser radial event was won by Xu Lijia of China. The Australians are guaranteed another sailing gold medal after Nathan Outteridge and Iain Jensen opened up an unassailable gap with one race to spare in the 49er class.

The women’s football semi-finals have been completed, with USA vs. Japan being the gold medal match in a repeat of the World Cup final, and Canada vs. France for bronze. World champion Japan resisted a late renaissance from France to book their place in the final with a 2-1 victory. Yuki Ogimi and Mizuho Sakaguchi scored either side of half-time for the Japanese, before Eugenie le Sommer scored with fifteen minutes to go to make the end of the match interesting. But Japan held on, and is guaranteed a medal, while France will have to compete for bronze. At Old Trafford, an incredibly hard-fought match saw the USA defeat Canada 4-3. The game was enthralling from start to finish, with Canadian captain Christine Sinclair scoring a hat-trick as they led three times. But three times the USA came back, with two goals from Megan Rapinoe and one from Abby Wambach. The game went into extra time at 3-3, but Alex Morgan rose highest in the third minute of injury time in the second half of extra time after a wonderful cross, to put the USA through.

Kirani James became the first man from Grenada to win an Olympic medal, doing so in style by winning gold in the men’s 400m. He ran a national record to win the race ahead of Luguelin Santos of Dominican Republic and Lalonde Gordon of Trinidad and Tobago in a Caribbean 1-2-3. Grenada is now the smallest country ever to win a gold medal at an Olympic Games.

In the women's hockey, Argentina fought out a 0-0 draw with Australia to set up a semi-final tie with Great Britain. Australia had to win the match to progress from Pool B; the draw leaves them third, level with Argentina and New Zealand on points, but eliminated on tiebreakers. New Zealand will take on the only side still unbeaten, the Netherlands, in the semi-final. They drew 0-0 with Germany earlier today to book their place in the last four.

Unsung Heroes

Greco-Roman wrestling, one of the more obscure sports of the Games, got underway yesterday. Roman Vlasov of Russia won the gold medal in the under 74kg category, with the under 55kg category won by Hamid Soryan Reihanpour of Iran winning that country’s first ever Greco-Roman wrestling gold medal. Today, Omid Noroozi won the under 60kg category to collect Iran’s second gold in as many days, and Alan Khugaev achieved the same feat for Russia in the 84kg category. Cuba’s Mijain Lopez took gold in the under 120kg category.

Disappointment

Kristian Thomas was unable to follow up his great performance in the men’s gymnastics team event, where he helped Great Britain win bronze, in the individual vault final. Thomas sat on the mat during his second vault, which resulted in a significant penalty, dropping him down to eighth overall. Hak Seon-yang of South Korea took the gold medal, finishing a full point ahead of Thomas.

Holly Bleasdale struggled in the final of the women’s pole vault and was eliminated early without challenging for a medal. She vaulted 4.45m at the third attempt but didn’t really come close to making her next attempt of 4.55m. World record holder and defending champion, Elena Isinbayeva of Russia, also disappointed, recording 4.70m which was only good enough for bronze. Jennifer Suhr of the USA won the gold medal, with the appropriately named Yarisley Silva taking the silver medal.

Meanwhile Dai Green missed out on a medal in the men’s 400m hurdles, after finishing fourth. Green was catching up on the leaders during the final straight but remained well short of claiming third place for bronze. Felix Sancez of the Dominican Republic took the gold, before receiving his medal in floods of tears and receiving a very warm reception from the crowd in the Olympic Stadium.

Valerie Adams of New Zealand, the world and Olympic champion, was unable to match Nadzeya Ostapchuc in the women’s shot put final as the Belarusian took gold. Adams came home in the silver medal position, but repeatedly failed to match her rival who streaked away with victory, putting 21.36m, 76cm further than Adams.

Other news

Taoufik Makhloufi of Algeria became the ninth athlete (after the eight badminton players) to be thrown out of the Games for not trying, before later being reinstated allowing him to take his place in the 1500m final. Makhloufi was one of the favourites for that race after winning his semi-final in style, but was forced also to compete in the 800m after his country’s Olympic committee did not withdraw his entry. In the 800m heat, he began the race but quickly fell off the back of the pack and gave up in the first lap.

Phillips Idowu has finally arrived in London ahead of triple jump qualifying tomorrow, following his injury saga.

American judoka Nicholas Delpopolo, who finished seventh in the men’s under 73kg category, has been expelled from the Games after testing positive for marijuana. Delpopolo said he that he had eaten food laced with the drug, but had not known at the time what the food contained.

Australia has ordered an inquiry into the country’s poor performance in the swimming pool. Australia won 10 medals but only one gold in the pool, though that was their only gold medal of the first week of the games.

Louis Smith, Britain’s silver medal winner in the pommel horse, believes he may miss out on a place in Rio 2016 due to increasing competition within British men’s gymnastics.

Geraint Thomas, who won gold as part of the men’s pursuit cycling team, has said the performance vindicated his decision to prioritise the Olympics over the Tour de France.

Wendy Houvenaghel, who won a silver medal in the individual pursuit in Beijing, has criticised Great Britain’s gold medal winning women’s pursuit team after she was left out of it. Houvenaghel has said that she was assured she would have been part of the team by coach Shane Sutton, and had recorded a faster time in training than the world record that the trio of Dani King, Jo Rowsell and Laura Trott recorded in the final. She described the team as juvenile after they ignored her following their gold medal triumph.

And finally…

A man has been arrested after a bottle was thrown on to the Athletics track as the 100m finalists were in their blocks. The man who was arrested was tackled by a Dutch judoka sat behind him after the incident. The bottle was thrown behind the athletes and did not affect the race, though Justin Gatlin, the American who won the bronze medal, described it as distracting.

Updated medal table

China now leads the USA by 2 gold medals, sitting on 31 overall. Great Britain has reached 18 gold medals, one fewer than they achieved in Beijing with six days of competition still to come. Australia had its best day of the Games, with one gold in the bag and another guaranteed though not yet awarded. When that gold is finally given, they will leapfrog southern hemisphere rivals New Zealand and South Africa, both of whom have already won three gold medals but have far fewer silver and bronze.

Tomorrow’s big events

The track cycling culminates tomorrow with Britain going for three more medals; world champions Laura Trott in the women’s omnium, and the legendary pair of Victoria Pendleton in the women’s sprint and Sir Chris Hoy in the men’s keirin. Brothers Jonathan and Alastair Brownlee compete in the men’s triathlon. The equestrian dressage events conclude with Great Britain in contention in both individual and team events, while the men’s hockey round robin stage reaches its climax. There are semi-finals for women in both the water polo and beach volleyball, and women’s handball quarter-finals.