Australia’s new teenage swimming sensation Kyle Chalmers won the blue riband Olympic 100m freestyle gold, as golf headed for a controversial return to the Games after 112 years.
Chalmers, only 18, became the first Australian in 48 years to win the prestigious race.
The teenager hit the wall in 47.58 seconds, just 22 hundredths ahead of Belgium’s Pieter Timmers and American Nathan Adrian, the 2012 champion, who took bronze.
Photo: Reuters
Chalmers is the first Australian to win the 100m free since Mike Wenden in Mexico City in 1968, but he did not realize it had been so long.
“I actually had no idea about that to be honest with you,” he said. “I’m someone that probably doesn’t follow swimming too much. I kind of stay away and follow basketball and soccer and football. I know that we’ve been beaten a few times.”
His victory came as American Katie Ledecky sealed her third gold medal of the Games, anchoring the US team home in the 4x200m relay.
Photo: AFP
She already has the 200m and 400m freestyle titles in Rio.
Elsewhere in the pool, Michael Phelps returned from his heroics in winning his record 20th and 21st gold medals, to safely reach the final of the 200m individual medley.
There was a rare gold medal for Kazakhstan in the 200m breaststroke, where Dmitriy Balandin won his country’s first Olympic swimming title since the break-up of the Soviet Union. It was one of two golds for Kazakhstan on the fifth full day of Olympic action. Kazakh weightlifter Nijat Rahimov won the other in the men’s 77kg category.
Taiwan’s best medal hope in women’s individual archery, Tan ya-ting, shot her way to advance into the quarter-finals yesterday, when she defeated Deepika Kumari of India 6-0, on combined set scores of 28-27, 29-26, and 30-27.
Tan is set to face Germany’s Lisa Unruh in today’s event.
Earlier in the day, four other Taiwanese archers faltered in the individual competitions and could not advance further into the pre-final rounds.
In women’s individual recurve competition, Lin Shih-chia lost 6-2 in four sets to India’s Laishram Bombayla Devi, while Le Chien-ying was knocked out by South Korean Choi Mi-sun by the same score 6-2.
In men’s individual archery elimination, Norway’s Baard Magnus Nesteng prevailed over Taiwan’s Yu Guan-lin 6-5, and Spain’s Antonio Fernandez trounced Taiwan’s Kao Hao-wen in each set and ended with a 6-0 result.
Tan earlier in the week won a bronze medal for Taiwan in the women’s group competition, together with Lin Shih-chia and Le Chien-ying.
In women’s tennis, fans had to wait for the outcome of the much-anticipated quarter-final battle between Taiwanese sister duo of Chan Jung-jan and Chan Hao-ching, as they face former Grand Slam champion Martina Hingis and her Swiss partner Timea Bacsinszky.
Rainy conditions in Rio on Wednesday forced postponement of the game, and the third-seeded Chan sisters were scheduled to take on the Swiss pair late last night.
Golf was to return yesterday for the first time since the 1904 Games in St Louis, Missouri, when George Lyon of Canada won the men’s title.
Gymnastics is assured of its place for Tokyo 2020 and Japanese star Kohei Uchimura underscored his gymnastics dominance as he clinched a second straight all-around gold medal on Wednesday.
Uchimura snatched victory by just 0.099 points with a daredevil routine on the horizontal bar.
The men’s rugby sevens saw a day of upsets, with New Zealand losing to Japan in the groups before being eliminated in the quarter-finals by Fiji, who are chasing their country’s first Olympic medal.
Japan scored a shock win over France to reach the last four.
In fencing, Tunisia’s Ines Boubakri became the first African woman to win a medal in the sport with a bronze in the individual foil, dedicating her achievement to “the Arab woman ... who has her place in society.”
In soccer, Gabriel Barbosa struck twice as hosts Brazil finally sparked into life with a 4-0 win over Denmark to secure a place in the quarter-finals against Colombia.
Veteran cyclists Fabian Cancellara and Kristin Armstrong hammered home their Olympic superiority with wins in the men’s and women’s time trial.
The star-studded US men’s basketball had to dig deep against Australia before pulling away for a 98-88 win. Carmelo Anthony scored 31 points and Kyrie Irving added 19, including 12 in the final period.
A sumo star was born in Japan on Sunday when 24-year-old Takerufuji became the first wrestler in 110 years to win a top-division tournament on his debut, triumphing at the 15-day Spring Grand Sumo Tournament in Osaka despite injuring his ankle on the penultimate day. Takerufuji, whose injury had left him in a wheelchair outside the ring, shoved out the higher-ranked Gonoyama at the Edion Arena Osaka to the delight of the crowd, giving him an unassailable record of 13 wins and two losses to claim the Emperor’s Cup. “I did it just through willpower. I didn’t really know what was going
The US’ Ilia Malinin on Saturday produced six scintillating quadruple jumps, including a quadruple Axel, in the men’s free skate to capture his first figure skating world title. The 19-year-old nicknamed the “Quad god,” who is the only skater to land a quadruple Axel in competition, dazzled with an array of breathtakingly executed jumps starting with his quad Axel and including a quadruple Lutz in combination with a triple flip and a quadruple toe loop in combination with a triple toe. He added an unexpected triple-triple combination at the end to earn a world-record 227.79 in the free program for a championship
Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter is being criminally investigated by the IRS, and the attorney for his alleged bookmaker said Thursday that the ex-Los Angeles Dodgers employee placed bets on international soccer — but not baseball. The IRS confirmed Thursday that interpreter Ippei Mizuhara and Mathew Bowyer, the alleged illegal bookmaker, are under criminal investigation through the agency’s Los Angeles Field Office. IRS Criminal Investigation spokesperson Scott Villiard said he could not provide additional details. Mizuhara, 39, was fired by the Dodgers on Wednesday following reports from the Los Angeles Times and ESPN about his alleged ties to an illegal bookmaker and debts well
MLB on Friday announced a formal investigation into the scandal swirling around Shohei Ohtani and his former interpreter amid charges that the Los Angeles Dodgers superstar was the victim of “massive theft.” The Dodgers on Wednesday fired Ippei Mizuhara, Ohtani’s long-time interpreter and close friend, after Ohtani’s representatives alleged that the Japanese two-way star had been the victim of theft, which was reported to involve millions of dollars and link Mizuhara to a suspected illegal bookmaker in California. “Major League Baseball has been gathering information since we learned about the allegations involving Shohei Ohtani and Ippei Mizuhara from the news media,” MLB