WEIGHTLIFTING
Shi Zhiyong of China set a world record and won his second gold medal in weightlifting in the men’s 73kg category. Shi lifted 166kg in the snatch and 198kg in the clean and jerk for a total 364kg. That was 1kg more than his previous record. Julio Mayora of Venezuela took silver and Rahmat Erwin Abdullah of Indonesia took bronze.
EQUESTRIAN
Jessica von Bredow-Werndl of Germany has unseated Charlotte Dujardin of Great Britain for gold in the individual dressage competition. German teammate Isabell Werth finished second and Dujardin came in third after winning the title in 2012 and 2016. Von Bredow-Werndl also helped Germany win the team competition on Tuesday.
RUGBY
Fiji have beaten New Zealand 27-12 to successfully defend the title they won when rugby sevens made its Olympic debut at Rio de Janeiro in 2016. The gold in Rio was Fiji’s first Olympic medal in any sport. Now the Pacific island nation has two. Jerry Tuwai was in the squad five years ago and he led Fiji in their title defence in Tokyo. The silver medal was a vast improvement for New Zealand, who missed the podium in 2016. Argentina defeated 2016 finalists Great Britain 17-12 for the bronze.
TENNIS
Matches in Tokyo will have later start times from Thursday in a move aimed at protecting players amid extreme heat and humidity. The International Tennis Federation says matches will start at 3pm local time instead of 11am. Several players struggled with heatstroke on Wednesday. Daniil Medvedev nearly fainted during his win over Fabio Fognini while Paula Badosa left the court in a wheelchair after retiring from her quarter-final match against Marketa Vondrousova.
TENNIS
Tennis player Novak Djokovic’s Golden Slam bid is alive and well. The top-ranked Serb beat training partner Alejandro Davidovich Fokina of Spain 6-3, 6-1 to reach the quarter-finals at the Tokyo Games. Djokovic is attempting to become the first man to achieve a Golden Slam by winning all four Grand Slam tournaments and Olympic gold in the same calendar year. He has already won the Australian and French Opens plus Wimbledon this year. So now he needs the Tokyo Games title and the US Open trophy to complete the unique collection. Djokovic’s quarter-final opponent in singles will be Kei Nishikori of Japan.
JUDO
Judo’s governing body has formally warned a coach who slapped a female athlete hard in the face twice to prepare her for an Olympic bout. German judoka Martyna Trajdos later defended coach Claudiu Pusa from criticism, saying it was her request “to fire me up” before stepping on the mat. That did not satisfy the International Judo Federation, who issued the warning a day after the incident shocked Olympic viewers. The IJF said it issued “a serious official warning” for the Germany team coach.
CYCLING
Primoz Roglic has capped an incredible month for Slovenian cycling by winning the Olympic time trial. He added a gold medal to the bronze won by UAE Team Emirate’s Tour de France champion Tadej Pogecar in the road race. Roglic’s closest rival was Dutch time trial specialist Tom Dumoulin, who finished more than a minute behind to win his second consecutive Olympic silver medal. Rohan Dennis of Australia claimed the bronze medal. The pre-race favourite, Italian time-trial champ Filippo Ganna, faded over the final kilometres and finished fifth.
COVID-19
Quarantined Olympic skateboarder Candy Jacobs says she’s had to take action to be allowed to get fresh air in an isolation hotel in Japan. The Dutch athlete was removed from the Olympic Village after testing positive for COVID-19 a week ago. Jacobs says in a video message posted on Instagram that “not having any outside air is so inhuman”. She says she refused to move on her seventh day of quarantine in a room where the window doesn’t open. After more than seven hours, she says, officials agreed she could stand at an open window under supervision for 15 minutes a day. Jacobs says “having that first breath of outside air was the saddest and best moment in my life.” The 31-year-old skateboarder missed the street event in the sport’s Olympic debut. Jacobs says watching the event on television was “a supercool distraction” from quarantine.
BOXING
Two world champions have been knocked out in the round of 16. That blows open the brackets at men’s featherweight and men’s light heavyweight. Irish featherweight Kurt Walker pulled off one of the biggest upsets of the tournament with a 4-1 win over Uzbek world champion Mirazizbek Mirzakhalilov. Two hours later, Russian light heavyweight Imam Khataev surprised Kazakh world champ Bekzad Nurdauletov with a 4-1 victory. The 26-year-old Khataev has nearly a decade of high-level amateur experience, but no victories to compare to this upset. Nesthy Petecio of the Philippines and Italy’s Irma Testa also clinched their nations’ first Olympic women’s boxing medals by advancing to the semi-finals at featherweight.
CYCLING
Annemiek van Vleuten has roared to an emphatic victory in the women’s time trial at the Tokyo Olympics. That gave her a measure of revenge for some miscommunication that may have cost her gold in the road race last weekend. The Dutch rider led by more than six seconds at the first time check, then pushed it to an astonishing 28 seconds before she put the hammer down to finish in 30 minutes, 13.49 seconds at Fuji International Speedway. The sixth-from-last rider on the course, van Vleuten was forced to sit on the hot seat for several minutes while those who started after her finished. None of them really had a chance. Marlen Reusser of Switzerland finished more than 56 seconds back to earn the silver medal and van Vleuten’s teammate Anna van der Breggen earned bronze.
BASEBALL
International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach and Japanese baseball great Sadaharu Oh are attending the opener of the Olympic baseball tournament and were on the field for the ceremonial first pitch in Fukushima. They were joined by Tokyo Organizing Committee President Seiko Hashimoto and World Baseball Softball Confederation President Riccardo Fraccari as a high school baseball player from the region threw out the first pitch — a full windup from atop the rubber. Bach, wearing bright white gloves on both hands, fist bumped the 14-year-old before Team Japan took the field for its game against the Dominican Republic. It’s the only Olympic baseball game being held in Fukushima, which was devastated by an earthquake and an ensuing tsunami and nuclear accident in 2011. The rest of the tournament will be held at Yokohama Baseball Stadium in Tokyo. Baseball was restored to the Olympic slate this year for the first time since 2008. The sport will be dropped again for the 2024 Games in Paris but is expected to again be played in Los Angeles in 2028.
SWIMMING
Great Britain have won the men’s 4x200m freestyle relay at the Olympics for the first time since 1908, but just missed a world record. With a powerhouse group that included the 1-2 finishers in the 200 freestyle, Britain blew away the field in 6 minutes, 58.58 seconds. That was just off the world record set by the Americans (6:58.55) at the 2009 world championships. The 200m gold medallist, Tom Dean, led off for the British. James Guy and Matthew Richards took the middle legs before 200m silver medallist Duncan Scott swam the anchor leg. Russia claimed the silver in 7:01.81, while Australia took the bronze in 7:01.84. The four-time defending champions, the US, finished fourth.
SWIMMING
Katie Ledecky has finally collected her first gold medal of the Tokyo Games. Ledecky has won the 1,500m freestyle, which made its Olympic debut for women this year. That helped the American star make up for what has so far been the worst showing of her Olympic career. About an hour after finishing fifth in the 200m freestyle, Ledecky held off teammate Erica Sullivan to win in 15 minutes, 37.34 seconds. Germany’s Sarah Kohler grabbed the bronze in 15:42.91.
SWIMMING
Japanese swimmer Yui Ohashi has claimed the 200m medley, beating Americans Alex Walsh and Kate Douglass. Ohashi had previously won the 400m individual medley. The winning time was 2 minutes, 8.52 seconds. Walsh took the silver in 2:08.65, while the bronze went to Douglass in 2:09.04. Defending Olympic champion and world record-holder Katinka Hosszu of Hungary finished seventh. She was the oldest swimmer in the final at age 32.
ROWING
China has wrapped a record-setting first day of rowing finals by smashing the world record in women’s quadruple sculls and winning gold. The Chinese boat finished in 6 minutes, 0.13 seconds and shaved nearly two seconds off the previous mark set by the Netherlands in 2014. Poland won silver more than six seconds behind the Chinese. Australia won bronze for that country’s fourth medal of the day.
SWIMMING
Kristof Milak of Hungary has romped to a dominating victory in the men’s 200m butterfly at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre. Milak won the gold by about two body lengths, backing up his status as one of the biggest favourites at the Olympic pool. He touched in 1 minute, 51.25 seconds -2.5 seconds ahead of Japan’s Tomoru Honda, who finished in 1:53.73. The bronze went to Italy’s Federico Burdisso in 1:54.45.
ROWING
The Netherlands have set a new world record in men’s quadruple sculls with a sprint over the final 500m to win the gold medal. Their time of 5 minutes, 32.03 seconds beat the previous mark of 5:32.26 set by Ukraine at the 2014 world championships. The Dutch boat was fourth after the first 500m but had closed to second by the next marker. A late push overtook Great Britain for the lead. Great Britain then held off a late charge by Australia to win silver.
SWIMMING
Ariarne Titmus has beaten Katie Ledecky again at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre. Ledecky didn’t even win a medal — the first time that’s ever happened to her at the Olympics. Titmus gave the Australian women their third individual swimming gold with a victory in the 200m freestyle. Titmus set an Olympic record of 1 minute, 53.50 seconds to make it two-for-two against the American star, following up a thrilling victory in the 400m freestyle. In the longer race, Titmus conserved her energy over the first half of the race, then rallied to pass Ledecky with the second-fastest performance in history. Ledecky wasn’t even close in the 200m, making the first flip in seventh place and never getting higher than her fifth-place showing at the end. She finished in 1:55.21 — nearly two seconds behind the winner. Ledecky is facing a gruelling morning that also includes the final of the 1,500m free. She’s a big favourite for gold in that race, which is new to the women’s programme this year.
ROWING
Australia doubled its haul of Olympic rowing golds as the men’s four charged to victory. Australia bolted to the front by the 500m mark and were never challenged as Romania fought a late surge by Italy to claim the silver medal.
ROWING
Australia’s women’s four set a new Olympic-best time to win the gold medal in windy conditions at Tokyo’s Sea Forest Waterway. The Australian boat led at each marker but had to fight off the Netherlands over the last 50m to win in 6 minutes, 15.37 seconds, just 0.34 seconds ahead of the Dutch boat. Ireland took bronze more than five seconds back.
ROWING
The French team of Hugo Boucheron and Matthieu Androdias has held off a late charge from the Netherlands over the final 50m to win the men’s double sculls by 0.2 seconds in Olympic record time of 6 minutes, 33 seconds. China Zhiyu Liu and Liang Zhang finished third for bronze.
ROWING
Romania’s Ancuta Bodnar and Simona Radis have won the first rowing gold medal of the Games, in women’s double sculls. They bolted from the start and never let up in a dominating performance. The rowing medal events had been delayed for a day because of bad weather forecasts amid a tropical storm. Once back on the water, the Romanians were never challenged and led by two boat lengths with 500m to go. Bodnar and Radis are both just 22. New Zealand’s Brooke Donohue and Hannah Osborne edged the Dutch boat of Roos de Jong and Lisa Scheenaard for silver.
