Gold rush: Four jaw-dropping feats at the Paris Olympics
Quan Hongchan’s perfection in the pool and Noah Lyles becoming the world’s fastest man will live long in the memory
THE Summer Olympics in Paris began with a brilliant, rain-soaked opening ceremony on the Seine a fortnight ago, and soon the quadrennial event will come to an end as the last few batches of medals are handed out. These three weeks of intense competition have delivered immense joy, tears and controversy in almost every sport and discipline, with the history books rewritten in many instances.
Of course, there are far too many memorable moments to include in just one article, but here are just four of them that stand out:
The Djoker tastes gold at last
Barely a month ago, Novak Djokovic was licking his wounds at Wimbledon after being demolished in straight sets by the 21-year-old Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz in the final. Fast forward to the Olympics and these two players met again on Aug 4 in the singles final and it was the 37-year-old Serbian who exacted revenge to claim his first gold medal.
This battle on the famous red clay courts at Roland-Garros was one for the ages. The epic match lasted nearly three hours with both sets going to a tiebreak. Just when it seemed neither player would blink, it was Djokovic who used all his experience, strength and mental fortitude to outlast Alcaraz, who was reduced to tears at the end.
Djokovic, the holder of 24 Grand Slams, had finally done it and captured Olympic gold – the one glaring item missing from his trophy cabinet until now.
Lyles in stunning photo finish
At the end of this astonishing 100-metre race on Aug 4 that saw all eight runners go below 10 seconds, the big question at the end was: Who won?
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The commentators were dead sure that it was Jamaican Kishane Thompson who crossed the line first, but a photo-finish – taken with Omega’s Scan’O’Vision technology – determined that it was American Noah Lyles who did so with a timing of 9.784 seconds. Amazingly, that was just five-thousands of a second quicker than Thompson.
These are the fine margins that separate gold and silver. This was the closest men’s 100 m race at the Olympics in 44 years, and only the second time in the last 60 years that the top two runners had exactly the same time measuring into the hundredths.
Lyles, by virtue of his torso crossing the line first, became the first American – male or female – to win the 100 m final at the Olympics since 2004. The 27-year-old can confidently claim he is the undisputed fastest man on the planet today.
Leon’s the king of the pool
With four gold medals around his neck, Leon Marchand has been the French darling of the Olympics. The 22-year-old has captivated his countrymen and the swimming fraternity with his remarkable performances in the pool.
His final event was the 200 m individual medley on Aug 2, and he achieved an Olympic record of 1 minute and 54.06 seconds – just a fraction behind American Ryan Lochte’s world record that has stood for 13 years.
That was pretty much the only feat that Marchand did not manage in Paris. He had already won the 400 m individual medley, the 200 m butterfly and the 200 m backstroke events. He is the only fourth swimmer in Olympics history to claim four individual golds at a single Games.
As Marchand himself summed up: “I don’t think anything went wrong this week. It was just perfect.”
“The water forgot to splash”
Speaking of perfection, look no further than teenage Chinese diver Quan Hongchan, who mesmerised the crowds in Paris and the millions watching around the world with her feats.
The 17-year-old won two gold medals in Paris, with the second one achieved with a perfect score of 10 on the first of her five dives.
That dive was a forward 3 1/2 somersaults, and she barely made a ripple in the water as she entered the pool. As one social-media commentator put it: “The water forgot to splash”. The throngs of Chinese fans went into a frenzy when they saw all seven judges had given Quan the maximum score of 10.
Incredibly, this is not the first time that Quan had managed a perfect score. The three-time world champion has done so thrice before, including on two occasions at the Tokyo Games in 2021.
Quan is the fifth woman in history to win back-to-back gold medals in the platform event at the Olympics. With many more Olympics on her radar, there is no telling just how many more golds she will scoop up before she calls time on her career.
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