The fifth final block took place at the Stade de France. The only Czech representative was Radek Juška, who jumped to tenth place in the long-distance final. Two Olympic records were on display.
Radek Juška shone in the qualification with an excellent season maximum of 815 centimeters and believed that he would repeat something similar in the final. He started this with an attempt at 778 centimeters. Unfortunately, in the second series, the pupil of Josef Karas did not improve, as he recorded 769 centimeters. It was a last-ditch attempt to get into the elite eight. In it, Radek improved to 783, but unfortunately that was not enough distance and he takes tenth place from Paris. The Greek Miltiadis Tentoglou proved his uniqueness. It is difficult for him to find a conqueror, and this is doubly true when it comes to major championships. This time he successfully defended the Olympic gold when he flew to 848 centimeters. Jamaican Wayne Pinnock followed up the silver from last year’s World Championship with the same valuable metal, whose longest attempt measured 836 centimeters. Italian Mattia Furlani also won a bronze medal at the age of nineteen. He decorated this success with a quality performance of 834 centimeters.
“I dare to say that I felt better than in qualifying, but today we had a bit of a fight with the wind in the sector. It was spinning a lot. Of course, everyone was the same and some were more lucky, others less so. If someone had told me a few weeks ago he said that I would be tenth in the Olympics, so I chose luck in the qualification. It may sound stupid to some, but I am satisfied with the tenth place in the Olympics it’s a bit bitter, because the close final was not far away, but given the course of the season, I would like that a bit too much,” he communicated his immediate feelings.
Hocker decorated the surprise triumph with an Olympic record
The final race of 1500 meters was started very ambitiously by Norwegian defending champion Jakob Ingebrigtsen, who dictated a very fast pace right from the start. However, he paid for it in the end, as he ended up without a medal. In the finish line, three rivals rushed in front of him, and his top quality time of 3:28.24 was not enough for him to finish better than fourth place. The very surprising winner was the American Cole Hocker, who also reigned in a new Olympic record, which he took from Ingebrigtsen. With a new continental maximum of 3:27.65, he improved the three-year-old record from the Tokyo Games by 72 hundredths. Josh Kerr finished in the British national record 3:27.79 for silver, and Yared Nuguse from the United States of America (3:27.80) was just a hundredth slower. All three medalists ranked seventh through ninth in the all-time world standings.
Pole vaulter Winfred Yavi added another Olympic record
Also in the women’s steeplechase final, it was clear from the opening meters that they would not run tactically and to the finish line. The African favorites wanted to tear apart the starting field very quickly, which they succeeded in doing. Soon, a six-person group of female medal candidates was already in the lead. The world record holder Beatrice Chepkoech was very active, but in the end she fared even worse than Ingebrigtsen and jumped deep into the field of losers. In the finish line, Uganda’s defending champion Peruth Chemutai and Bahrain’s reigning world champion Winfred Yavi battled it out for gold. Yavi had a stronger finish and enjoyed the Olympic title in a Games record 8:52.76. She broke the sixteen-year-old maximum of Russian Gunara Galkina by more than six seconds.
Chemutai took silver in a national record time of 8:53.34, which ranks her fifth on the all-time world charts. The bronze medalist Faith Cherotich, who saved the honor of the Kenyan stilt school, moved to the seventh place of the same statistics with a time of 8:55.15. The fourth Frenchwoman Alice Finot became the fastest European woman in history with a time of 8:58.67. Gunara Galkina lost two records during one race.
The Maple Leaf continues to rule the World Hammer
The queen of the 200 is Gabrielle Thomas
The final program was closed by the women’s 200, where the leader of this year’s world rankings, the American Gabrielle Thomas, was expected to compete with the fresh Olympic champion in the 100, Julien Alfred from St. Lucia. The winner was the first-named, who was the only one from the entire starting field to lower her time below 22 seconds. She sprinted for the Olympic gold in 21.83. Alfred crossed the finish line as second in 22.08. Another American, Brittany Brown (22.20), finished third.
Three times under 44 seconds were seen in the 400 meter semi-final races. The fastest was the Grenadian matador Kirani James, who with a time of 43.78 was just four hundredths of a second behind this year’s best world performance of the British Matthew Hudson-Smith. He was ably seconded by Zambian Muzala Samukonga, who improved his own national record to 43.81. The American favorite Quincy Hall won the first semi-final in 43.95.
Defending champion and world record holder Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone of the United States of America was the fastest in the women’s 400-meter hurdles semifinals in 52.13. Her main rival, Dutchwoman Femke Bol (52.57) and another American, Anna Cockrell (52.90), also came under 53 seconds.
