Howdy, and congrats you those readers that made it thru the last post, as I said, the remaining Olympics posts won't be that long, so lets dig in on Monday and Tuesday's recaps and eye candy! Oh, a note about the triathlon and the Seine River - the water was tested again today, and the toxic levels were considered too high, and once again cancelled the practice. If there is one negative about these Paris Olympics, the pollution in the Seine would be it.
Gymnastics: Okay, this IS the last of this sport, and it came with some drama in the final moments of Floor Exercise scoring! Balance Beam was first though, and boy, did this apparatus live up to its reputation as a dream-killer, as almost all of the lady gymnasts fell off the beam during their routines, including USA's Sunni Lee and Simone Biles, who did not medal. Italy captured both the bronze and gold, which Alice D'Amato, who has had a great Summer Olympics, and one to keep an eye on in 2028, broke down in tears when she learned she captured the first medal for Italy in gymnastics history!
Keep an eye on this young lady- Alice D'Amato -Italy gymnastics!
To close out gymnastics, we hit the floor, literally, as both Biles and her teammate, Jordan Chiles are in this challenge, along with Brazil's amazing Rebeka Andrade, who after Simone stepped out of bounds on one of her tumbles, secured the gold, while Biles took silver, and a Romanian gymnast, who did a almost flawless routine, was sitting in the bronze position as USA's Jordan Chiles was the last to compete, and did a very good, very clean floor exercise, but judges placed her in fifth place, and so we conc....WAIT! Something is happening! A few minutes later, a new score was posted for Jordan, and her routine was upgraded enough to have her snag the bronze in a shocking turn of events! And THAT is how the 2024 Olympics gymnastics competition closes out, with "That girl" (her term) Chiles getting her first individual medal, and on the medal podium, Olympic history was made, with Andrade, Biles and Chiles being the first ever three black women on the medals podium! #Herstory
Hang this photo in the Louve ! What a moment of sportsmanship and respect! LOVE IT!
Surfing: Since Paris and Europe is not known for their big waves, this Olympic event was held about ten thousand miles away in Tahiti. I know very little about the scoring for this event, so I will just report that a Tahiti native won the gold for the men (talk about home island advantage), and in relative surprise, Caroline Marks of Team USA won the gold; this is the second consecutive gold medal for the women in surfing!
Surf's up for Caroline- for gold!
Pole Vault: In the finals for this event that more coverage than it ever expected when a vaulter's junk knocked the bar off, and denied that vaulter a medal, we had everyone's junk under control for the men on this night. USA's Sam Kendrick's took the silver, but the BIG story of the night was Sweden's Mondo Duplantis- and theres a backstory here: Mondo and his family live in Louisiana, where Mondo was pole vaulting since he was like 4 years old. Mondo's mom though, is from Sweden, and after Mondo set world records each year he competed, a few years ago Sweden reached out to Mondo and his family, and asked if he would like to represent Sweden, and the family said yes! So, on this night, in his forst Olympics, and AFTER securing the gold medal, Mondo had 3 chances to set a new world record for the NINTH time! (Did i mention he is only in his early twenties?. Mondo missed on the first try, but on the second vault, Mondo easily cleared the bar, and set tey another world record with a 20 feet , 6 inches vault! the crowd, which was already going wild, went bonkers, as Mondo ran around the field of pure joy, sharing his victory with his family and friends- This is what makes the Olympics so special!
Mondo with his family celebrating a NINTH pole vault record! Lais'sez faire, indeed!
Volleyball: US Men's indoor volleyball team advanced to the semi's by beating Brazil in a tough five set match. USA will play Poland in the quarterfinals.
In women's beach volleyball, one Team USA duo fell to Canada, and are out of the medal run. Spoiler: on Tuesday, the other women's duo also lost, leaving just one male pair left for a chance at a medal in this sport.
Discus: Another USA gold medal defended as Valerie Allman threw that discus hard and fast, and the longest to defend her title!
Water Polo: The USA men's team defeated Croatia and have moved on the the quarterfinals!
Tuesday's action: We're getting closer to the team sports finals!
Men's Basketball: The USA men's team wiped the court floor with a pure drubbing of Team Brazil, winning 122-87, and will face Serbia in the semifinals!
Women's soccer: For the second match in a row, Team USA had to score in extra (stoppage) time to defeat Germany, 1-0, and moves on to the gold medal match against Brazil on Saturday!
Boxing: Algeria's Imane Khalif, she who has been unjustly targeted with abusive chatter about her gender, won her match, and moves into the gold medal match later in the week!
Wrestling: American Amit Emor became the youngest ever woman to win a medal in wrestling, winning her freestyle 68kg match!
Hammer Throw: I had to copy and paste this name, no way was I going to try and get the typing correct- Annette Nneka Echikunwoke became the first American woman to medal in the Olympic hammer throw Tuesday.
Track: In a stunning upset, American Josh Hocker, who was considered a long shot, but on the turbo blasters and came from behind in the last meters of the 1500M race and won the gold in Olympic record time! This is probably THE biggest upset in all of the Olympic games far, as therel battle was to be between Great Britains' John Kerr (current world champion) and Norway's Jakob Ingebrigtsen (Tokyo Olympics 2020 champion) who have been doing some serious trash talking towards one another for the last few months! nd those two finish 2nd and fourth, respectively, Yared Nuguse took third and the bronze, making it the first time in over 100 years that two Americans medaled on the podium in this event!
Found gold for Josh Hocker and Team USA!
In the 200m women' final, Team USA's Gabby Thomas (her bio is amazing, check it out!), raced to the finish line a won the gold medal in this track meet, beating the 100m winner Julien Allred by .25! Fellow teammate Brittany Brown took home the bronze.
Gabby Gold!
This post is definitely carrying an awesome girl-power energy!
I'm going to drop one of my many pics that I haven't posted yet to close out this post. The social media has gone gaga over this Irish lad, who won the gold medal on the pommel horse, Rhys Mcclenaghan (I checked the spelling!), and I have more of this cheeky Irish lad to come!
Rhys straddling his gold medal apparatus! He won't need to buy a pint in the pubs of Ireland for a long time!
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