Four on the floor for Biles; McLeod brings Jamaica more glory

RIO DE JANEIRO: Simone Biles closed her Rio Games with more gymnastics gold and Jamaica unleashed a new sprint sensation as Omar McLeod took 110m hurdles while it was a wild ride for fans of the Brazil team on Tuesday.

Brazil’s women’s football team and top-ranked beach volleyball duo were eliminated from the Olympics, but a lightweight boxer gave the host nation a lift with a stirring victory in his gold medal bout.

Robson Conceicao whipped the packed arena into a frenzy with every jab as he claimed the country’s first gold medal in boxing.

Britain won another two cycling titles through golden couple Laura Trott and Jason Kenny, taking their total to six out of the 10 disputed.

Biles won the floor exercise Tuesday for her fourth gold of the games — only the fourth Olympic gymnast to do so.

“It’s been a long journey,” the 19-year-old Biles, who added a bronze in the balance beam on Monday, said. “I’ve enjoyed every single moment of it.”

Men’s all-around silver medallist Oleg Verniaiev of Ukraine took gold on parallel bars and Fabian Hambuechen of Germany finally reached the top step of the podium in the Olympics by claiming the high bar title.

McLeod, 22, led the hurdle race from start to finish and won in 13.05sec.

Cuba-born Orlando Ortega of Spain took silver and France’s Dimitri Bascou bronze.

McLeod said inspiration had come from fellow Jamaicans Usain Bolt, the new 100m champion, and Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, who took bronze in the 100m.

“You see them, they go out and have fun and represent themselves and their country and they win, and you just want to go out and do the same thing,” McLeod said. “It’s honestly contagious. You just want to feel how it feels.”

Elsewhere, Kenya’s Faith Kipyegon produced a startling last-lap sprint to outpace overwhelming world record holder Genzebe Dibaba of Ethiopia to 1500m gold and Canada’s Derek Drouin clinched gold in the men’s high jump.

One day after a Brazilian pulled off an upset to win the men’s pole vault on Monday night, the women’s football team lost to Sweden 4-3 in a shootout at Rio’s Maracana Stadium.

The Brazil-Sweden game had the biggest crowd ever for a women’s national team match in the country, and the fans roared whenever Marta touched the ball.

The charismatic forward has been one of the world’s top players for more than a decade, but she has never won a major international tournament with her national team.

“This loss won’t take away from all that we have done to get here,” Marta said. “We have the match for the bronze medal now and we will fight until the end to get that medal.”

Sweden, who also beat defending champions the United States in the quarter-finals, now play Germany, victors over Canada, in Friday’s final.

At Rio de Janeiro’s landmark Copacabana Beach, the top-seeded women’s volleyball team, Talita and Larissa, was ousted in straight sets, losing 18-21, 12-21 in the semi-final to Germany’s Laura Ludwig and Kira Walkenhorst.

But Brazil’s other team, of Barbara Seixas and Agatha Bednarczuk, overcame Americans Kerri Walsh Jennings and April Ross in the other semi-final.

Conceicao, however, won Brazil’s first ever Olympic boxing gold medal when he beat France’s Sofiane Oumiha on points in the lightweight final.

British cyclists Kenny won the men’s keirin and Trott the team pursuit in the Olympic velodrome.

Trott has four golds, a record for a female British athlete, while Kenny equalled the six golds and one silver of celebrated compatriot Chris Hoy.

BRAZIL’S Bruna (R) comforts team-mate Marta after they lost the women’s football semi-final to Sweden at the Maracana Stadium.—AFP

Germany’s Kristina Voegel won the women’s sprint, out-pacing Britain’s Rebecca James in the final.

Cao Yuan easily won the men’s individual 3-metre springboard event and gave his dominant Chinese team its fifth diving gold medal of the Games.

The Chinese then won their 26th gold medal in table tennis when their women’s team crushed Germany 3-0 in the final.

Georgian weightlifter Lasha Talakhadze set a combined world record of 473kg to claim the gold medal in the +105kg category.

Armenia won a gold and silver in Greco-Roman wrestling — Artur Aleksanyan beating Cuba’s Yasmany Daniel Lugo Cabrera in the 98kg final while Migran Arutyunyan lost to Serbia’s Davor Stefanek in the 66kg gold medal match.

At the shores of the Guanabara Bay, cancer survivor Santiago Lange helmed Argentina to an emotional Narca 17 catamaran sailing gold — a first Olympic gold for the 54-year-old sailor in his sixth Olympic tilt — alongside crewmember Cecilia Carranza Saroli.

Britain’s Giles Scott clinched gold in the Finn class medal race, Peter Burling and Blair Tuke of New Zealand won the 49er gold with, Tom Burton of Australia won the Laser gold and Marit Bouwmeester of the Netherlands emerged with the women’s Laser Radial gold.

Medals table

As at 10:00pm (PST) on Wednesday

(Tabulated under gold, silver, bronze, total):

United States 28 30 28 86

Britain 19 19 12 50

China 17 15 19 51

Russia 12 12 14 38

Germany 11 8 8 27

France 8 11 11 30

Italy 8 9 6 23

Netherlands 8 3 3 14

Australia 7 8 9 24