PARIS: The United States’ Bobby Finke smashed the 12-year-old 1500m world record on Sunday on his way to Olympic gold as Swedish veteran Sarah Sjoestroem capped her fifth Games by sealing the 50-100m freestyle double.

On a thrilling final day of action in La Defense Arena, the American women turned on the afterburners to lower their own 4x100m medley relay world best while China powered to the men’s title.

It concluded an electric nine-day meet marred at the start by a lingering Chinese doping scandal but which was overtaken by some outstanding individual performances.

Once again the United States topped the overall medal table with 28 ahead of Australia’s 18. China came third with 12.

Their two titles on Sunday meant the Americans finished with eight gold to Australia’s seven to keep intact a record they have held since 1988.

With the crowd urging him on, defending champion Finke powered home in 14min 30.67sec to better the previous best of 14:31.02 set by China’s Sun Yang at London in 2012.

Italian Gregorio Paltrinieri took silver and Ireland’s Daniel Wiffen, the 800m winner, bronze.

“I had a pretty decent lead at about the 300 and I knew I had to keep going,” said Finke, who led from the onset and was never seriously threatened.

“Hopefully try to make the guys hurt a bit trying to catch up with me.

“They started catching up with me and I started to get a little worried, but I decided to keep pushing and as long I could keep a little bit of a distance I knew I was in a good shape for the race.”

Sjoestroem, 30, thundered to the wall in 23.71 to be crowned 50m freestyle champion ahead of Australia’s Meg Harris and China’s Zhang Yufei.

It was only her third career Olympic gold medal, compared to the 14 she has won at world championships.“Well, this was definitely my best one with the two golds. I never thought I would win the two goals on my fifth Olympics,” she said.

The American women — Regan Smith, Lilly King, Gretchen Walsh and Huske — were untouchable in the medley relay, storming to a world best 3:49.63.

It lowered their previous record of 3:50.40 set in 2019, with Australia taking silver and China bronze.

Chinese 100m freestyle world record holder Pan Zhanle swam a blistering final leg to hand his country gold in the men’s medley ahead of the United States and France.

The team of Xu Jiayu, Qin Haiyang, Sun Jiajun and Pan touched in 3:27.46.

DJOKOVIC FINALLY STRIKES GOLD

Earlier on Sunday, Novak Djokovic completed his career Golden Slam as the 37-year-old Serb fought off Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz in a magnificent Olympic men’s singles final battle at Roland Garros on Sunday.

After heartbreak in Beijing, London, Rio de Janeiro and Tokyo, Djokovic simply would not be denied the one title that had eluded him so long, winning 7-6(3) 7-6(2) in front of an enthralled crowd on Court Philippe Chatrier.

Top seed Djokovic had to deliver one of the finest performances of his career to deny a man 16 years his junior and become only the fifth player to win all four singles Grand Slams and the Olympic title during their careers.

“It was an incredible fight and I had to play my best tennis,” an emotional Djokovic said on court as flag-waving Serbian fans sang his name. “I put my heart, my soul, everything to win gold. I did it for my country first, for Serbia.”

While Djokovic became the oldest Olympic singles champion since tennis returned to the Games in 1988, the 21-year-old Alcaraz looked inconsolable after failing to add the gold medal to this year’s French Open and Wimbledon crowns.

In the women’s doubles final, Italy’s Sara Errani and Jasmine Paolini beat Mirra Andreeva and Diana Shnaider 2-6, 6-1, (10-7) to win Olympic gold.

NEMOUR MAKES HISTORY

In the gymnastic events, Algeria’s Kaylia Nemour became the first African gymnast to win an Olympic medal when she secured the gold with a breathtaking routine on the asymmetric bars that wowed the crowd in Bercy Arena.

The 17-year-old’s fast-paced routine featuring a number of complex release-and-catch manoeuvres delighted the crowd who came to support a gymnast who had previously represented France.

China’s Qiu Qiyuan, the 2023 world champion, took the silver, while American Sunisa Lee captured her second consecutive Olympic bronze on the apparatus with 14.800 points.

In men’s competitions on Sunday, Carlos Edriel Yulo of the Philippines won the vault title — his second Olympic gold in as many days after he triumphed in the floor exercise on Saturday. Artur Davtyan of Armenia claimed the silver, while Britain’s Harry Hepworth took the bronze.

On the rings, Liu Yang successfully defended his Olympic title to earn China their first gymnastics gold in Paris. His compatriot Zou Jingyuan had to make do with the silver and Eleftherios Petrounias of Greece took the bronze.

LEE, WANG RETAIN GOLD

Taiwan’s Lee Yang and Wang Chi-Lin retained their Olympic badminton men’s doubles title, beating China’s Liang Weikeng and Wang Chang 21-17 18-21 21-19 at the Porte de La Chapelle arena in a gripping final.

The Taiwanese pair, who won gold in Tokyo and are childhood friends, fell to the floor screaming when they won an emotionally charged match at which spectators chanted “Taiwan”, although they compete as Chinese Taipei at the Olympics

Malaysia’s Aaron Chia and Soh Wooi Yik bagged bronze after winning 16-21 22-20 21-19 against Kim Astrup and Anders Rasmussen of Denmark in a match that lasted over an hour, destroyed 34 shuttlecocks and was filled with hypnotic rallies.

Earlier in the day, Rio gold medallist Carolina Marin of Spain’s Olympic run ended in heartbreaking fashion when she was forced to retire midway through her women’s singles semi-final against China’s He Bingjiao, with what appeared to be a serious knee injury.

Marin was leading 21-14 10-8 and seemed to be cruising to the gold medal match when she collapsed.

In the cycling event, American Kristen Faulkner caused a major upset as she won the women’s road race gold medal, making the most of the top guns’ mind games to snatch the biggest victory of her career.

The US champion, along with Belgian Lotte Kopecky, caught the leading duo of Dutch great Marianne Vos and Hungarian Blanka Vas with 3.4km remaining and immediately produced a brutal acceleration.

Vas, Vos and Kopecky looked at each other, all three reluctant to burn the little energy they had left to chase, and let Faulkner ride to glory by the Eiffel Tower.

The 31-year-old seemed in such disbelief that despite her comfortable advantage on the Pont d’Iena, she did not even celebrate as she crossed the finish line.

Kim Woo-Jin completed a South Korean sweep of Archery titles when he won the individual men’s gold. It was South Korea’s fifth gold in the archery.

In the table tennis, China’s Fan Zhendong emerged victorious, maintaining the Chinese stranglehold in the sport while Jessica von Bredow-Werndl successfully defended her Olympic title in individual dressage ahead of fellow German Isabell Werth in a repeat the result from Tokyo in 2021.

In Saturday’s late results, swimmer Caleb Dressel won his ninth career Olympic gold from the sidelines as team US won the 4x100m medley relay in world record time while Canadian swimmer Summer McIntosh became the first Canadian athlete to take three golds from a single Olympics when she won the 200 metres individual medley.

Femke Bol led the Dutch to 4x400m mixed relay gold. Bol, along with Eugene Omalla, Lieke Klaver and Isaya Klein Ikkink clocked a European record of 3min 07.43sec for victory.

Medals table

(Tabulated under country, gold, silver, bronze and total)

China 19 15 11 45

USA 18 26 25 69

France 12 14 17 43

Australia 12 10 7 29

Great Britain 10 12 15 37

South Korea 10 7 7 24

Japan 8 5 10 23

Italy 7 9 5 21

Netherlands 6 5 4 15

Germany 5 5 2 12

Canada 4 4 8 16

Romania 3 3 1 7

Hungary 3 2 2 7

Ireland 3 0 3 6

New Zealand 2 4 1 7

Philippines 2 0 0 2

Serbia 2 0 0 2

Brazil 1 4 5 10

Israel 1 4 1 6

Spain 1 2 5 8

Georgia 1 2 1 4

Switzerland 1 1 4 6

Kazakhstan 1 1 2 4

South Africa 1 1 2 4

Ukraine 1 1 1 3

Chile 1 0 0 1

Dominica 1 0 0 1

Ecuador 1 0 0 1

Saint Lucia 1 0 0 1

Norway 1 0 0 1

Slovenia 1 0 0 1

Uganda 1 0 0 1

Mexico 0 2 1 3

North Korea 0 2 1 3

Turkey 0 1 1 2

Armenia 0 1 0 1

Denmark 0 1 0 1

Ethiopia 0 1 0 1

Fiji 0 1 0 1

Mongolia 0 1 0 1

Tunisia 0 1 0 1

India 0 0 3 3

Tajikistan 0 0 3 3

Dominican Republic 0 0 2 2

Moldova 0 0 2 2

Austria 0 0 1 1

Cabo Verde 0 0 1 1

Cuba 0 0 1 1

Egypt 0 0 1 1

Grenada 0 0 1 1

Indonesia 0 0 1 1

Lithuania 0 0 1 1

Malaysia 0 0 1 1

Portugal 0 0 1 1

Slovakia 0 0 1 1

Updated to 11:00pm (PST)

Published in Dawn, August 5th, 2024