As American Simone Manuel and Canadian Penny Oleksiak celebrated tying for gold, Bronte was left with a 4th place position (53.04) and Cate faded all the way to 6th (53.24). But Oleksiak was almost a half-second faster on the final length, and TV replays showed that their fingers found the wall in the same time. I’m just so blessed to have a gold medal.
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In the race, Manuel led at the halfway mark. But after posting the second-fastest time in the semi-finals heading into Thursday’s competition, it’s safe to say she’s now on every other swimmer’s radar. But Cate Campbell was there, as expected, in first, a blistering 24.77 seconds.
Harrison had been expected to fight Brazilian Mayra Aguiar, ranked fourth in the world, in the final. Manuel was fighting for a medal, for sure, but a gold seemed unlikely.
“I don’t remember much of it over the last 15 meters”, Manuel said.
Bronze in the 4×200: Heading into the race, teammate Brittany MacLean said the Canadians knew that if they could get within striking distance of the podium by the time Oleksiak dove in for the final leg, they would have a good shot at a medal. They both touched. A single light – indicating first – lit up on the starting block. Instead, Sweden’s Sarah Sjostrom won a bronze medal after finishing 0.29 behind the winners. “I think that was the biggest surprise so far of this competition”. “My color just comes with the territory”.
At the time, Ervin was the first person of African-American heritage to win a gold medal.
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JaVe Bonner, a pre-med student at George Mason University, said Manuel’s win is significant to her because she was told when she was younger that she couldn’t go into a neighborhood pool since her skin was “dirty”. “Just coming into this race I kind of tried to take the weight of the black community off my shoulders, which is something I carry with me just being in this position”.
