Rutherford was unable to improve on his first effort second time round as he jumped 8.11m, but two clean jumps out of two would have given him confidence given that he fouled on two of his three qualification jumps on Friday night.
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It came down to his sixth and final jump on Saturday night in Rio, and Jeff Henderson of the USA delivered, leaping 8.38 meters (27’4) on his final jump to overcome Luvo Manyonga of South Africa and win the gold medal, the first of his career. In his next four jumps, he couldn’t seem to do any better.
While Rutherford fouled his fourth jump and failed to improve with his fifth, Manyonga extended his lead with an incredible 8.37m.
However, he produced a gutsy 8.29m effort to sneak into the bronze medal position.
And in fairness to Rutherford, he gave it everything as he jumped an almighty 8.29m which put him in third place.
He created some buzz about his chances in Rio when he won the 100m, 200m and the long jump at the 2016 NCAA outdoor championships, something only previously accomplished by Jesse Owens.
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Luvo Manyonga of South Africa took silver to claim his first Olympic medal while Britain’s defending champion Greg Rutherford had to settle for bronze.
