“I got the right balance, and got the key to get over this day”.
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“At the moment I’m more or less quite disappointed”, said Dumoulin, who broke his wrist in a crash at the Tour de France just over two weeks ago.
“If I’d come in five or 10 secs behind him I’d have been questioning if I could have gone any faster but he was a minute clear of me”. While he wore the leader’s yellow jersey in six Tours de France, the power that made Cancellara so successful in the time trial or Europe’s great one-day races did not translate to the sport’s three great tours, the Tour, the Vuelta and the Giro d’ Italia, whose picturesque mountain stages favor lighter riders. “What do I want more than this?”
In the time trial, he tackled the hilly 54km coastline course in 1 hour, 12 minutes and 15.42 seconds.The triumph comes eight years after winning a gold medal at the Beijing Games, and just weeks after pulling out of the Tour de France – which passed through his native Bern, Switzerland, last month.Tom Dumoulin (Netherlands), took silver on Wednesday, having opted to compete despite breaking his hand during Le Tour, while Tour de France victor Chris Froome (Britain) won bronze. I gave it everything I had. “Just to be at the Olympics is really special, but to come away with another medal is even more special”.
Martin Pearman, headmaster at Laugher’s former school, said: “On behalf of everyone at Ripon Grammar School I would like to congratulate Jack on his historic achievement”.
Froome reckons Cancellara’s success was a result of digging deep for one last time.
But Cancellara, in his final season and victor of Olympic gold in Beijing eight years ago, had other ideas. “Congrats to him. He nailed it”.
He is now expecting to start the year’s third and final Grand Tour, the Vuelta a Espana, on August 20, after having it on his Team Sky schedule since the beginning of the year.
And the route may be a familiar one.
He added: “Maybe a few more laps of the TT circuit. It seems to be the best road around here”.
Hugo Houle of Sainte-Perpetue, Que., finished 21st with a time of 1:17:02.04. After a long time sitting in first, Cancellara went a minute quicker than the Spaniard finishing with a time of 1:12:15 with Dumoulin silver and Bronze going to Froome.
Armstrong, who turns 43 today, produced a courageous display in similarly treacherous conditions to claim her third consecutive women’s time trial gold. “After missing out on gold in London and all the ups and downs I’ve had since then, this is just fantastic to win the gold today”, he said.
Mears said: “We’ve been looking pretty damn good in training”.
After the agony of David Florence’s last-placed finish on Tuesday, British kayaker Clarke lit up a gloomy Whitewater Stadium with the race of his life.
“I just can’t really put it into words”, he said.
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Both men failed to reach the gold medal match, and then faced a shoot-out with James Willett to decide which two progressed into the scrap for third, with the Australian missing out to leave the two Britons to fight it out for the final podium position.
