Competing in her first Olympics, Thrasher, as the first champion of the 2016 Games, was awarded her medal by International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Thomas Bach and said the achievement was beyond her wildest dreams.
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The 19-year-old USA college champion edged out China’s Du Li, gold in Athens in 2004, with an Olympic-record score of 208 in the sport’s new finals format. Only the margin of victory was ever in question.
You can watch the US women’s team win gold in primetime, tonight on Channel 11!
Carli Lloyd scored the lone goal for the Americans.
The U.S. team started on vault, where it built an early lead that no country would come close to. Next up was uneven bars, where Kocian and Douglas earned two of the highest uneven bars scores of the day. Yet, Simone Biles nailed the best score on the floor for the whole competition! If that’s all it took for her to stay cool as a cucumber to dominate her first Olympic competition-plus the confidence that she’s the best in the world-I’ll have what she’s having. Laurie was incredible during her floor routine, as was Aly.
Rio de Janeiro (CNN) At just 4 feet 9 inches tall, Simone Biles might be the smallest American Olympian in Brazil, but she’s threatening to become Team USA’s biggest star of Rio 2016.
Douglas and Raisman made some history of their own.
The women’s team has been on a winning streak.
Kevin Durant, Carmelo Anthony lead the heavily favored Americans against the Chinese in hoops, although some say the real action is more than 6,000 miles away in Las Vegas, where betting on the Olympics is legal for the first time since 1998.
She’ll now enjoy the moment, but recalibrate and prepare for her second event, the women’s small bore competition set for Thursday.
Fiji and New Zealand had been hoping to play for the gold medal in rugby’s return to the Olympics but will instead meet in the quarterfinals later Wednesday after a tumultuous group stage left playoff places hinging on the last group match between world series champion Fiji and the United States.
Loud chants of “U.S.A” could be heard in Rio Olympic Arena as the gymnasts completed their final rotation, securing the gold.
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Thrasher pulled it off against two of the world’s best rifle shooters, Li and Yi Siling.
