She helped lead her team to an American record while Australia set the world record to win the gold by more than a second.
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Golf is back in Olympics after 112 years and India have the Anirban Lahiri, SSP Chawrasia in men and 18-year-old Aditi Ashok in women in a field depleted by the pullout of top four – Jason Day, Dustin Johnson, Jordan Spieth and Rory McIlroy, citing Zika virus threat.
They took silver at the prestigious Champions Trophy earlier this year and bagged a bronze at the Hockey World League last December.
China won yet another medal in air rifle on a day nasty winds sent the clay targets in the trap event bobbing and bouncing through the air, forced delays on the tennis courts and whipped up treacherous waves in the Rodrigo de Freitas Lagoon. US women’s volleyball? It opened with a smooth win over Puerto Rico.
This year will mark the debut of rugby sevens in which teams are made up of seven players instead of the usual 15, while each half is reduced to seven minutes from the usual 40.
“We’ve talked about water polo, and how much we’ve had players before us pioneer our sport”, said Maggie Steffens of the defending-champion USA team. It won its second game of the Olympic tournament on a goal by Carli Lloyd (of course) with its second consecutive shutout.
Van der Breggen was greeted first by a light mist and then moments later by compatriot Marianne Vos, who won gold in London, where a puncture near the finish line cost American rider Shelley Olds a spot on the podium.
KOSOVO FIRST: Majlinda Kelmendi won Kosovo’s first Olympic medal, taking gold in the women’s 52-kilogram judo division.
Next, Maya DiRado, the 23-year-old Stanford grad who is retiring from swimming after the Olympics. DiRado finished almost five seconds slower than Hosszu, but swam her personal best time by more than half a second. Every swim race has its stories. Hosszu and DiRado each wrote theirs.
With India’s largest contingent travelling to the 2016 Summer Olympics here, billions back home will hope that the blend of experience, youth and debutants participating in the Games will go the extra mile and script history in the biggest extravaganza in the world of sports. “You have to be proud of that”.
The U.S. medal total will swell when Ledecky digs into her specialties and Michael Phelps gets going with his Olympic schedule, also on Sunday in the men’s 4×100 freestyle relay.
British gymnastics has gone from strength to strength in recent years, particularly in the men’s disciplines, and the squad of Sam Oldham, Daniel Purvis, Louis Smith, Kristian Thomas and Max Whitlock secured bronze four years ago at the London Games. But Zhang Mengxue picked up the slack, earning China’s fourth air pistol gold in the last five Games.
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In the history of Olympic swimming, the United States of America is the big cheese by a mile, winning 230 golds and 520 total medals before Saturday night, light years ahead of Australia’s 57 gold and 178 total medals.
