South Korea’s archers extended their unbroken reign in the women’s team event to an eighth successive Olympics with an emphatic defeat of Russian Federation in the final on Sunday. As it did in London, the USA team took silver. “This medal was won not just by the team but by everyone who supported us”. Mi-Sun also finished in first at the Olympic test event with an nearly flawless performance. They scored 345.60, well ahead of Italy for silver and Australia for bronze. Case in point: none of the three men that won the team bronze in London – Im Dong-hyun, Oh Jin-hyek and Kim Bub-min – survived the national team trials for Rio. Into a decades-long top-of-the-medal-table battle between China and South Korea stepped Vietnam, which took gold in the 10-meter air pistol. That was Vietnam’s first-ever gold in any sport.
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The first day of Olympic shooting Saturday introduced a new Asian wrinkle.
She also competed on the world championship-winning women’s team and mixed team in 2013.
The Olympic gold medal is the third of Ki’s career.
Swimming, men’s 4×100 meters freestyle relay: A terrific turn by Michael Phelps and a super finish by Nathan Adrian helped the United States regain their dominance in this event, along with Caeleb Dressel and Ryan Held, posting a time of 3:09.92 to take gold. For Adrian it was his fourth gold and fifth overall, for Phelps it was number 19 in gold, 23 overall.
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World titles are great, but athletes say an Olympic gold is the ultimate. Penny Oleksiak of Canada, only 16, already has her second medal in Rio, taking silver. Unfortunately for Gabby Douglas, who won gold in the all-around four years ago, she’s the odd woman out. She missed the national team for the 2014 Asian Games in South Korea’s Incheon, and was reduced to watching her former rivals from the broadcast booth as a color commentator.
