De Grasse set a new Canadian record in the semi-finals on Wednesday with a time of 19.80 seconds.
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Eaton adds the 2016 Olympic gold medal to the one he won in London in 2012. His run for gold No. 9 comes Friday in the 4×100 relays. The 100 didn’t go well, but the long jump did.
Ashton Eaton retained his title as the best all-around athlete in the world by tying the decathlon Olympic record and, within minutes, had stepped back for track and field’s ultimate superstar to take center stage again.
He recalled the 2015 World Championships when he missed his first attempt.
Also Thursday, UO alum Matthew Centrowitz made his second straight Olympic final in the men’s 1,500 meters. “Thankfully it went 63 metres and not 58 because that was the difference maker in this decathlon”.
The “awesome hour” of the night before had evolved into a pretty great 24 hours for the U.S by Thursday night.
It was a not-all-unexpected result, though this might be an eye-opener: Both 2008 champion Dawn Harper-Nelson and the current world-record holder, Keni Harrison, were back home after failing to crack the top three at the U.S. Olympic trials.
Dalilah Muhammad kept the USA total ticking with gold in the women’s 400-meter hurdles and Ashley Spencer added a bronze, with another American 1-2 in that race only just thwarted by Denmark’s Sara Slott Petersen.
Kerron Clement flashing a toothpaste-endorsement-level smile after grabbing gold for the U.S.in the men’s 400-meter hurdles.
She easily won and didn’t really push herself, saying: “Times don’t matter in championships but medals, gold medals, silver or bronze, those are targets”. With just that clock and the crowd for company, the Americans took the baton around in 41.77 seconds to reach the final.
He’s not as decorated as Michael Phelps or Katie Ledecky, or as electric as Usain Bolt or Simone Biles, but Ashton Eaton is just as dominant as the other stars of Rio.
After they saw their names come up on the scoreboard, they huddled together, hugged and jumped up and down before grabbing their US flags from the stands. That’s not to say there still wasn’t some intense action on the track, in the gym and beyond on Thursday night. The top-ranked Americans had fought back to force a fifth set against Serbia before falling short – short of the gold-medal goal that had driven her and others back to the national team for one more Olympic cycle.
Barring injury, there was very little doubt leading into the Rio Games that Eaton would end up in gold. He finished 18th in the decathlon, she 15th in the heptathlon. Warner also ran 10.15 at Gotzis earlier this year, so his win isn’t at all surprising.
The Somali-born British runner was tripped in the 10,000 on Saturday but still recovered to win his second Olympic gold over that distance.
“I don’t have time to think of the way, because we’re training”.
“I’ve just got to keep working and challenge myself and get ready for 2020”. First, the American Olympian was called a “traitor” by some for wearing a Team Canada cap in Rio, even though it was to support of his wife, heptathlete Brianne Theisen-Eaton.
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Warner, who grew up dreaming of one day playing in the National Basketball Association, went into the London Olympics with a double-digit world ranking, but wound up finishing a surprise fifth. All three American riders advanced to the semifinals.
