TOKYO — A roundup of gold medals from Thursday, July 29, at the Tokyo Games:
CANOE SLALOM
Australia’s Jessica Fox has made Olympic history at the Tokyo Games as the first gold medalist in women’s canoe slalom. Fox made the last run of the final and crushed it.
She beat rival and silver-medalist Mallory Franklin of Britain with a winning run through the rapids of of the Kasai Canoe Slalom Center. The women’s canoe slalom is one of 18 new events introduced to the Olympics this year in a push for gender equity. Andrea Herzog of Germany took bronze.
JUDO
WOMEN’S 78-KILOGRAM
Shori Hamada won Japan’s seventh gold medal in judo at the Tokyo Olympics, beating French former world champion Madeleine Malonga by ippon just 1:08 into the women’s 78-kilogram final.
Hamada, who won the 2018 world title, was the third Japanese woman to win gold in the past week.
Germany’s Anna-Maria Wagner — the current world champion — and Brazil’s Mayra Aguiar won bronze.
MEN’S 100-KILOGRAM
Aaron Wolf won Japan’s eighth gold medal in judo at the Tokyo Olympics, defeating South Korea’s Cho Gu-ham 5:35 into golden score for his first Olympic title in the men’s 100-kilogram division.
Wolf, whose father is American, won the draining final bout by ippon with an o-uchi-gari throw. Wolf beat Georgian veteran Varlam Liparteliani in the semifinals to reach his first Olympic final.
Portugal’s two-time world champion Jorge Fonseca and Russian athlete Niiaz Iliasov won bronze. Cho upset Fonseca in the semifinals.
ROWING
MEN’S PAIR
Croatian brothers Martin and Valent Sinkovic dominated the men’s pair in Olympic rowing, cruising to gold in a race they led from the start.
The Croatians were the heavy favorites. They won double sculls in 2016, then switched boat disciplines and won two world championships before claiming another Olympic gold medal. They are the first men to win Olympic gold in both double sculls and the sweep pairs.
Romania’s duo of Marius Cozmiuc and Ciprian Tudosas won silver. Denmark’s Frederic Vystavel and Joachim Sutton won bronze.
WOMEN’S PAIR
New Zealand’s Grace Pendergrast and Kerri Gowler won gold in the women’s pair.
The Kiwi duo won the world championship in 2019 and were favored to grab victory in Tokyo. They are just the third non-European team to win the Olympic event and the first since 1996.
Russia’s Vasilisia Stepanova and Elena Oriabinskaia surged past Canada’s Caileigh Filmer and Hillary Janssens over the final 300 meters to take the silver medal. Canada won bronze.
MEN’S LIGHTWEIGHT DOUBLE SCULLS
Irish duo Fintan McCarthy and Paul O’Donovan held off a late charge from Germany’s Jonathan Rommelmann and Jason Osborne to win the gold medal in men’s lightweight double sculls.
The Irish boat looked secure through the first 1,000 meters before the Germans closed the gap with 500 to go and threatened to pull even. A late surge over the final 200 meters sent the Irish to the win by 0.86 seconds.
Italy’s Stefano Oppo and Pietro Ruta won bronze.
WOMEN’S LIGHTWEIGHT DOUBLE SCULLS
Italy’s Valentina Rodini and Federica Cesarini surged over the final 50 meters to win gold in the women’s lightweight double sculls.
The Dutch team of Marieke Keiser and Ilse Paulis had led nearly the entire race but collapsed to the bronze medal in the final 20 meters as the French team of Laura Tarantola and Claire Bove won silver.
The Dutch team nearly slipped out of the medals entirely, and only took the podium by 0.01 seconds ahead of Britain.
SHOOTING
WOMEN’S TRAP
Slovakia’s Zuzana Rehak Stefecekova set an Olympic record in women’s trap to deny the United States a third-straight shotgun gold medal at the Tokyo Olympics.
Rehak Stefecekova hit 43 of 50 targets on a breezy day at Asaka Shooting Range, beating American Kayle Browning.
Alessandro Perilli took bronze to earn the first medal in San Marino’s 61-year Olympic history.
A 37-year-old police officer, Rehak Stefecekova took silver at the 2008 Beijing and 2012 London Games, and missed Rio in 2016 due to the birth of her son.
MEN’S TRAP
Czech shooter Jiri Liptak has outlasted teammate David Kostelecky in a shoot-off to win men’s trap gold at the Tokyo Olympics.
Liptak and Kostelecky tied after 50 shots, hitting 43 targets to set an Olympic record. Both shooters hit the first six targets in the shoot-off before Kostelecky missed on the seventh.
Britain’s Matthew Coward-Holley took bronze.
Liptak finished 18th at the 2012 London Games, but did not compete in Rio five years ago. Kostelecky earned his second medal in his sixth Olympics with the gold he won at the 2008 Beijing Games.
SWIMMING
MEN’S 800-METER FREESTYLE
Bobby Finke of the United States captured gold in the debut of the men’s 800-meter swimming freestyle event at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre.
Italy’s Gregorio Paltrinieri grabbed the silver after leading most of the race, while the bronze went to Mykhailo Romachuk of Ukraine.
It was a thrilling finish. Germany’s Florian Wellbrock grabbed the lead from Paltrinieri on the final flip, with Finke lurking back in fourth. But the American turned on a dazzling burst of speed at the end of the 16-lap race, passing all three swimmers ahead of him to take the gold.
MEN’S 200-METER BREASTSTROKE
Izaac Stubblety-Cook of Australia won the 200-meter breaststroke at the Olympic pool in Tokyo.
Stubblety-Cook rallied on the final lap to pass Arno Kamminga of the Netherlands, who went out fast and tried to hold on. The winning time was an Olympic record of 2 minutes, 6.38 seconds.
Kamminga was under world-record pace through the first 150 meters, but he faded to the silver in 2:07.01. The bronze went to Finland’s Matti Mattsson in 2:07.24.
WOMEN’S 200-METER BUTTERFLY
Zhang Yufei of China turned in a dominating performance to win the women’s 200-meter butterfly with an Olympic-record time of 2 minutes, 3.86 seconds. She was more than a body length ahead of the pair of Americans, Regan Smith and Hali Flickinger.
The U.S. swimmers dueled back and forth for the silver, with Smith pulling ahead at the end to touch in 2:05.30. Flickinger earned the bronze in 2:05.65.
MEN’S 100-METER FREESTYLE
American swimmer Caeleb Dressel claimed the first individual Olympic gold medal of his career.
Dressel held off the defending Olympic champion, Australia’s Kyle Chalmers, with a furious sprint to the wall. The winning time was an Olympic record of 47.02 seconds.
Dressel beat Chalmers by a mere six-hundredths of a second, leaving the 2016 winner with a silver medal this time. The bronze was claimed by Russia’s Kliment Kolesenikov.
WOMEN’S 4 x 200-METER FREESTYLE RELAY
China surprised the U.S. and Australia with a world-record performance to win gold in the women’s 4×200-meter freestyle relay.
China won in 7 minutes, 40.33 seconds.
The Americans claimed silver in 7:40.73, while Australia took the bronze in 7:41.29. It was the first swimming world record of the Tokyo Games — in fact, all three medalists broke the previous mark of 7:41.50 set by the Aussies at the 2019 world championships.
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