More Bronze Medals!
SOCCER – Women’s Final Round
Bronze Medal Game – Canada vs. Brazil
Probably one of the toughest things to do is come so close to a gold medal chance, only to have to prepare yourself for a bronze medal showdown (and against the host national at that). Canada opened the scoring in the first half after an amazing crossfield headman pass from deep in the defensive end up to Ashley Lawrence near half. Lawrence took one look, then blitzed up the wing with the ball, outrunning her marker and drawing the other Brazilian defence to her. With her head up, Lawrence spotted 17-year-old teammate Deanne Rose charging to the net. A beautiful cross and Rose found the back of the net with a one-time to put Canada up 1-0!
In the second half, Captain Canada, Christine Sinclair, found the back of the net early on to add a buffer to their lead. It would prove to be the winning goal in her 250th Canadian appearance.
Brazil would add some suspense to the game in the 79th minute by slipping one past Labbe, but Canada would hold on to win 2-1 for their second bronze medal, the only Canadian team to earn back to back medals at the Summer Olympics.
In the Gold Medal game, Germany accepted Sweden’s own goal as one of theirs to go up 2-0. Sweden would manage to recoup one, but it wouldn’t be enough as Germany won 2-1 earning their first-ever gold medal in women’s soccer.
EQUESTRIAN – INDIVIDUAL JUMPING
There was a 6-way tie for first place, sending the Finals to a Jump off for the second equestrian medal in a row. Eric Lamaze and Fine Lady 5 knocked off one bar (the only one of their competition) at the end of their run, putting the gold medal out of reach. Lamaze settled for a bronze medal while GBR’s Nick Skelton took Gold and Sweden’s Peder Fredricson took silver.
FIELD HOCKEY – WOMEN’S MEDALS
GBR met the Netherlands in the gold medal final. After a 3-3 tie, the match went to a shootout. Shooters are given 8 seconds, they can carry the ball in, shoot, and rebound until the time runs out. It was GBR who was victorious in the end as they scored 2/5 in the shootout. Germany defeated New Zealand for the bronze medal.
CYCLING – BMX
Tory Nyhaug was looking for the podium today in the men’s BMX, but despite great heats and an okay semifinal, Tory came 5th in the final, Canada’s best finish ever.
TRACK AND FIELD
Men’s 50km Race Walk – Canada’s Evan Dunfee was looking to be in great stride, he even encouraged a French competitor to keep moving. Towards the end of the race, Dunfee was in 3rd place when he was jostled by the 4th place Japanese walker. He side stepped only slightly but that was enough to break his momentum as he threw his hands up in frustration. He ended up finishing 4th while setting a Canadian record!
Soon after the completion of the race, it was announced the Japanese walker would be disqualified and Dunfee was awarded the Bronze medal. But, soon after that, the Japanese coaching team appealed and the Bronze was reinstated!
Dunfee decided not to appeal again as he felt that the Japanese athlete did not intentionally knock him (though, still not sure why there wasn’t more effort on the Japan athlete’s part to pass without making contact when the lane is so large).
Women’s Pole Vault – Greece’s Stefanidi, and USA’s Morris matched each other’s highest jump, however both reaching the same max height, the tiebreaker was to go back through the last jump and note who took fewer tries to reach the height. Greece took it. New Zealand took Bronze.
Women’s 4x100m – USA, fresh from their re-run to qualify for the final, took the gold medal over Jamaica; both set Season’s Bests. Great Britain set a national record and took the bronze medal. Canada was trailing in last place but made a surge near the end to beat out Nigeria.
Men’s 4x100m – The Big Man has done it! Achieved his desired Triple Triple (3 events, 3 golds, 3 back to back Olympics). I wasn’t even watching Bolt cross the line as he was so far ahead. Instead, the focus was on the fight for 2nd and 3rd. Canada didn’t have a fast third leg and lost some ground that they had, but as soon as De Grasse grabbed the baton, he was off! He made up a lot of ground and rivaled for the bronze and silver position. Had he another meter or two, he certainly could have overtaken the USA and Japan. Still, the Canadians broke the 20-year old Canadian record (from 1996).
It was Jamaica, Japan and USA celebrating for squeezing out Canada. But, many minutes later, it was Canada who was celebrating a Bronze as the USA was disqualified for an illegal handoff at the first bend.
And, this is why you run your very best until the very end – you never know what will happen!