2008 Olympics Results
Day 15 Review
Matthew Mitcham celebrates his gold medal. (Photo credit: Jamie Squire/Getty Images) (BEIJING, August 22) -- Wow, what a busy last major day of competition we had here in Beijing with 32 gold medals handed out. Nine events bowed out with their last medals, six events doled out their first ones, and a few roll over to tomorrow. There can be no more dramatic place to start than the National Aquatics Center – or Water Cube – where there was feverish expectation that China could complete its quest to collect all eight Beijing 2008 Diving medals. All eyes were on Zhou Luxin and Huo Liang, the nailed-on host favorites who, true to form, had qualified for two of the top three places going into the final. Lurking in between was the ominous figure of Australian Matthew Mitcham. On Saturday night, Zhou dived more consistently as Huo's challenge faltered. With one round left, China seemed on the cusp of clinching its eighth record breaking gold medal. But Zhou then put in his worst dive of the night, worth just 74.80 points. World No. 3 Mitcham seized this moment by pulling out by far the best dive of the competition – a dive with a degree of difficulty of 3.8 to earn a whopping 112.10 points - enough to sweep Zhou off the top of the leader board and into the silver spot by some 4.80 points. Huo missed the medals completely as Gleb Galperin of Russia took bronze. So near and yet so far – but it was a magnificent team effort by China's divers over the whole competition, and also by Mitcham, who took a remarkable victory. From the pool to paddling...well, of sorts. There was no mistaking China's dominance in Table Tennis with a clean sweep of all three Men's Singles medals - the first time this has ever been achieved. The only slight upset was that World No. 2 Ma Lin beat World No. 1 Wang Hao fairly comfortably, by four sets to one. Wang Liqin, World No. 3, had earlier defeated Swedish veteran Jorgen Persson to take the bronze medal. And now to the final Athletics evening of Beijing 2008, which had a sort of symmetry to it – at least as far as where the medals went. Firstly, the three middle distance races went the way of Africa as you might expect. Two titles went to Kenya, with Wilfred Bungei taking the Men's 800m in a season's best time of 1:44.65. Ismail Ahmed Ismail of Sudan claimed silver and world champion Alfred Kirwa Yego, also of Kenya, collected bronze. Then Nancy Jebet Langat won the Women's 1500m in a personal best time of 4:00.23, with Ukrainians Iryna Lishchynska and Nataliya Tobias sharing the podium with her. Ethiopia maintained its vice-like grip on the longer distances as Kenenisa Bekele scooped his second gold of the Games by winning the Men's 5000m in a new Olympic record time of 12:57.82 to match the 10,000m crown he took earlier in the week. Fellow Ethiopian Tirunesh Dibaba had claimed the same two Women's titles. 
Kenenisa Bekele (R1) of Ethiopia competes. (Photo credit: Xinhua) The Men's and Women's 4 x 400m Relays belonged undisputedly to the United States. The defending champion Men's team sped home in new Olympic record time, 2:55.39, with the Bahamas claiming the silver medal and Russia earning the bronze. The United States Women's team didn't enjoy quite the same margin of victory, but their time of 3:18.54 was just enough to beat off the challenge from Russia, with Jamaica, for once, failing to get their own way, by finishing third in a time of 3:20.40. The last two field events of the Athletics program went to mainland Europe. Andreas Thorkildsen of Norway successfully defended his Men's Javelin Throw title with a new Olympic record throw of 90.57m, while European champion Tia Hallebaut of Belgium cleared 2.05m on her first attempt to claim the gold medal in the Women's High Jump. Earlier in the day, in the great outdoors, there were six more Canoe/Kayak Flatwater finals, all at the 500 meter distance. Ken Wallace from Australia and Tim Brabants of Great Britain switched podium positions from the previous day's K1 1000m race. Wallace took the gold this time, and Brabants the bronze. Adam van Koeverden from Canada took the silver medal. Russia's Maxim Opalev won the Men's C1 race ahead of David Cal of Spain who, again, claimed the silver medal after finishing second in yesterday's C1 1000m event. The bronze medal went to Ukraine's Iurii Cheban. There were narrow wins for Inna Osypenko-Radomska in the Women's Kayak Single K1 race and for Spain's Saul Craviotto and Carlos Perez in the Kayak Double K2 final. Defending champion's Meng Guanliang and Yang Wenjun of China successfully retained their title in the Men's Canoe Double C2 class, as did Katalin Kovacs and Natasa Janic of Hungary in the Women's K2 race.
In the one-day Mountain Bike Cycling competition, four-time world title holder Julien Absalon of France successfully defended his Men's Cross Country gold medal, while Sabine Spitz of Germany had time to stop and carry her bike over the line to win the Women's race. 
Sabine Spitz celebrates her victory. (Photo credit: Hou Deqiang/Xinhua) Moving swiftly indoors, lets focus on competitors who, literally, fought for their medals today – in five Boxing and two Taekwondo finals. Let's begin with the punchers at Workers' Gymnasium, where the first medal of the evening went to Thailand's Somjit Jongjohor, who convincingly beat Andris Laffita Hernandez of Cuba 8-2 in the Flyweight (51kg) final. No such good news, though, for Thailand's defending Athens 2004 Light Welterweight (64kg) gold medalist Manus Boonjumnong, who was beaten 12-4 by Felix Diaz of the Dominican Republic. Ukraine's Vasyl Lomachenko comfortably won the Men's Featherweight (57kg) gold medal by stopping France's Khedafi Djelkhir, while Great Britain's James DeGale came through a closer and tougher 16-14 encounter against Cuba's Emilio Correa Bayeaux to clinch the Middleweight (75kg) gold. Russia's Rakhim Chakhkiev won the Heavyweight (91kg) gold medal by defeating Clemente Russo of Italy 4-2. And so to the kickers, and the final bouts of the four-day Olympic Taekwondo tournament. Maria del Rosario Espinoza of Mexico took the Women's +67kg gold medal, beating Nina Solheim of Norway 3-1, while Cha Dong-min of the Republic of Korea won his first major championship title by defeating European champ Alexandros Nikolaidis of Greece 5-4 in the Men's +80kg weight class. It was also a golden day for Russia in two of its traditionally strong women's sports. Evgeniya Kanaeva performed four perfect routines to score an impressive 75.500 points, giving her the Rhythmic Gymnastics Individual All-Around title. Inna Zhukova of Belarus was a distant second with 71.925 points. Athens bronze medalist Anna Bessonova of Ukraine came in third again with 71.875 points. 
Evgeniya Kanaeva of Russia (Photo credit: Xinhua) There was further Russian joy when, as expected, Russian athletes retained the Synchronized Swimming Team gold medal for the third consecutive time by finishing with a perfect 100.000 performance in the Free Routine for a cumulative score of 99.500 points. Two members of Russia's team, Anastasia Davydova and Anastasia Ermakova, have now won a record four medals in Synchronized Swimming. That final was one of seven team sport finals on the penultimate day of Beijing 2008. A Lionel Messi inspired Argentinian team retained the Men's Football gold medal by defeating Nigeria 1-0 in a repeat encounter of the Atlanta 1996 Olympic final (which Nigeria won 3-2). The Barcelona playmaker supplied the pass for Angel Di Maria to convert the all important second-half goal. The Republic of Korea beat defending champion Cuba 3-2 in an intense and tight Baseball final to take the title. US players had an easier time, beating Japan 8-4. World champion Germany won the Olympic Men's Hockey gold medal for the first time since Barcelona 1992 after defeating Spain 1-0. Australia defeated the Netherlands in emphatic style, 6-2, to collect the bronze medal. Team USA retained their Women's Basketball title by cruising to a 92-65 victory over Australia, while Russia defeated host China 94-81 in the earlier tip off game to decide the bronze medal winner. World No. 1 Brazil collected its first ever Olympic Women's Volleyball gold medal by beating the United States 25-15, 18-25, 25-13, 25-21. Brazil dropped just one set throughout the entire tournament. Athens 2004 winner China beat Cuba 25-16, 21-25, 25-13, 25-20 to take the bronze medal. Norway reversed the defeat inflicted on them at the 2007 World Women's Handball Championships by Russia by overpowering their European rival 34-27 to take the gold medal. The Republic of Korea won the earlier bronze medal match, defeating Hungary 33-28. That, then, folks, was just about it on the next to last day of competition here at Beijing 2008. Tomorrow there are just 12 finals, including six Boxing matches and a bright and early start on the streets of China's capital for the Men's Marathon…oh, and a spectacular Closing Ceremony to enjoy when the final contests are over. Medal Results:
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