« Back to article | Print this article |
Usain Bolt ended his London Olympics in glorious style on Saturday with a third gold and a world record as Jamaica won a blistering men's 4x100 metres final but the 'living legend' was uncertain of repeating the feat again.
Bolt, who gave himself the title after defending the 100 and 200 crowns he won in Beijing four years ago, anchored the Jamaican quartet of Nesta Carter, Michael Frater and Yohan Blake to victory in 36.84 seconds, knocking 0.2 off the record they set at last year's World Championships.
The win gave Bolt his sixth career Olympic gold from two Games and the 25-year-old, usually so assured, was wary of promising a three-peat.
- London Olympics 2012 - Complete coverage
"I've thought about it but I think it is going to be very hard. Yohan is coming through and I'm sure a lot of the other young guys are coming up so I will see what happens in four years," Bolt told reporters.
"It's always a beautiful feeling to end off like this. We did it last year in the World Championships - for me it's a wonderful feeling," Bolt said.
"The team came out and gave their all. I knew a world record was possible."
The United States team of Trell Kimmons, individual bronze medallist Justin Gatlin, Tyson Gay and Ryan Bailey won silver in 37.04 to equal the old record.
Canada finished third but were disqualified for a lane infringement, leaving the athletes in tears on the track as Trinidad and Tobago were awarded the bronze in 38.12.
World champion Mariya Savinova of Russia won the Olympic 800-meter title on Saturday, beating Caster Semenya of South Africa.
Russia also took the bronze with Ekaterina Poistogova.
Savinova finished the race in a season's-best 1 minute, 56.19 seconds, beating Semenya by 1.04 seconds. Poistogova clocked 1:57.53.
Semenya was last with 250 meters to go, and her strong finishing kick only carried her to silver while Savinova raced away to an easy victory.
Semenya made her Olympic debut three years after being forced to undergo gender tests.
Mo Farah won the 5,000 meters to complete an Olympic distance double for Britain on Saturday night.
Backed by a boistrous, capacity crowd at 80,000-seat Olympic Stadium, Farah surged ahead late and held on to win in 13 minutes, 41.66 seconds. He still had the energy to do a few playful situps on the track before he grabbed a flag for the real celebrations.
Dejen Gebremeskel of Ethiopia won silver in 13:41.98, while Thomas Longosiwa of Kenya took bronze in 13:42.36.
The Somali-born Farah won the 10,000 meters on Britain's "Super Saturday" last weekend, the same night Jess Ennis won the heptathlon and Greg Rutherford the long jump.
Russian Yelena Lashmanova won gold in the Olympic women's 20 kilometres walk in a world record time of one hour 25 minutes two seconds on Saturday.
Compatriot and 2008 champion Olga Kaniskina took the silver seven second behind after being overtaken by Lashmanova in the final few metres having led from the start.
China's Qieyang Shenjie was third for the bronze medal.
Three-times world champion Kaniskina had been aiming to become the first woman to retain the 20-km walk title but crossed the line in obvious pain and was limping as she congratulated her younger team mate.
Russia's Sergey Kirdyapkin won gold in the men's 50km race walk at the London Games on Saturday in an Olympic record time of three hours 35 minutes 59 seconds.
The 32-year-old double world champion shaved more than a second off Alex Schwazer's record of 3:37:09 to finish 54 seconds ahead of Australia's Jared Tallent, whose time was also inside the previous Olympic record and a personal best.
"Around the 25-30km mark I hit the wall. I had to fight with myself but I found my second wind. If I didn't have that small problem I would have done a better time," said Kirdyapkin, who did not finish the 50km event in Beijing four years ago.
China's Si Tianfeng, 28, won bronze in a personal best of 3:37:16, adding to Chen Ding's 20km gold and Wang Zhen's bronze a week ago - China's first men's race walk medals.
World champion Anna Chicherova of Russia soared 2.05 metres on a breezy London evening to win gold in the women's high jump at the Olympics on Saturday.
Sixth in Athens and a bronze medallist in Beijing, the 30-year-old cleared the first five heights at the first time of asking before becoming the only woman to get over the bar at 2.05 on her second attempt.
Brigetta Barrett of the United States jumped a personal best 2.03 metres on her second attempt to clinch silver and Chicherova's compatriot Svetlana Shkolina won bronze after needing three jumps to match the American.
Keshorn Walcott won the javelin gold medal on Saturday to give Trinidad and Tobago its first Olympic title in a field event.
Walcott, the world junior champion, threw a national record 84.58 meters with his second attempt and nobody improved on the mark for the remainder of the final.
Oleksandr Pyantnytsya of Ukraine was second with a throw of 84.51 and Antti Ruuskanen of Finland took third.
Two-time defending champion Andreas Thorkildsen of Norway finished sixth.
Allyson Felix won her third gold medal of the London Olympics, giving the United States a 20-meter lead after the second leg of the 4x400-meter relay and then watching teammate Sanya Richards-Ross bring home the victory Saturday night.
The U.S. runners finished in 3 minutes, 16.87 seconds for the country's fifth straight Olympic title in the event. Russia finished second in 3:20.23 and Jamaica was third in 3:20.95.
DeeDee Trotter ran the opening leg for the United States and built a lead before handing to Felix, who more than doubled the advantage by the time she passed to Francena McCorory.
Richards-Ross had a stress-free anchor leg to add this gold medal to her 400-meter gold. Felix earlier won the 200 and 4x100 relay.