The United States had to wait until its penultimate
gold-medal match to surpass China, but after a win in the women's volleyball
final, Team USA clinched the gold-medal count for the third-straight Summer
Olympics.
Team USA's 39 gold medals doesn't quite match its last two
Olympic performances where it won 46 gold medals in Rio de Janeiro and London,
respectively. But it was enough to finish just one ahead of China's 38 in
Tokyo.
Team Nigeria was placed 74th at the end of the 2020 Tokyo
Games on Sunday and eighth best among the 54 African nations at the Games with
two medals – bronze and silver.
While Ese Brume won the bronze for Nigeria, Blessing
Obodururu secured the silver medal.
Brume recorded a 6.97 metres jump in the final of the event
at the Tokyo Olympic Stadium to win her first Olympic medal and Nigeria’s first
at this Games.
Oborududu had to settle for the silver medal in the women’s
freestyle 68kg event on Tuesday in the Tokyo Olympics wrestling competition in
Tokyo.
The medal was Nigeria’s first one ever in the wrestling
sport since the country’s first-ever appearance at the Olympics in 1952.
After Kipchoge’s marathon win for Kenya, the United States
scored victories in volleyball, track cycling and basketball to top the medals
tally with 39 golds, just one ahead of China.
The 339th and final gold medal went to Serbia’s men’s water
polo team, capping a Games that were in stark danger of cancellation after they
became the first postponed Olympics last year.
Thirty-three sports have been contested across 16 days in
largely empty stadiums, with fans barred over coronavirus risks and athletes
living in strict biosecure conditions.
“Some were already speaking of ‘Ghost Games’,” Olympics
chief Thomas Bach told an International Olympic Committee session on Sunday.
“What we have seen here is that on the contrary the athletes
have brought soul to the Olympic Games.”
The Olympics were plagued by low Japanese support over
super-spreader fears but officials maintained that a record haul of 27 gold
medals, putting Japan third on the table, has won hearts.
“We believe our athletes’ earnest spirit and all-out
performance moved people,” said Tsuyoshi Fukui, chef de mission for the
Japanese team.
Britain finished fourth with 22 golds and the Russian
Olympic Committee, the team for Russian athletes after Russia were banned for
systematic doping, were fifth with 20.
‘Once in a lifetime’
A succession of big names have failed to perform in Japan,
where new sports skateboarding, surfing, sport climbing and karate have brought
young new stars to the fore.
But marathon world record-holder Kipchoge showed his class,
kicking in the closing stages and clocking 2hr 08min 38sec to retain his 2016
title.
“I know there were a lot of people against holding this
Olympics due to the coronavirus,” said a flag-waving, 47-year-old fan on the
marathon route who gave his name as Tsujita.
“But I am glad it took place. This was a once-in-a-lifetime
experience for everyone.”
The marathon, moved north to Sapporo to avoid Tokyo’s summer
heat, was one of the few events to allow spectators.
Sunday’s closing ceremony will take place at a largely
vacant Olympic Stadium, rounding off an extraordinary Games conducted mostly
without live spectators for a worldwide audience of billions.
Fears of a major outbreak proved unfounded in the mostly
vaccinated Olympic contingent and 430 cases were picked up during the Games,
including 32 in the Olympic Village.
But athletes had the added pressure of strict ‘bubble’
conditions including orders to wear masks unless competing, training, eating or
sleeping.
Victory celebrations have been low-key, with lonely laps of
honour and sparsely attended medal ceremonies. But the emotions of the
competitors have been on full view.
Trans athletes, ‘Twisties’
Superstar gymnast Simone Biles provided the most
jaw-dropping moment when she abruptly pulled out of competition over a bout of
the “twisties”, a disorientating mental block.
Biles, widely acknowledged as the greatest gymnast in
history, recovered sufficiently to return for the final event, the beam,
claiming a redemptive bronze.
Weightlifter Laurel Hubbard became the first openly
transgender woman to compete at the Games and Canada’s Quinn became the first
openly transgender Olympic medallist, with gold in the women’s football.
In other highlights, the US men’s team won their fourth
consecutive men’s basketball crown and US swimmer Caeleb Dressel assumed the
mantle of Michael Phelps with five gold medals in the pool.
Among the final events on Sunday, Canadian cyclist Kelsey
Mitchell took gold in the women’s sprint while Jason Kenny won the men’s keirin
to become the first Briton to win seven Olympic titles.
The Americans started the day two golds behind China but the
women’s basketball and volleyball titles and US track cyclist Jennifer
Valente’s omnium victory put them top of the final table.
Uzbekistan’s Bakhodir Jalolov beat US fighter Richard Torrez
in the super-heavyweight boxing final, while Britain’s Lauren Price and
Ireland’s Kellie Harrington also boxed their way to gold.
The Olympic flag will now pass to 2024 hosts Paris. But the
circus will reconvene in just six months when Beijing, faced with boycott
threats and a renewed coronavirus emergency, holds the Winter Games in
February.
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