Egypt’s Abdelaziz bags gold, historic win for India as Japanese fulfil determined mission

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Saudi Arabia claim silver, Felix, becomes most-decorated woman in Oly track history

TOKYO, Aug 7, (AP): Feryal Abdelaziz of Egypt won the first Olympic karate gold medal in women’s over-61 kilogram kumite, beating Azerbaijan’s Iryna Zaretska to win Egypt’s second Olympic gold medal since 1948. The 22-year-old Abdelaziz went ahead on a yuko with 28 seconds left in a cagey final bout. She scored again three seconds later and hung on for a 2:0 victory celebrated with a primal scream. Gong Li of China and Sofya Berultseva of Kazakhstan won bronze. Iran’s Sajad Ganjzadeh won the Olympic gold medal in men’s over-75 kilogram karate after final opponent Tareg Hamedi was given a disqualification penalty for kicking Ganjzadeh hard in the upper body or head. Hamedi, who left the mat in tears, still won Saudi Arabia’s second-ever silver medal, but missed out on their first gold. Hamedi overcame Japan’s Ryutaro Araga in the semifinals. Araga’s bronze surprisingly was the host nation’s only kumite medal in Tokyo. Karate proliferated in Japan and spread throughout the globe during the 20th century.

Gold medalist Neeraj Chopra of India poses during the medal ceremony for the men’s javelin throw at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo. (AP)

Neeraj Chopra won India’s first gold medal in Olympic track and field with a throw of 87.58 meters on Saturday to clinch the javelin title at the Tokyo Games. Neeraj Chopra held a corner of the India flag in each hand and raised it over his head. A half-hour later, the tri-color was flying at the top of the mast at Tokyo’s Olympic Stadium and Chopra was standing atop the podium. A first gold medal in Olympic track and field for a nation of 1.3 billion had to be cause for celebration. “It feels unbelievable,” he said. “This is our first Olympic medal for a very long time, and in athletics it is the first time we have gold, so it’s a proud moment for me and my country.”

India’s only previous medals in Olympic track and field were two silvers won by Norman Pritchard in the 200 meters and the 200-meter hurdles at Paris in 1900. Jakub Vadlejch took silver with a best mark of 86.67 meters and former world champion Vitezslav Vesely won bronze with 85.44.

Peres Jepchirchir led a 1-2 Kenyan finish in the women’s marathon, withstanding the heat and humidity while running through the streets of Sapporo. Jepchirchir finished in a time of 2 hours, 27 minutes, 20 seconds in a race moved up an hour to avoid the heat. Her teammate Brigid Kosgei was second and American Molly Seidel, a relative newcomer to the marathon stage, took home the bronze. A race that was moved to Sapporo to avoid the extreme heat in Tokyo found little relief on a winding course through the city. The starter’s gun went off a minute after 6 a.m. local time under sunny skies and with a temperature reading of 77 degrees Fahrenheit (25 Celsius). It climbed to nearly 86 degrees (30) near the finish, with a humidity of around 65%. Sifan Hassan won the 10,000 meters for her second gold and third medal of the Tokyo Olympics after entering three long-distance races.

Hassan burst past world-record holder Letesenbet Gidey on the final turn and won in a time of 29 minutes, 55.32 seconds. It completed an astonishing 5,000 and 10,000 double for the Ethiopianborn runner, who now competes for the Netherlands. She also won a bronze in the 1,500 meters. Her victory in the 10,000 was her sixth race in eight days in Tokyo. Kalkidan Gezahegne of Bahrain took silver in 29:56.18 and Gidey, having led for most of the race, faded for the bronze as she had no answer to Hassan’s finish. Jakob Ingebrigtsen of Norway surged ahead as he rounded the last curve and set an Olympic record to win the 1,500 meters at the Tokyo Games. Ingebrigtsen ran behind world champion Timothy Cheruiyot for most of the race before kicking late to win the gold medal in 3 minutes, 28.32 seconds, beating the record of 3:31.65 set by Abel Kipsang of Kenya two days earlier in the heats. Cheruiyot took silver in 3:29.01. Josh Kerr of Britain won bronze and Kipsang placed fourth. Allyson Felix won her 11th Olympic medal, combining with her American teammates to finish the 4×400-meter relay in 3 minutes, 16.85 seconds for a runaway victory. The team of Felix, Sydney McLaughlin, Dalilah Muhammad and Athing Mu was never in jeopardy.

Poland finished second, 3.68 seconds behind, and Jamaica finished third. Felix, who became the most-decorated woman in Olympic track history when she won bronze in the 400 on Friday night, now passes Carl Lewis with the most track medals of any U.S. athlete. Of the 11 medals, seven are gold. There were no bad exchanges this time as the U.S. men won their first gold medal in a track race at the Tokyo Games with a victory in the 4×400- meter relay. The U.S. men didn’t reach the final of the 4×100-meter relay, but the 4×400 team of Michael Cherry, Michael Norman, Bryce Deadmon and Rai Benjamin was never really in trouble as they completed four laps of the Olympic oval in 2 minutes, 55.70 seconds. It was the fifth gold for the U.S. men in the 4×400 since 1996. The Netherlands took silver in a national record 2:57.18 and Botswana won bronze in 2:57.27. A Japanese team of all-stars fulfilled a determined national mission to win the Olympic baseball gold medal for the first time, beating the United States 2-0 Saturday night behind Munetaka Murakami’s third-inning home run.

Masato Morishita and four relievers combined on a six-hitter, and the Japanese men (5-0) matched the accomplishment of the women’s softball team, which upended the Americans for their second straight gold medal. America, the nation that introduced baseball to Japan in 1872, finished 4-2. Teams were denied access to all 40- man roster players and many eligible top prospects by Major League Baseball and its clubs, hindering the U.S. and other countries whose top players are in MLB. The Dominican Republic beat South Korea to win bronze. The U.S. won their fourth straight Olympic men’s basketball gold medal, holding off France 87-82. Kevin Durant scored 29 points for the Americans and joined Carmelo Anthony as the only three-time gold medalists in men’s basketball. France defeated the U.S in the teams’ opening game in the tournament. The French almost beat them again Saturday while attempting to win their first gold in men’s basketball. They had to settle for a third silver. Patty Mills scored 42 points to carry Australia to their first Olympic medal in men’s basketball with a 107-93 victory over Slovenia in the third-place game on Saturday. Malcom scored in the 108th minute and Brazil won their second consecutive gold medal in men’s soccer with a 2-1 victory over Spain. Brazil also won gold on home soil five years ago at the iconic Maracana Stadium. Neymar struck the winner in a 5-4 shootout after a 1-1 draw with Germany. Mexico downed Japan 3-1 in the bronze medal match in Saitama on Friday. Nelly Korda gave the Americans a sweep of gold medals in golf, holding on for a one-shot victory in a thrill-aminute finish to the Olympic women’s golf competition. Korda led by as many as three shots on the back nine. In the end, she needed two putts from just inside 30 feet on the 18th hole for par and a 2-under 69. Mone Inami of Japan made bogey from a plugged lie in the bunker on the 18th hole and faced a playoff against Lydia Ko of New Zealand for the silver medal. Britain’s Joseph Chong set an Olympic record to win the men’s pentathlon, matching the gold medal won by Britain’s Kate French in the women’s event. Chong finished third in the event’s swimming, first in fencing, 14th in riding and 15th in laser-run to set a new Olympic mark of 1,482 points. Egypt’s Ahmed Elgendy won silver and Wonngtae Jun of South Korea won bronze. Britain is the first country to win the men’s and women’s individual modern pentathlon at the same Olympic Games. S v e t l a n a R o m a s h i n a clinched the seventh gold medal of her Olympic career by leading the Russian Olympic Committee to gold in the artistic swimming team event. The rest of the ROC team included: Vlada Chigireva, Aleksandra Patskevich, Marina Goliadkina, Svetlana Kolesnichenko, Alla Shishkina, Polina Komar and Maria Shurochkina. Romashina teamed with Kolesnichenko to win the duet on Wednesday.

ROC was awarded 98.8000 points for the free routine and finished with a total of 196.0979 points after also leading the technical routine. China finished 2.5669 points behind to take the silver medal and Ukraine was 5.7961 behind for bronze. Christian Sorum and Anders Mol beat Russia in the men’s beach volleyball gold medal match, earning Norway’s first medal in the sport. The top-seeded Norwegians beat the reigning world champions 21-17, 21-18 in an intermittent rain at the Shiokaze Park venue overlooking Tokyo Bay. With Qatar’s victory over Latvia for the bronze earlier Saturday, all three countries on the podium – and all six players – were first-time medalists. Galal Yafai won Britain’s first boxing gold medal at the Tokyo Olympics, beating Carlo Paalam of the Philippines 4:1 in the fl yweight final. Yafai, the 28-year-old younger brother of two professional boxers from Birmingham, is a two-time Olympian who had an impressive run in Tokyo. He finished by knocking down Paalam in the first round of the gold medal bout and going on for a comfortable win. Ryomei Tanaka of Japan and Saken Bibossinov of Kazakhstan won bronze medals. Yafai beat Bibossinov in a thrilling semifinal. Stoyka Krasteva of Bulgaria capped her impressive run through the Tokyo Olympics with the women’s fl yweight boxing gold medal. She beat top-seeded Buse Naz Cakiroglu of Turkey 5:0. The 36-year-old Krasteva, a 2012 Olympian who returned to boxing in 2019 after a break, dominated her final four opponents to win Bulgaria’s fifthever boxing gold and its first since Daniel Petrov in 1996. Bulgaria had won just one bronze in boxing since 2004.

Huang Hsiao-wen of Taiwan, the 2019 world champion, and Tsukimi Namiki of Japan won bronze in the lightest women’s weight class. Brazil’s Hebert Sousa won the men’s middleweight boxing gold medal at the Tokyo Olympics in shocking fashion when his bout with Ukraine’s Oleksandr Khyzhniak was stopped by a thirdround knockdown. Sousa, who beat second-seeded Gleb Bakshi of Russia in the semifinal, joins lightweight Robson Conceição as the only boxing gold medalists in Brazil’s Olympic history. Conceição won his historic gold at home in Rio de Janeiro. Bakshi and Eumir Marcial of the Philippines won bronze medals in likely the most talent-stacked division in Tokyo. Busenaz Sürmeneli of Turkey won the women’s welterweight gold medal in Tokyo. She persevered through a difficult final against China’s Gu Hong to win Turkey’s first-ever boxing gold. Gu’s awkward, hold-heavy style confounded opponents on her way to silver. Gu was docked a point early in the second round for holding, but would have won the fight on two judges’ scorecards without the deduction. Oshae Jones of the United States and Lovlina Borgohain of India won bronze. Jones is one of four medalists for the most successful U.S. boxing team since 2000. Borgohain is the third boxing medalist in India’s Olympic history. China’s Mengya Sun and Shixiao Xu won the country’s first medal in women’s canoe sprint by winning the gold in the canoe double 500 at the Sea Forest Waterway. The 2019 world champions finished 2 seconds clear of Ukraine’s Anastasiia Chetverikova and Liudmyla Luzan. It was the second medal for Luzan, who took bronze in the single 200. Canada’s Laurence Vincente Lapointe and Katie Vincent took the bronze medal in third. Vincent won the silver medal in the 200. Brazil’s Isaquias Queiroz dos Santos won the men’s 1,000 meters canoe sprint and Moldova’s Serghei Tarnovschi took the bronze medal five years after his similar result in Rio de Janeiro was stripped because of a performance- enhancing drug violation. China’s Liu Hao, the 2019 world champion, won the silver medal. Queiroz dos Santos was the Olympic silver medalist in 2016. Tarnovschi was suspended for four years after his doping violation. He was able to return to the Olympics in Tokyo because of the one-year delay caused by the coronavirus pandemic. Hungary won the gold medal in the women’s kayak four 500 meters. New Zealand’s Lisa Carrington missed a fourth medal of the Tokyo Games when the Kiwi boat finished fourth. Hungary finished 0.61 seconds clear of silver medalists Belarus and Poland won the bronze. The New Zealand kayak was in medal position halfway through the race before fading late.

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