Mo Farah: Hometown Hero; Canadians Jobbed in 4x100
It's the second to last day of the Olympics! Mo Farah ran his way into the heart of British fans everywhere, and another gold medal, in the 5000 meter; the U.S. might have the best wrestler ever; a new world record was set in the 4x100, but more importantly the Canadians got robbed.
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Remember how one of the American beach volleyball teams beat out the favored Brazilian teams to make a U.S. vs. U.S. gold medal game? The Brazilians have their revenge! They upset the favorite American indoor volleyball team in the final 3-1. Its the second Olympics in a row the U.S. has lost to the Brazilian team in the final, so this is like a tradition now. Also, the U.S. have never won gold in indoor volleyball since it was introduced in 1964, so losing is something they're used to by now. [The New York Times]
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Modern Pentathlon is one of the weirder Summer Olympic sports. It's like someone said "we need more!" and they threw a bunch of things together and boom, a sport. Anyway, one of the things you have to do is show jumping with an "unfamiliar horse," aka one you've never seen or ridden before. A horse went crazy on a Korean rider and bucked her off. The rider takes the horses full weight on her leg and is in intense pain on the ground afterwards. But! This has a (somewhat) happy ending. She got up, remounted the horse and finished her run. [Deadspin]
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From Brazilian triumph to Brazilian heartbreak. So, after Spain was eliminated in Men's soccer, everyone was ready to all but hand it over to the Brazilian team. They are always the best at soccer when the Spanish are not. The Mexican team didn't get that memo, though. They outplayed them and, most importantly, outscored them en route to a 2-1 victory for the gold medal. It helps that Mexico scored in the first 29 seconds of the match. Also, the announcers in the goal video (below) go absolutely nuts. (Fun fact: the only guy who scored for Brazil goes by the nickname, "HULK.") This was the first time Mexico's ever won gold in Men's soccer at the Olympics, so yay! Congratulations, Mexico. [Deadspin (goal video); ESPN]
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Jordan Burroughs is 24 years old, a former NCAA wrestling stud, and now an Olympic gold medalist. The wrestler won his first gold medal, and the first for the U.S. in wrestling this year, today in the 74 kg (163lbs) weight class freestyle wrestling. What's interesting about Burroughs is that he's aiming to be the best wrestler of all time. His resume for the last two years is insane:
In 2011, he became a gold medal at Pan American Games as well as the World Championships, become the U.S. Open Champion, won the U.S. World Team Trials and became the U.S. Open champion.
In 2012, he repeated as U.S. Open Champion, won the Olympic Trials, earned a gold medal at the wrestling World Cup and now a gold medal in the Olympics.
Burroughs is going to wrestle until 2017, the year he thinks he'll finally pass American wrestling's G.O.A.T. John Smith in Olympic and world championship gold. He's something special. [MMA Fighting]
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Mo Farah is emerging from these Olympics as Briton's breakout hometown hero. After winning gold in the 10,000 meters last week he said he was tired. He wasn't sure he had enough in the tank to win the 5,000. But then someone reminded him that 5,000 meters is, like, half of 10,000. And he's so good at the 10,000! Gold medal good, even. So Farah was all like, "I got this," and he totally dominated Saturday's race on the way to his second gold of this Olympics. There's strong money on him carrying the British flag in the closing ceremonies tomorrow. [The Guardian]
The American women dominated the 4x100 meter relay final on Saturday. They beat everyone else by almost four full seconds. That's how bad it was. But the controversy was over in the men's 4x100 meter final... [ESPN]
...blah blah blah Jamaica won and set world record and the U.S. got silver but most importantly THE CANADIANS GOT JOBBED:
Canadian sprinter Jared Connaughton barely stepped on the inside line just before the final handoff and the team was disqualified because of it. They would have finished third, won a bronze medal and would have been heroes back home except for this stupid turn of events. When the race was over the team was running around the track and celebrating with the Canadian flag, as athletes who just won a huge race are wont to do, but then there was confusion when they were posted fifth on the board when they thought they finished in third, and then the crushing news that they were actually disqualified. The team tried to appeal the track judge's decision, arguing the violation had no outcome on the result, to no avail. (Hint: it didn't effect the outcome of the race. This is stupid.) Connaughton's got balls of steel, though. He went on TV immediately after the race and gave an interview in which he owned up and took responsibility for the team's loss. He echoed that sentiment in a tweet about an hour after the race, too. "I'm so sorry everyone. My heart is broken. I let my team down. I'm sorry," he wrote. The silver lining in all of this is that, after showing so much class and poise in the face of crushing defeat, if you search "Jared Connaughton" on Twitter media members and normals alike are calling for him to carry the Canadian flag in the closing ceremonies tomorrow. The country would have been proud of him if he won, but he's a hero because of how he lost. [Deadspin] [Full disclosure: Connaughton and I are from the same place, and I'm good friends with his sister.]
