Olympic Diary : Day 6

A Night for Legends - Hoy , Vessali and a guy called Phelps

Trust the man to make me look an absolute fool. Just 2 days back , after his loss in the 200m butterfly, I was eulogising over Michaels Phelps attempt at the holy grail of the three-peat , an endeavour I honestly didn’t think he’d pull off. Last night , however , Phelps swam an outstanding 200 IM , only fractions of a second outside world record place and reasonably comfortably beat his great rival Ryan Lochte. So the tally now reads – 20 medals , 16 gold. If his performance in the 100 butterfly semi-final minutes after the individual medley  is any indication , not to mention the storming of the pool by US swimmers , I think pretty safe bets may be placed on Phelps coming away from London with 2 more gold medals.

Phelps : Back where he belongs

If Phelps had a blinder of a day, Lochte had  shocker. It is perhaps testament to the expectation he sets on himself (inspired no doubt by Phelps), that on a night a swimmer becomes the 2^nd greatest medal winner in the pool for his country , we talk of him having failed. However so it was as Tyler Clary romped home in th final 50 m to take the men’s 200 backstroke gold with Ryan Lochte finishing a not too close third (inspite of having a comfortable lead at the final turn). The Americans had an absolute scorcher in the pool with Rebecca Soni blitzing the 200m breaststroke WR on the way to her gold medal. The US hegemony was only broken by the gloriously named Dutchwoman Ranomi Kromowidjojo who won the women’s 100m freestyle.

If a legend shone bright in the pool , there were others making splashes in the deep in other disciplines. Sir Chris Hoy anchored the GB team sprint to equal Sir Steve Redgrave haul of 5 gold medals. Meanwhile on the piste, 38 yr old mother of one, Valentina Vessali (Italy) guided Italy to the women’s team foil gold – her 6^th Olympic gold and ninth medal. Vessali, incidentally, intends to back in Rio at the age of 42 after taking a year’s sabbatical to give birth to her 2^nd child.

The British Sprint Team with Sir Chris Hoy

                                                                Valentina Vessali

Mixed day for Indians : While Saina Nehwal entered the women’s singles badminton semi-final to really brighten our hopes for another medal. The other great medal prospect, shooter Ronjan Sodhi, failed to even qualify for the double trap final.

Quote of the Day: Journalist Leo Turrini, why Italian Fencing is so good- "There is a romantic explanation. It's the result of the Risorgimento [the movement that unified Italy in the 19th century]. If you look at the sports we are good at – Shooting, archery, fencing– they are all to do with defending ourselves. Once, every small town in Italy had a tower and had to defend itself against attacks."

Great Day : Host Britain finally started to assert themselves with golds in cycling , trap shooting and rowing. American Teenager Gabrielle Douglas won the women’s all round gymnastics gold.

Jackpot of the Day : Germany, who took the women’s cycling team sprint gold after first GB (semis) and then China are disqualified for illegal changeovers. Incidentally both Britain and China had faster times than the Germans with the Chinese setting a world record pace before the disqualification.