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Defending Olympic champs bumped from beach volleyball semis

The men’s beach volleyball defending champions from the Athens 2004 Olympics have gone down in a tight semifinal match against their fellow Brazilians.

The pairing of Ricardo Santos and Emanuel Rego were one match away from defending the gold. In today’s match Fabio Magalhaes and Marcio Araujo were too good on the day and took the match 22-20, 21-18.

Ricardo and Emanuel were up against it in the first set after falling behind at 5-10. This margin was slowly reduced and both teams found themselves level at 19-19. It was then 20-20 before the younger and taller pairing took the last two points to take the crucial first set.

In the second set the defending champions took the first point however after that they were always fighting to catch their opponents. Late in the set it was 18-19 for Ricardo/Emanuel. They were not able to score again and the pairing of Marcio Araujo/Fabio Luiz closed out the match.

They will meet the USA pairing of  Philip Dalhausser and Todd Rogers who easily defeated Jorge Terceiro and Renato Gomes of Georgia 21-11, 21-13 in the first semifinal.

The men’s beach volleyball gold medal match is scheduled to take place at 11am on August 22 at the Chaoyang Park Beach Volleyball Ground. 

If you don’t like to party stay away from the beach volleyball

Last night I got to experience beach volleyball Olympic style. It is a real party atmosphere and has changed a lot from the days when I played.

Every moment that the players are not in action there is a party song pumping out of the sound system. Any break in play you get to see the dancing girls strut their stuff. Even in the hey days of the AVP tour in the USA you did not get all this.

Some might say it is a bit over the top, others love it. The main event is watching the beach volleyball and there was plenty of action on the courts last night.

In the first match the Brazilian pairing of Marcio Araujo/Fabio Luiz took on Florian Gosch and Alexander Horst. The first set was tight and could have gone either way when the score was 20-20. It was however the more experiend Brazilians who took the set 22-20.

In the second set the Brazilians always held a slight advantage and they were able to use that to win the second set and a spot in the semi-finals as they completed a 22-20, 21-17 win. The Austrian’s had chances to win and played well.

In the second match the stadium came alive. It was the traditional showdown between the US and Brazil. The 2004 gold medal winners from the Athens games, Ricardo Santos and Emanuel Rego faced off against Sean Rosenthal and Jacob Gibb.

Gibb is just over 2 metres tall and put up some pretty big blocks for his Brazilian opponents to hit past. The shorter Brazilian’s also did pretty well in the blocking department and the crowd witnessed some huge blocks and huge spikes. Throw in some great defence and we had a great match.

The strong USA-Brazil following in the crowd added to the atmosphere. The US team pushed the defending champions in the first set and were at one stage just 18-17 down. Ricardo and Emanuel were able to hold it together and claimed the first set 21-18.

In the second set the Brazilian team slowly edged away from the USA team despite several errors coming in their play. Santos missed quite a few serves and sent some spikes long or wide by large margins. To counter this he also came up with many crucial blocks and good digs.

The match was taken 21-18, 21-16 by the big time Brazilian players. They are looking good to defend the gold medal. 

One semifinal is an all Brazilian affair with the winners from the above matches meeting each other. In the other semi the USA’s Rogers/Dalhausser meet the surprise semifinalist’s of Geor/Gia from Georgia.  

No magical moment for Hackett in Beijing

Australia’s Grant Hackett was today swimming for his place in history as he attempted to do what he denied Keiran Perkins in 2000, three consecutive 1500m freestyle Olympic swimming gold medals. Just like Perkins he has come up one short.

The final today has seen Tunisia’s Oussama Mellouli upset the great Australian distance swimmer. Mellouli took the lead at the 1100m mark and held on as a late rush came from Hackett. The margin at the end of 1500m was 0.69.

Mellouli’s winning time was 14:40.84 which was slower than the 14:38.92 swum by Hackett in his qualifying swim on Friday.  Ryan Cochrane from Canada took third.

It remains to be seen if this is the end of the road for Grant Hackett after what to date has been a fantastic swimming career.

Usain bolts home in magical night at the Bird’s Nest

My wife and I were privileged enough to be just two people in a crowd of over 90 000 that witnessed Usain Bolt dash home in world record time in the glamour event at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. His time of 9.69 run in the 100m final made it one of the great runs in Olympic history.

The photo above, although not the best you are likely to see shows just how he dominated the event. The expected challenge from Asafa Powell did not eventuate and it was left to Bolt to thrill the crowd, and that he did.

Having been to sporting events in China in the past I am amazed at how their behaviour has changed over the years. The atmosphere in the Olympic Stadium for the 100m final was the most electrifying I have witnessed. The crowd went off once the athletes arrived at the start of the 100m.

The level of excitement lifted about 20 notches and you knew you were witnessing something special. As the start drew near a message went up on the giant screen calling for quiet to allow the starter to be heard. The crowd made up of mainly Chinese obeyed.

The tension built as the starter yelled out “On your marks”… the gun sounded and the stadium exploded with noise and excitement. It was now the Usain Bolt show.

He glided to the front of the pack as thousands of flashbulbs glittered in the night. Within a blink of an eye Bolt crossed the line and moments later the realisation of a new world record hit the crowd.

This added to the moment. It was one thing to be part of the main event at the 2008 Beijing Olympics but to see the world record of 9.69 was another thing. The roar of the crowd had still not diminished as the Olympic champion played it up to the crowd and the watching billions around the globe.

The crowd cheered as if they never wanting the moment to end. It was a bit like a music crowd calling for an encore. The best that could be done was some serious strutting and some flag waving from Bolt but that was what the crowd wanted to see.

This was truely a night to remember in hot and steamy Beijing.

Li Na has Olympic tennis center rocking

Playing before a huge one sided crowd in the Chinese capital Beijing, Li Na could not have asked for more support as she took on the current Wimbledon champ Venus Williams.

The match started with Williams jumping out to an early 3-0 lead. She looked to be overpowering her Chinese opponent. With the crowd on her side Li gradually worked her way back into the match.

A few double faults from Williams helped the cause and before you knew it Li was up a break and had the first set in her sights. The crowd was pumped and the fact Li was playing an American made it even more exciting for them. Li went on to take the first set 7-5. If there was a roof over the whole stadium it would have been lifted by the Chinese cheering.

In the second set it was Li who got the first break as she went out to a 3-1 lead.  Williams quickly hit back and then it was neck and neck until at 6-5 when Li got the crucial break to wrap up the match.

7-5, 7-5 to Li and a great victory for  the home town favourite.

Federer out of Olympic singles tournament

After a long rain delay Roger Federer took on James Blake in the Olympic tennis singles. Federer made too many unforced errors. This combined with good play from Blake at crucial times saw the Swiss no. 1 seed exit the tournament.

James Blake won the match 6-4, 7-6(2). The unforced error count for Federer was  56. This is way too high in two sets of tennis.

Watching from courtside it seemed that Federer was having trouble getting into his game. His shotmaking did not appear silky smooth as I have witnessed in the past.

Overall Blake was just too good. When Federer looked like making a comeback after getting into the tiebreak Blake came up with the big plays and won convincingly.

The crowd made up mostly of Chinese with a sprinkling of foreigners were cheering for the Swiss player. There was the odd cheer for Blake from US people in the crowd.

In the other quarterfinal match that followed Rafael Nadal defeated Jurgen Melzer of Austria 6-0, 6-4.

In other matches on the outside courts at the Olympic tennis green Serbia’s Novak Djokovic defeated Gael Monfils of France 4-6, 6-1, 6-4 and Chile’s Fernando Gonzalez defeated Paul-Henri Mathieu also from France 6-4, 6-4.

Check back here later for some photos from my night at the tennis.

Australia’s 4 x 200m women claim gold and smash world record

In what had not been a good day at the pool so far for Australia the 4 x 200m freestyle team has changed all that.

Australia were hoping for three gold medals in the pool today. They have had to settle for one.

Swimming a world record time of 7:44.31, down from the previous record of 7:50.09, the team of Stephanie Rice, Bronte Barratt, Kylie Palmer and Linda Mackenzie have triumphed over China. The winning margin was 1.62 seconds. The USA took bronze.

France narrowly lead after the first leg with Coralie Balmy just 0.03 ahead of Stephanie Rice after the French girl clocked 1:56.57. By the next leg Australia held the lead and never looked back.

Other teams had individuals who swam faster times than the Aussie girls however this is a team event and overall the combination was too strong for the rest of the field. It was China’s Pang Jiaying who swam the fastest individual leg as she anchored the Chinese team with a 1:54.39 leg.

Stephanie Rice has now bagged three gold medals following her two medley gold’s she won on other days at the Beijing Olympic swim meet. So far all of Australia’s gold medals have come from the swimming pool and all have been won by the women.

Misery for Sullivan as Bernard takes gold in 100m freestyle swimming final

Don’t you hate it when you see someone break world records in the races that don’t matter. That is how it has panned out for Australia’s Eamon Sullivan in the men’s 100m freestyle at the Beijing Olympics.

Sullivan had broken the world record in the first leg of the 4 x 100m freestyle final a few days ago. He saw France’s Alain Bernard snatch it away from him in the first semi of the 100m freestyle yesterday. Sullivan then hit back and further lowered the mark to 47.05 in the second semi.

That set the stage for today’s climatic 100m men’s freestyle final. Sullivan and Bernard have been the hot swimmers in this event in 2008. Each held the world record only to see it broken by the other man.

The two lined up next to each other in the final and after the first lap it was Sullivan who held a narrow lead as he made the first turn with a time of 22.48. The Frenchman was just 0.05 behind.

You had the feeling that the gold was going to be won by a narrow margin, and that it was. Bernard came home in 24.68 compared with Sullivan’s time of 24.84. That gave him a margin of 0.11over his Australian opponent.

Bernard was triumphant, Sullivan looked on stunned. After all the build up, the world records and the expectation he was going home with the silver.

The old saying goes ”You can break world records anytime however you can only win an Olympic gold every four years.” Has Sullivan missed his chance? I am sure he would trade all the world records for the gold.

Congratulations to Alain Bernard the men’s 100m freestyle champion at the Beijing Olympic games. It was a race that lived up to expectations. A great one in the long Olympic history.

China wins first gold at Beijing 2008 Olympic swim meet

The 200m butterfly race for women has turned out to be a glorious victory for the Chinese. They have gone one-two to win the first gold medal of the Beijing games in the swimming.

Australia’s Jessicah Schipper who is the world champion and world record holder in this event was taking on Liu Zige and Jiao Liuyang from China.

In the semifinal Schipper had faded over the closing stages of the race. I was wondering to myself was she saving herself for the final or would she repeat this in the final.

Unfortunately there was a repeat of the semi performance in the final. Schipper went out hard and was under world record pace. She lead at the 50m and 100m marks.  Liu made her challenge going to the 150m turn anad from there she pulled away from Schipper who was also overtaken by Jiao in the last 50m.

In the end it was Liu who powered to the wall to not only win China’s first swimming gold at the Beijing Olympics but she also set a new world record with a time of 2:04.18.  This was well under Schipper’s previous mark of 2:05.40.

This was a fantastic result for China.

My psychic powers help Trickett qualify for 100m freestyle final

I do not claim to be a psychic but it is funny how things worked out this morning in the semifinals of the 100m women’s freestyle.

Libby Trickett had put in a swim where she swam 54.10 seconds to touch the wall in fourth place in the first semi. I was thinking that she could miss out on the final with that time.

Next up was the second semifinal. At the start of this I was thinking it must be time for a false start. As it turned out the girl from China swam a fast race and touched the wall first. Luckily for Trickett she had false started and this saw the Australian world record holder sneak into the final as the slowest qualifier.

It was a Pang Jiaying’s misfortune that allowed Trickett to sneak into the final.

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