Great Britain enjoyed a rush of gold medals across a range of sports on Friday - including an unexpected triumph in team show jumping.
The trio of Ben Maher, Scott Brash and Harry Charles qualified for the event in third place behind Germany and the USA, but with the scores reset to zero, all three jumped clear with just two time penalties between them which was good enough for gold.
Maher won individual gold in Tokyo three years ago, while both he and Brash were members of the team that secured gold in 2012. It is a first Olympic medal for Charles, whose father Peter was also in the London squad.
Britain led all the way through the competition to see off silver medallists the USA, with France third after Julien Epaillard had one fence down in the final round.
After completing his clear round aboard Romeo 88, Charles said: “I’m pretty speechless, I need a good few hours to reflect. That was probably the best round of my life at the biggest moment in my career so far.
“To have me be good and Romeo come through like that on this stage and at this moment – it’s taken a lot to get to this position and I’m really proud of him.”
Page out of history
Great Britain’s Bryony Page completed her set of Olympic medals with gold in the women’s trampoline.
The 33-year-old won a surprise silver medal in Rio eight years ago and then bronze in Tokyo but went into this competition as the reigning world champion and gold medal favourite.
Page was the penultimate gymnast to compete in the final at Bercy Arena and she cried and leapt with joy after her score of 56.480 was confirmed.
Viyaleta Bardzilouskaya from Belarus became the first neutral athlete to win a medal at the Games, taking silver, while Canada’s Sophiane Methot claimed bronze.
Page, who also won the world title in 2021, qualified for the final with the fifth highest score but watched those competing ahead of her largely fail to surpass their qualifying marks.
The Sheffield-based athlete, meanwhile, increased her score by close to a full mark from 55.620 and then saw the final competitor, China’s Hu Yicheng, fall during her routine.
That ensured Page would win Britain’s latest gold medal, to the delight of the hordes of flag-waving fans packed into the arena.
Duo row to gold
Emily Craig and Imogen Grant won Olympic gold for Great Britain in the lightweight women’s double sculls at Paris 2024 after Ollie Wynne-Griffith and Tom George claimed silver in the men’s pair.
Craig and Grant finished just 0.01 seconds off the podium and 0.5 seconds from gold in Tokyo three years ago, with the 31-year-old Grant keeping a picture of the photo finish on her living room wall as inspiration.
It has certainly worked as they are unbeaten during this Olympiad and delivered on their status as pre-race favourites to win by 1.72 seconds from the Romanian pair Gianina van Groningen and Ionela Cozmiuc.
Craig was in tears after the race finished. The title they craved is now theirs in perpetuity, with this the last time the event is due to be part of an Olympic Games.
Although slightly slow at the start, the British pair nosed in front after 400 metres and had opened up a one-second lead by the mid-point of the race, finding clear water to give themselves a cushion to hold off the late Romanian sprint.
That was something Wynne-Griffith and George had not been able to do as they led for the majority of the men’s pair race, only to be beaten in a frantic finish by Martin and Valent Sinkovic of Croatia, who won in a time of six minutes 23.66 seconds – less than half a second in front of the British pair.
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