Around Tokyo
Swimming: Chase Kalisz won the first American medal of the Tokyo Games, taking gold in the men’s 400-meter individual medley. Jay Litherland made it a 1-2 finish for the powerhouse U.S. team, rallying on the freestyle leg to claim the silver. Brendon Smith of Australia earned the bronze. Kieran Smith grabbed another medal for the Americans with bronze in the men’s 400 freestyle. Tunisia’s Ahmed Hafnaoui was the surprising winner from lane eight, while Australia’s Jack McLoughlin settled for silver after leading much of the race. Kalisz, a protege and former training partner of Olympic great Michael Phelps, touched first in 4 minutes, 9.42 seconds. Litherland was next in 4:10.28, just ahead of Smith (4:10.38). Kalisz flexed his muscles, splashing the water while a contingent of his teammates cheered him from the stands of the nearly empty Tokyo Aquatics Centre. Yui Ohashi gave Japan its first swimming gold medal at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre. With a dazzling breaststroke leg, Ohashi romped to victory in the women’s 400-meter individual medley, touching first in 4 minutes, 32.08 seconds
Judo: Distria Krasniqi of Kosovo beat Funa Tonaki in the women’s 48-kilogram Olympic judo final, depriving host Japan of its first gold medal in its home Olympics and winning Kosovo’s secondOlympic medal. Krasniqi won on a throw with 20 seconds left, scoring a waza-ari and claiming a title that moved her to tears moments later. Later, Naohisa Takato won Japan’s first gold medal, beating Taiwan’s Yang Yungwei in the men’s 60-kilogram judo final. The 28-yearold Takato atoned for his disappointing bronze-medal performance in Rio de Janeiro five years ago with a hair-raising run to the Tokyo final at the venerable Nippon Budokan arena, the site of judo’s introduction to the Olympics in 1964.
Taekwondo: Panipak Wongpattanakit of Thailand and Vito Dell’Aquila of Italy have won the first two gold medals of the Olympic taekwondo competition in Tokyo. Wongpattanakit won her first gold in dramatic fashion in the women’s 49-kilogram final, scoring two points on a body kick inside the final 10 seconds for an 11-10 victory over 17-year-old Adriana Cerezo of Spain. Wongpattanakit’s gold is only the 10th in Thailand’s entire Olympic history.
Air rifle: China’s Yang Qian overtook Anastasiia Galashina of Russia to win the first gold medal of the Tokyo Games in the women’s 10-meter air rifle. Her last shot was her worst of the finals but still rallied her past Galashina with an Olympic-record score of 251.8. Switzerland’s Nina Christen took bronze.
Fencing: Aron Szilagyi of Hungary has become the first Olympic fencer to win three individual sabre gold medals after beating Luigi Samele, 15-7, in the men’s final at the Tokyo Games. Szilagyi used his fast reflexes to build an early 7-1 lead and held off a brief comeback from his Italian opponent before closing out the win.
Epee fencing: Sun Yiwen of China has beaten fivetime Olympian Ana Maria Popescu of Romania, 1110, in overtime to win gold in the women’s epee fencing competition. Popescu leveled the score at 10-10 with three seconds remaining to go to overtime but Sun soon scored the winning point instead.