Wide eyed — and Golden
17-year-old Jacoby wins swimming gold
TOKYO — The Latest on the Tokyo Olympics, which are taking place under heavy restrictions after a year’s delay because of the coronavirus pandemic:
MEDAL ALERT
Alaska has an Olympic swimming champion.
Seventeen-year-old high schooler Lydia Jacoby gave the United States a victory in the women’s 100-meter breaststroke, knocking off teammate and defending Olympic champion Lilly King.
Jacoby was the first swimmer from the state ever to make the U.S. Olympic swimming team.
Now, she’s heading back to Anchorage with a gold medal, rallying to win in 1 minute, 4.95 seconds.
South Africa’s Tatjana Schoenmaker claimed the silver in 1:05.22, while King gave the Americans another medal by taking the bronze in 1:05.54.
MEDAL ALERT
The American men have lost a backstroke race at the Olympic pool for the first time 1992.
Russian athletes swept the top two spots in the 100-meter back, with Evgeny Rylov claiming the gold medal in 51.98 seconds and teammate Kliment Kolesnikov taking the silver in 52.00. The defending Olympic champion, American Ryan Murphy, settled for the bronze in 52.19.
It was the first backstroke defeat for the U.S. men at the Olympics since the 1992 Barcelona Games. They won 12 straight golds at the last six Olympics, including Murphy’s sweep of the 100- and 200-meter backstroke at the 2016 Rio Olympics.
But the streak finally ended at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre.
MEDAL ALERT
Kaylee Mckeown has given the Australian women another swimming gold medal.
Mckeown backed up her status as the world record-holder in the women’s 100-meter backstroke with a winning time of 57.47 seconds. That’s just off the mark she set this year of 57.45.
The silver went to Canada’s Kylie Masse in 57.72, while former world record-holder Regan Smith of the United States settled for the bronze at 58.05.
Coming into the Olympics, Australia had not an individual women’s title since 2008. Now they have two, with Mckeown’s gold coming after Ariarne Titmus’ victory Monday in the 400 freestyle.
MEDAL ALERT
Britain has gone 1-2 in the men’s 200-meter freestyle at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre.
Tom Dean captured the gold in 1 minute, 44.22 seconds, while teammate Duncan Scott picked up the silver in 1:44.26. The bronze went to Brazil’s Fernando Scheffer at 1:44.66.
American Kieran Smith settled for a sixth-place showing after capturing a bronze in the 400 free.
Defending champion Sun Yang was banned from the Tokyo Olympics for a doping violation.
He is serving a more than four-year ban, though he could be eligible to return for the 2024 Paris Games. BEACH VOLLEYBALL The American “A-team” of April Ross and Alix Klineman have guaranteed themselves at least one more beach volleyball match at the Tokyo Olympics.
The U.S. women beat Spain 21-13, 21-16 on Tuesday morning for their second straight win. With one more game in the preliminaries left, they can do no worse than a three-way tie for first, which would be broken during a “lucky loser” matchup after the round-robin.
Ross, a three-time Olympian who has already won silver and bronze, and first-timer Klineman will play the Dutch team of Sanne Keizer and Madelein Meppelink on Friday.
MEDAL ALERT
Flora Duffy has won the Olympic women’s triathlon, earning Bermuda’s first Olympic gold medal and its first medal of any kind since 1976.
Duffy is a two-time former world triathlon series champion. She’s competing in her fourth Olympics and is one of just two athletes representing Bermuda in Tokyo.
The start of the race was delayed 15 minutes because of storm conditions around Tokyo Bay. Duffy pumped her arms over her head as she finished the swimming, cycling and running course in 1 hour, 55:36 minutes.
The 33-year-old Duffy had never finished higher than eighth in her previous three Olympic triathlons.