Now the big names must try to match achievements of the unsung heroes
Canoeing and diving golds save British team from creeping angst
In London it was the mainstream sports of rowing and cycling that lifted the flagging spirits of Britain’s Olympians. Here in Rio it was the suitably watery pursuits of canoeing and diving that brought gold medals on a chilly day that felt like winter in Weston-super-Mare.
A first-ever GB diving gold – for Jack Laugher and Chris Mears in the three-metre synchros – and victory for Joe Clarke in the canoe slalom K1 may have lacked the glamour of Bradley Wiggins’s breakthrough win four years ago, but they saved the British team from creeping angst. The fifth day of Brazil’s Games was one for the unsung heroes and now the household names will have to match their deeds.
As Chris Froome rode along the seafront in the rain shaking his head, a lone British spectator held a Union flag against a fence in silent defiance of some underwhelming results. The mind span back to 2012, and Wiggins flashing Winston Churchill victory Vs on a golden throne outside Hampton Court Palace.
The feeling of a wet Brazilian town in winter was hardly in keeping with the sun-buttered pleasures of four years ago, when Wiggins’s victory in the time trial was the second of two gold medals that sent Britain’s Olympians into orbit, where they stayed for the rest of the London Games. With Froome’s thirdplace finish behind Fabian Cancellara here, there was a creeping sense that, for Team GB, there was a lack of brio in Rio.
That fear was lifted before the afternoon was out, with the canoeing and diving golds. What timing. After the Froome race it was fair to pick out patches of underachievement, or regression, for a team who won a record 65 medals on home soil after a slow start. Britain had already had their Wiggins moment, with Adam Peaty in the pool. The first gold medal celebration was a whopper. Yet the difficulties of reproducing the London bonanza in a South American setting are already apparent as the track cyclists, rowers and track and field stars (and Andy Murray) arrive on stage.
As Froome came home third, the 2012 memory produced images of Helen Glover and Heather Stanning winning the women’s pair at Eton Dorney to start the gold rush, and then Wiggins riding through Teddington and Strawberry Vale to Hampton Court Palace. Four hours earlier, Glover had announced: “This was for the whole of the team and the whole of the country.” Stanning also caught the mood: “We hope this is the start of things to come from the Great Britain team.”
A footnote to the Wiggins timetrial win is that the throne, a theatrical prop from a firm in Cricklewood, later failed to reach its reserve at Sotheby’s. But it certainly did its job that day. London glowed with excitement. Energy coursed through the streets. Britain’s Olympians fanned out across the sports with renewed vigour, grabbing medals, seizing fame. That was London. Specifically, London: the home city, rammed with euphoric fans. The crowd fed off the triumphs and the performers drew that extra edge of impetus from the crowd.
Nobody was doubting the enthusiasm of Britain’s biggest travelling team since Barcelona in 1992, but winning medals in Brazil is not like pulling them off a London tree. The conditions are utterly different. Small regressions are sufficient to erase medal chances.
In gymnastics, for example, the men’s team slipped from bronze in London to fourth in Rio. And after four full days, Britain easily led the table
for fourth-place finishes. There were other signs that Rio will be harder work than London. On day five, Qais Ashfaq became the fifth British boxer to fall when he was beaten in his opening bantamweight bout. The previous day, Britain’s big hope in the canoe slalom, David Florence, finished last of 10 in the final, more than 14 seconds behind the winner.
Concern mounts when the biggest names are custard-pied. But the smaller names are stepping up. Britain are not short of reinforcements, from Wiggins to Jessica Ennis-Hill to Mo Farah and Greg Rutherford. Those three heroes of “Super Saturday” four years ago can now see that Rio demands an extra level of application. The minimum target before the Games was 48, with a dream figure of 79, with Gracenote Sport’s Virtual Medal Table predicting a lower figure of 56. According to the BBC, Gracenote’s head analyst, Simon Gleave, reckoned Britain should have won 13 medals by close of play on Tuesday (rather than seven). Clarke, Laugher and Mears did a wonderful job of closing that gap.
British Cycling concealed its own disappointment by reporting: “Such a steely performance by Chris Froome to get another bronze medal four years after London 2012, especially on the back of his third Tour de France win. Well done Chris!” The power of positive thinking. A more critical assessment would be that Froome was meant to emulate Wiggins in adding Olympic gold to the Tour de France victory but found the task beyond him.
Britain’s track cycling team are next off the rank. They won seven golds from 10 events at the last two Games. The men’s team sprint today is the velodrome’s first big test. Of the men’s team pursuit, Wiggins says: “Something will have to go seriously wrong, I believe, for us to lose.”
So speaks the V for Victory man. The big names will now take their lead from so-called lesser sports.