Italy’s spectacular summer scuppered golden dreams in the men’s 4x100m, while the women’s team took bronzeThe mixed relays may have finished last weekend, but what a lot of conflicting emotions for the eight British sprinters who won medals in the 4x100m on Friday night.The men won the silver behind Italy, the women the bronze behind Jamaica and USA, and between them the British athletes ran the gamut from joy to frustration, anger and regret. Dina Asher-Smith was among the disappointed; she had hoped to win more than one bronze at these Games. It was not her injured hamstring that was nagging at her, but the sense that the relay team should have done better. Related: Laura Muir keeps faith and...
The run of Olympic Games when one British gold medal followed another in seamless style appear to be at an endOn a day that looks to have marked the end of Great Britain’s dominance of track cycling at Olympic level, there were symbols aplenty that the world has moved on, beyond the bald facts of the medal table. Dramatic crashes involving the men’s and women’s team pursuit squads closed the run of Olympic Games when one British gold medal followed another in seamless style, the hallmark of the track action in Beijing, London and Rio.In all the chaos, the sprinter Jason Kenny became Britain’s most decorated Olympian with his eighth medal in total, a silver in the team sprint, putting...
I did not sacrifice everything all these years I’ve been boxing and training so hard to settle for a few good performancesThe moment, when it came, was really powerful. Last Thursday night, in our GB Boxing team room in the Olympic village, it finally hit me. This is real. I am about to fight in the Olympic Games and my hopes of winning a medal, with gold being my favourite colour, begin now.We had been in Tokyo for 10 days, staying in a hotel for the first week before we moved into the village and it had all felt a bit surreal. I had this weird feeling this was just another training camp and I couldn’t switch on totally. It...
Watering the soil of cultural participation would leave a greater legacy than any number of British Olympic championsThere was a memorable moment at the emotional zenith of the London Olympics, back in that strange time when it seemed so vitally important the home Games was a success, so deeply shocking that George Michael played “new material” – oh, that new material – at the closing ceremony, and when Boris Johnson was just a…. Well, actually that’s pretty much the same.I don’t like to make Super Saturday too much about me, but it was also the moment I broke the record for witnessing British gold medals in a single day. There is no hard proof that my (yes, my) tally of...
Organisers have made the Games as safe as they can be – now athletes must follow the rules and embrace their opportunityNo matter who you are, or what sports you enjoy, the Olympics remains the greatest show on earth. It’s bigger than anything in football. Bigger than anything in any other sport. And, while I know there are many who don’t feel it is right that Tokyo 2020 is taking place during a global pandemic, I respectfully disagree and can’t wait for the Games to get under way.Let me try to explain why. It’s about wanting the best athletes in the world to have the opportunity to display their talents on the biggest stage of all, so they can provide...