GOLD and BRONZE for Jamaica in the Women’s 100m in RIO!

by Sports

It was Elaine Thompson who won the GOLD for Jamaica in 10.71s for the 100m Women Final! Our 2-time Defending Olympic Champion, Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce won the Bronze. A valiant effort from Shelly after aggravating her toe injury in the Semi-Final. She ran her Season’s Best through the line in 10.86. It was a bittersweet feeling for Jamaicans knowing she was in shape to win the Gold and make history as the first woman to win 3 consecutive Olympic 100m titles, but it wasn’t meant to be after the injury was aggravated. We are extremely proud of our Pocket Rocket for being able to run through the pain and making the podium. Torie Bowie of the USA who came 3rd at the US trials got the Silver in 10.83. 

Congrats Ladies! It was a talented field, demanding focus, fitness, determination and of course speed.

Marie-Josee Ta Lou of the Ivory Coast continued to impress and came 4th with her PB in 10.86 (10.859). Thousandths of a second were used to separate her from Shelly. 

Dafne Schippers of the Netherlands still could not manage to get a good start and probably won’t ever because of her height and was 5th with 10.90. Look out for her in the 200m though! 

Michelle-Lee Ahye of Trinidad and Tobago was 6th in 10.92. 

English Gardner who the USA expected to win Gold and who won at the USA trials could not manage the pressure of the big stage and finished 7th in 10.94. 

Christania Williams of Jamaica looked as if she was injured and came last far behind with 11.80. News came in later that she had cramping in her calf muscle as a result of dehydration. A sign of being a rookie. However she is just coming out of high school and she put on a remarkable effort for Jamaica to even reach the Finals with her Personal Best and we are proud of her.

For those who missed it and wish to see the lead up to this heated field in the Final, let me take you through the 100m Women’s Semi Finals, as some familiar names were not there.

Torie Bowie and Ahye took Semi Final 1 on the same time in 10.90! Christania Williams did very well to come 3rd beating Ahoure of Ivory Coast with her PB of 10.96. 

Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce blazed the field winning in 10.88 over Dafne Schippers in 10.90! Ta Lou of Ivory Coast finished 3rd in 10.94. Shelly was in tears at the end over her toes though. It became a huge concern and most if not all Jamaicans swarmed social media worried about Shelly’s toe and prayed for Shelly and her toe for the Final. (The prayers worked!)

Elaine Thompson ate English Gardner‘s food (totally destroyed her from start to finish) also finishing in 10.88! English Gardner was stuck on clocking 10.90 as well, glaring over to Thompson’s lane wondering what really just happened.

Marie-Josee Ta Lou and Christania Williams went through to the final as the fastest losers.

Tianna Bartoletta from the USA did not make the final, coming a surprising 4th in the Semi-final won by Shelly in 11.00s!

10000m Men Final

Mo Farah of Great Britain got tripped up and fell during his race with about 14 laps to go but got back up giving the thumbs up sign and went on to win the race. Gold for Mohamed Farah! His 3rd Olympic Gold, running through the line with his Mobot sign. Congrats Mo!

Long Jump Final

Damar Forbes failed to hit over the 8.38m mark and finished at the bottom of the pack, 12th with a mark of 7.82m. Jeff Henderson of the USA won the Gold with 8.32m. 

Damar’s PB is 8.25m, which was the mark hit by the 4th place finisher. The athletes battled with headwind and Damar said he just did not feel comfortable or in full flight in the air for his last 2 jumps. There were other pits that could have been used to change the wind direction for the athletes but the wind in RIO changes direction all the time. That may be the reason they continued with the same pit. This is also the case at our very own National Stadium in Jamaica with 1 pit so our athletes must be prepared to put out their best in all conditions. Better luck next time Damar.

400m Semi-Finals

Javon ‘Donkey Man’  Francis finished 5th from Lane 1 in Semi Final 1 won by Kirani James easily in 44.02. LaShawn Merritt followed finishing 2nd. So Javon did not qualify for the Final. Well tried Donkey Man.

Van Niekerk jogged to 2nd in Semi Final 2. Trinidad & Tobago’s Cedenio won the race in 44.39. Ja’s Rusheen McDonald finished 6th, unable to qualify for the Final as well.

Taplin from Grenada won Semi Final 3 coming from behind for the win in 44.44.

Women’s Tennis

Mónica Puig of Puerto Rico upset Angelique Kerber (World #2) of Germany yesterday to win Gold.

Men’s Tennis

Juan Martín del Potro will face Andy Murray in the Gold Medal match today at 1pm 

Rafael Nadal will face Kei Nishikori in the Bronze medal match this morning at 11:30am. 

Swimming


Michael Phelps helped take his team to Gold and an Olympic record last night in the 4×100m Medley Relay, in what he says will be his last Olympic race. His RIO total is 5 Gold and 1 Silver. He ends his Olympic career with 23 Gold medals and 28 Olympic medals overall and of course a standing ovation as he waved Goodbye to the spectators in the Olympic stadium.

Stay tuned for the action and Lane assigment of the Men’s 100m today!

By: Gabrielle Burgess

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The Weekend in Sports – Michael Phelps is back, Tiger Woods’ record broken, Chelsea beaten 3-0 and more!

by SportsWhat's Hot

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What a weekend of Sports! Suga had no idea the weekend would be packed with so many Championships, drama and talent, but the Sports channels certainly delivered some unexpected treats and entertainment.

Swimming – U.S. Nationals in San Antonio

Michael Phelps (30 years old), the most decorated Olympian is not only back but back in Olympic form with 1 year to RIO! Phelps was out of the picture for a while, especially with his 6-month suspension for a DUI that ended 4 months ago. However, he was still not allowed to enter the World Championships in Russia. Instead he was confined to swimming in a more minor, but still important and respected National meet in San Antonio, USA.

Looks like they should have sent him to Kazan, Russia though, because Phelps’ times were faster than the Gold-winning times there. USA also had a poor performance only winning 2 individual gold medals! Phelps’ 3 individual events were the 100m Fly, 200m Fly and 200m IM. He had a late entry in the 200m Breast stroke perhaps just for practice, since he is worst at that one. He finished 5th in that race. But for his 3 main performances? He was body lengths ahead, racing against the clock and not the field. His 200m Fly time was faster than his Gold winning performance at the London Olympics and his 100m FLY and 200m IM times were just tenths of a second off. Spectacular performance. Can the legend on the track, Usain Bolt show he is back and ready for RIO too at the World Championships in Beijing this August 23?!

Golf – PGA Championship

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Jason Day finished the PGA Championship at 20 under with a par on the 18th hole, breaking Tiger Woods’ major championship record set of -19 at the 2000 Open Championship. After 7 top 5s including 3 second place finishes previously at majors and 10 top 10s since 2010, he finally came through and won his first major championship in style. Congrats Jason!

Netball- World Cup 2015

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Surprise Surprise, the Aussie Diamonds won the Netball World Cup in Australia. The Aussies have dominated for decades with their only threat, if any, being from New Zealand. The Sunshine girls from Jamaica played well, finishing 4th overall. They fell to the Aussies in the semi-finals 56-67 and then lost to England in the usual fight for Bronze, 44-66.

Tennis – Rogers Cup, Montreal

Serena Williams was upset by Belinda Bencic (mentored by former rival of Serena, Martina Hingis) in the semi-finals of the Rogers cup in 3 sets. Serena said she felt that she played like an amateur. Did she play like an amateur or did Bencic finally get an opportunity to beat her strategically? Bencic went on to win the cup in the finals by default versus Simona Halep, who retired down 0-3 in the 3rd set due to injury/heat.

For the men, Andy Murray (no. 2) beat Novak Djokovic 6-4, 4-6, 6-3 to win his 3rd Rogers Cup and eight-match losing streak versus world no. 1, Djoko. It was not easy though. After Djoko steam rolled him to even sets, Murray took an extended bathroom break before the 3rd and came out to serve first then quickly broke Djokovic to go up 2-0. At 3-1, Djokovic failed many times to break Murray’s serve and Murray finally went up to 4-1 after Deuce #10, a point that lasted over 15 minutes! I think that decided the match. Djokovic still showed some effort but Murray did not give up after losing 4 Championship points. He finally converted the 5th and won. Satisfying for Murray but frustrating for Djoko, whose streaks had to finally come to an end – 30 straight wins at Masters events, 24 straight wins in Masters deciding sets, 12 straight wins in Masters finals and of course, 8 straight wins versus Andy Murray.

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Gymnastics – USA Nationals

All Suga can say is that the men looked pathetic as usual. They were described as sloppy, making it hard for the selection committee to choose the best from the worst with competitors failing in what should be their strongest events individually. There were numerous falls off the bars, outrunning the runway after the vault and even unsure dismounts, one of which had to be repeated. Embarrassing.

Thank goodness for the ladies. Look out for Simone Biles, the women’s all-round Gymnastics Champ.

Barclay’s Premier League, BPL

Manchester City, runner up of BPL 2015, surely made their agenda known yesterday with a convincing 3-0 win over Defending Champs, Chelsea. After Terry’s failed attempt to defend the start of a play ending with Sergio Aguero’s first goal (31′), Terry was taken off for the entire 2nd half of the match. Kompany took advantage of a corner kick to head in the 2nd goal (79′) that went in off of the post and then Chelsea’s defense totally fell apart, resulting in Man City’s 3rd goal (85′) by Fernandinho. Mourinho placed players such as Fabregas and more in positions they should not have been, resulting in crucial coaching errors and they also played without their goal keeper who was sent off in the previous match, however Suga thinks Man City would have still come out on top regardless. After a draw with Swansea and a horrible loss to Man City for the opening of BPL, Chelsea has some work to do.

Looking forward to another weekend of high quality competition and variety of sports some time soon! Suga hopes you enjoyed as well.