Five-star Dressel Joins Elite Olympic Club As Schauffele Wins Golf Gold

Tokyo, Aug 1 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 1st Aug, 2021 ) :Caeleb Dressel powered to his fifth swimming gold medal of the Tokyo Olympics on Sunday as the United States won their duel in the pool with Australia, while Xander Schauffele claimed golf gold.

The Olympic Stadium will later witness the men's 100 metres showdown, while Germany's Alexander Zverev takes on Russia's Karen Khachanov in the men's tennis final.

Dressel dominated the men's 50m freestyle final, setting a new Olympic record of 21.07sec, and then returned to help his team smash the world mark in the men's 4x100m medley relay.

The other undoubted star of the pool was Emma McKeon, who finished with four golds to become the first woman to win seven swimming medals at a single Games.

McKeon provided a golden finish when she helped Australia to the women's 4x100m medley relay crown, less than 40 minutes after winning the 50m freestyle.

US swimmer Robert Finke touched first in the men's 1500m freestyle to make it a distance double after winning the 800m earlier in the meeting.

The United States ended with 11 golds in the pool, two ahead of fierce rivals Australia, whose nine golds marked their best-ever showing.

Dressel, 24, didn't get close to matching Michael Phelps' eight-gold haul at Beijing 2008 but he joins just four other swimmers with at least five wins at a single Games.

"I'm proud of myself," said the American, who also won two relay golds at the 2016 Rio Games. "I think I reached what my potential was here at these Games.

McKeon, 27, became just the second woman to win seven medals at one Olympics in any sport, after Ukrainian gymnast Maria Gorokhovskaya in 1952, and is now Australia's most successful Olympian, with five gold medals and 11 overall.

"I look at the athletes that have gone before me and have been so impressed and inspired by what they've done but I've never been into the stats and medal counts," she said.

"But to be in that kind of company, it's an honour and I know I've worked hard for it.

" US golf star Schauffele held his nerve at the Kasumigaseki Country Club to see off Slovakia's Rory Sabbatini by one shot.

The American world number five finished on 18-under par 266 after carding a 67 while veteran Sabbatini shot a stunning, course-record 10-under-par 61. Behind them, there was a seven-man playoff for bronze.

- Bolt crown up for grabs - Later on Sunday, Usain Bolt's Olympic 100m crown is up for grabs in the cavernous, spectator-free Olympic Stadium, where trackside temperatures soared in the summer heat.

The pandemic-postponed 2020 Games are the first since Athens 2004 to be held without Jamaican sprint king Bolt, who retired in 2017 after winning the 100m-200m sprint double in Beijing, London and Rio.

The race appears wide open. Trayvon Bromell, the American who owns the fastest time this year of 9.77sec, only scraped through as a fastest loser after finishing fourth in his heat.

China's Gong Lijiao lived up to her pre-Olympic form by winning gold in the women's shot put, denying New Zealand veteran Valerie Adams a third successive gold.

US gymnastics great Simone Biles, struggling with a debilitating mental block, withdrew from the floor final, leaving her with just one more chance of competing in Tokyo.

With Biles taking a back seat due to mental health issues, freshly crowned all-around champion Sunisa Lee goes for uneven bars gold as the apparatus finals begin.

Britain's Charlotte Worthington won the first BMX freestyle gold in Olympic history, while Australia's Martin Logan took the men's title.

Olympics chiefs sweated over the marathons and race walks, with temperatures at the race venue in Sapporo, north of Tokyo, expected to hover between maximums of 31 and 34 degrees Celsius (88 to 93 degrees Fahrenheit) over the next week.

Heat has been a persistent concern for organisers in Japan, with a raft of counter-measures drawn up including misting stations and ice jackets.