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All the action from day 16 - the final day - of the London
Olympics.
6:57am
And the announcement from the NZ Olympic Team is that single sculler Mahe Drysdale will carry the New Zealand flag during the closing ceremony this morning. He carried the flag in the opening ceremony at Beijing four years ago, so he's experienced and certainly deserves the honour.
5:26am
And that's that! Olympic competition is oficially over with the women's modern pentathlon all wrapped up. Naturally it is Lithuania who take the final gold medal thanks to Laura Asadauskaite. Also another silver for Team GB as Sam Murray caps a successful Games for the hosts winning their 65th medal overall.
So the United States top the medal table with 46 golds and 104 total medals ahead of China who had 38 golds in their 87 medals. Great Britain achieve their goal of third with 29 golds in their 65 medals. As we know New Zealand have had their most successful Olympics (equal with Seoul in total medals), winning 5 golds, 3 silvers and five bronze medals to finish 16th overall. That's an improvement from 26th four years ago in Beijing. Great stuff.
5:20am
The bulk of the New Zealand team will leave London late tonight.
Around 20 athletes, including the cyclists and swimmers will land
in Auckland first thing on Wednesday morning, followed closely by a
second wave of arrivals that day - the rowers, hockey teams and
sailors. Around 100 of the 184 members, including most of the
medal winners will take part in the official welcome home in
Christchurch on Friday. (Newstalk ZB)
4:35am
So with the basketball wrapped up there is just one more gold medal to be claimed in the women's modern pentathlon. They just have the combined event to come in that which involves athletes running to the shooting range, trying to hit targets, then running for a kilometre, then repeating. Interesting.
4:02am
And the US celebrate as they overcome Spain 107-100, it
was a great game, but a big final quarter from the American stars
was too much for the Spaniards to overcome. Kevin Durant top
scored with 30 while LBJ and Kobe bothe came up big at the end with
19 and 17 respectively. Pau Gasol's 24 points kept Spain in it,
while Juan Carlos Navarro started the game brilliantly to finish
with 21.
The Boss Bruce Springsteen's 'Born in the USA' is ringing out through the North Greenwich Arena as the star-studded American team parade around the court.
3:54am
LBJ confirms his new-found clutch-ness hitting a
contested three with the shot clock winding down to make it a nine
point game and possibly seal the gold medal.
3:51am
Finally LeBron James comes to life as the Spanish defence
goes to sleep to allow him to storm through the lane and throw down
a huge jame. That makes it 99-91 US with less than three minutes to
play.
3:32am
We go to the final quarter and it's still the same
margin. It was all Gasol that quarter as he added 15 points. Durant
added 10 for the US while Kobe started to make his presence felt
althoguh they still can't break away!
3:19am
Pau Gasol has come out HOT in this second half. He has
all nine of Spain's points four minutes into the third quarter to
have Spain up 67-66.
2:59am
We have a game on our hands in the basketball as USA lead
Spain 59-58 at half-time. Juan-Carlos Navarro has been excellent
for the underdogs with 19 points in the first half, while Denver's
Rudy Fernandez has added 12. Meanwhile Kevin Durant is leading the
Americans with 17 points, while LeBron James struggled to get in
the game early but finished the half with eight points.
It's a high scoring encounter with both teams playing attractive basketball and Spain look like they're not here to finish with a silver. Bring on an upset!
2:33am
It appears the basketball is the place to be seen. There are
celebrities aplenty with David Beckham, Arnold Schwarzenegger,
K-Stew (as I'm told she is known as) and Jesse Eisenberg (aka Mark
Zuckerberg or that geeky one) all in attendance. Meanwhile on the
court we have a game on our hands with it all tied up 39-39 midway
through the second.
2:05am
The highlight of the Olympic games (in my humble opinon) is
underway. A rematch of the 2008 final sees USA try to defend their
Olympic basketball crown against Spain. The Spaniards gave them a
run for their money four years ago, let's hope they can make
another game of it.
1.20am
Kazakhstan's Serik Sapiyev has topped Britain's Freddie
Evans to win the men's Olympic welterweight boxing gold medal
Sapiyev enjoyed a 17-9 victory, in the semi-finals Taras
Shelestyuk of Ukraine and Andrey Zamkovoy of Russia claimed the
bronze.
12:37am
There's been a bit of confusion over whether New Zealander Sam
Bewley would be riding in the men's mountain bike cross country
that has just got underway. Bewley is not in the race as he was
selected as a mountain bike rider to ensure New Zealand had a
reserve for their pursuit team on the track.
When questioned about it on their Facebook page, Bike NZ had this response:
"Our first priority was to select a male MTB rider to fill the spot. As no one met either the BikeNZ or NZOC selection criteria this left a space free. Given the limited number of spaces available for track due to IOC programme restrictions, the best use of the unfilled MTB spot was to ensure we had a reserve for our Mens TP. This resulted in a bronze medal. BikeNZ is investing in development pathways to ensure we have MTB riders capable of being selected for Rio 2016"
12:08am
Uganda's Stephen Kiprotich has claimed the London Olympic
marathon in a time of 2:08:01. He kept out Kenyans Abel Kirui and
Wilson Kiprotich to win by 26 seconds. He had several sneaky looks
over his shoulder running down the home stretch before bursting
into a massive smile when he realised he had it won.
Also Russia have beaten Agentina for the bronze medal in the
basketball in a thriller 81-77. Looking forward to the final
between USA and Spain coming up in just over 90 minutes. We will be
following that closely here so check back for updates!
11.49pm
For those of you holding out for the rhythmic gymnastics,
the group all round final starts at 12.30pm, as does the mountain
biking men's cross country.
The boxing is also coming up with finals of the fly 52kg, light
60kg, welter 69kg, light heavy 81kg and super heavy +91kg
divisions.
11.38pm
From the "Where are the now" file. Former Hurricanes and All Blacks
second five-eighth Paul Steinmetz has really taken control of this
5th-6th classification water polo clash. After leaving New Zealand
Rugby for the bright lights of Ulster in 2003, Steinmetz fell off
the radar for many New Zealand fans. It's a little known fact that
he actually emigrated to Hungary where he changed his first name to
Adam and rediscovered his true sporting passion, water polo.
He's putting on a real clinic tonight scoring twice to have Hungary
up 14-8 late in the piece.
Disclaimer: This story may not be completely true. If anyone does know the whereabouts of the Hurricanes rugby great Paul Steinmetz feel free to email us at sport@tvnz.co.nz
11.22pm
Despite his distinct bionic advantages, American
marathoner Steve Austin is lagging towards the back of the running
field at the halfway stage of the men's race. Can he make a push
for the front group?
11.05pm
Ugandan marathoner Stephen Kiprotich is leading the men's
race at the halfway point, Kenyan Abel Kirui is in second with
Ethiopina Getu Feleke coming third.
In the water polo, Australia cleaned up the US team with a dominant
8-4 victory deciding 7th and 8th place, while Hungary are leading
Spain 7-3 in the 5th-6th classification game.
10.40pm
Uzbekistan's Artur Taymazov won his third successive
Olympic gold in the men's 120 kg freestyle wrestling when he got on
top of Georgia's Davit Modzamanashvili in a close final.
The bout was scored 3-0 in Taymazov's favour after he took narrow
1-0 wins in each of the first two periods with minimum-ranking
throws.
Controversy reigned however with some questionable tactics employed
by the victor while his manager distracted the match referee.
10.02pm
The marathon is underway! Huge numbers of spectators line
the streets of London with people standing eight to ten deep along
the barriers.
There was the curious sight of Olympic officials
holding hands across the marathon's road track, keeping the second
field of competitors behind what I assume were the 'top
seeds', before they were allowed to join the front group prior to
the gun blast signalling the race start. Why didn't they simply
have a rope or tape, or some kind of cage to separate the
athletes?
9.56pm
The marathon is about to get underway with the runners
embarking on a 42.195-kilometre course that consists of one
short circuit of 3.571 kilometres followed by three circuits of
12.875 kilometres.
The course, which was designed to pass many of London's well-known
landmarks, starts on The Mall, within sight of Buckingham Palace,
and extends as far as the Tower of London in the east and the
Victoria Memorial in the west.
9.44pm
Kenya are hot favourites to take out the men's marathon
to make it back-to-back gold medals following their triumph four
years ago.
The trio of Wilson Kipsang, Abel Kirui and Emmanuel Mutai are
tipped to sweep all three top placings but they will be
racing in the memory of Beijing winner Sammy Wanjiru, who died
last year after he fell from balcony in the midst of a domestic
argument.
The race is due to get underway at 10pm.
9.21pm
The water polo match between Australia and the USA
to decide 7th-8th has just started.
It surprised me to learn the Aussies, for all their success in
the water over the years, have never won a medal in water
polo.
9.04pm
Back to wrestling - Belarusian Ali Shabanau took out the
1/8 freestyle 66kg final with a points decision over Jared
Frayer from the USA.
The American was beaten in both periods 3-0 and 1-0 in this round
of 16.
8.54pm
Water polo fans can enjoy some action in the pool just
after 9.15pm with USA taking on the Aussies in the 7th-8th
classification match.
Spain and Hungary follow that in the 5th-6th classification game at
10.40pm.
8.39pm
Looking ahead to the closing ceremony, Ben Ainslie, now
the most successful Olympic sailor after adding a fourth gold to
his collection at the London Games, will carry the flag for hosts
Britain.
The Spice Girls, One Direction, George Michael and The Who are expected to perform as London prepares to bid goodbye to what the Guardian newspaper dubbed the "feelgood Games".
8.04pm
The men's marathon starts at 10pm - that'll be a biggie
and no doubt draw a huge crowd out on the streets of London.
I'm interested to see the basketball final and whether the US team
can top yesterday's spectacle of Usain Bolt leading the Jamaican
quartet to 4x100 metres gold in world record-breaking time.
When all the finals are done and dusted, can China come through with a late rally in the gold medal winning stakes and top the US team? Currently the US has 44, above China with 38 and Britain on 28.
7.51pm
The wrestlers are wrapping up the freestyle 96kg
Qualifications with Turkey and Kazakhstan engaged in a tense
tussle.
The Kazakhstani came out on top, rag-dolling his opponent out of
the circle to take the win. Somewhat surprisingly the Kazakhstan
wrestler was dressed in blue, umm, tights, instead of the lime
green of Borat fame. Who knew blue was their national colour of
choice?
Right now India and Turkey are going head to head.
7.35pm
Welcome to onenews.co.nz's live updates of day 16 - the final day -
of the London Olympics.
No Kiwis in action tonight with the New Zealand contingent all having completed their events and no doubt partying hard somewhere in the Olympic village or greater London area.
We will cast our eye over various events with some athletics, wresting, boxing, gymnastics, mountain biking water polo all happening throughout the night, while around 2am our focus will shift to the final of the man's basketball with the US taking on Spain in a replay of the 2008 Games final.
For those of you that have been with us throughout the duration of the Games, get set for one more wild ride.