RIO DE JANEIRO: David Rudisha sealed a historic Olympic 800m double as Shaunae Miller’s audacious dive and Thiago Braz’s pole vault gold for Brazil lit up a wet Monday night in Rio.

Kenya’s Rudisha was all class in a smooth 800m victory which made him the first man since New Zealand’s Peter Snell in 1964 to win the event at consecutive Olympics.

“It is great to win such a big competition, my second gold,” Rudisha said. “It’s so great. I am so excited. It is the greatest moment of my career.”

But Rudisha was soon upstaged by the Bahamas’ Miller, who threw herself head-first across the line to snatch victory from flummoxed American favourite Allyson Felix in the women’s 400m after a downpour forced a delay in the evening events and sent spectators scurrying for shelter at Olympic Stadium.

“I’ve never done it before. I have some cuts and bruises, a few burns. It hurts,” Miller said.

“When I was on the ground I didn’t know I’d won. I still don’t know how it happened. What was in my mind was I had to get a gold medal. The next thing I was on the ground. It’s an amazing feeling.”

More was to come when Braz stunned French defending champion and world record-holder Renaud Lavillenie to win the pole vault, grabbing Brazil’s second gold of the Games and bringing the sparse crowd to its feet.

Earlier, a wobble on the balance beam ended Simone Biles’ bid for a record five gymnastics gold medals.

Biles lost her status as Rio de Janeiro’s juggernaut at the Netherlands’ Sanne Wevers topped the podium.

At the velodrome, Elia Viviani recovered from a mid-race crash to beat celebrated British sprinter Mark Cavendish in the men’s omnium.

“I’m not angry, it’s a bike race,” said the 27-year-old Italian after the crash, which left South Korea’s Park Sang-Hoon in hospital with friction burns and bruises.

Gymnast Eleftherios Petrounias, who is 5ft 5ins (1.64m) and was bullied a child for his lack of height, stood tall for Greece when he won the rings event.

And North Korea’s Ri Se-Gwang had tears in his eyes and saluted military-style as he accepted his gold medal in the men’s vault.

Boxing may have to weather another storm of its own after a surprising decision in the men’s heavyweight gold medal fight, where boos cascaded down from the crowd when Evgeny Tischenko, of Russia, was announced as the unanimous winner over Vassiliy Levit, of Kazakhstan, who looked like the winner.

Cuban heavyweight Mijain Lopez again bested Turkish rival Riza Kayaalp, putting him in the company of wrestling great Alexander Karelin. Lopez beat Kayaalp 6-0 to capture his third Greco-Roman gold medal.

Lopez joins Karelin and Carl Westergren of Sweden as the only wrestlers with three Olympic titles in the classic discipline.

Uzbekistan’s Ruslan Nurudinov won the men’s +105kg weightlifting gold and Briton Charlotte Dujardin won gold in the equestrian dressage individual grand prix freestyle event with Valegro, the horse she won individual and team gold medals at the 2012 London Games.

Published in Dawn, August 17th, 2016