RIO DE JANEIRO — Day 2 of the Olympic Games was one of painful drama and one for the record books. Swimmers set three world records Sunday.
• Sweden’s Sarah Sjostrom set a new 100-meter butterfly world record when she won in 55.48 seconds.
• English swimmer, Adam Peaty, won the 100-meter breastroke with 57.55 seconds and broke his own world record.
• American swimmer Katie Ledecky also broke her own world record and won the 400-meter freestyle with a time of 3 minutes, 56.46 seconds.
Meanwhile there were assorted other firsts:
• Swimmer Michael Phelps added his 19th gold medal when he and Nathan Adrian, Ryan Held, and Caeleb Dressel won the 400-meter relay for the USA, defeating France, which came in second, and Australia, third.
Phelps, 31, who produced a stunning second leg, has now won 23 medals in total, extending his record as the most decorated Olympian of all time.
• China’s Wu Minxia became the first diver to claim five Olympic gold medals, winning the 3-meter springboard for five consecutive Games stretching back to Athens 2004.
• America’s women’s basketball scored a 65-point rout over Senegal, setting a record for the largest margin of victory and a single-game high in points. Diana Taurasi, Breanna Stewart and Sylvia Fowles each scored a team-high of 15 points. On the Senegal team, only Fatou Dieng, scored in the double digits with 10 points.
• Majlinda Kelmendi won Kosovo’s historic first Olympic medal with a gold in judo. The 25-year-old defeated Italy’s Odette Giuffrida in the final of the women’s 52 kilogram event to add the Olympic gold to the two world titles and three European crowns she’s won since 2013.
This is the first Olympics at which athletes can compete under the flag of Kosovo, which proclaimed independence from Serbia in 2008.
• South Korea’s women won an incredible eighth consecutive team gold medal in archery. The trio of Chang Hye Jin, Choi Misun and Ki Bo Bae defeated Russia in the final, while Chinese Taipei earned the bronze.
It wasn’t really a surprise. Korean archers have won every women’s team title at the Olympic Games since the sport was introduced in 1988.
There was intense drama, first in the form of a bicycle race that saw a Dutch rider hospitalized and an American one not just lose her first place position with the victory within sight but to actually finish fourth.
The Netherlands’ Anna van der Breggen overtook USA’s cyclist Mara Abbott and claimed the gold medal Sunday with a 150 meters to go to the finish line. Abbott, who had been leading, was also surpassed at the last minute by Emma Johansson of Sweden who took the silver and Elisa Longo Borghini of Italy who earned the bronze.
Van der Breggen’s victory, however, was shadowed by the crash of her team mate Annemiek van Vleuten, who flew over her handlebars with 11 kilometers to go in the race. The wreck put her in intensive care with a serious concussion and three minor fractures to her spine.
There was more traditional sports drama too when the favorites to win the Tennis gold in doubles — American sisters Serena and Venus Williams — were upset by the Czech team.
Lucie Safarova and Barbora Strycova beat the first-seeded American sisters 6-3 6-4 in 93 minutes — the Williams sisters first ever doubles defeat at the Olympic Games in 16 matches
Hours after the Williams’ upset, more drama occurred on the tennis court when No.1 Novak Djokovic was defeated 7-6 7-6 by Argentina’s Juan Martin del Potro.
Meanwhile, unseeded Italian Fabio Basile claimed the men’s 66 kilogram judo gold, beating South Korea’s An Baul — and produced an impressive somersault to celebrate.
And, Hsu Shu-ching from Chinese Taipei won gold in the women’s 53 kilogram weightlifting with a combined total of 212 kilograms in the snatch and clean and jerk.
