Tokyo 2020 Olympics: Warholm smashes world record, GB sailing golds and cycling – live! | Sport

Football: The men’s semi-final as well. Nothing to report so far, 0-0 between Brazil and Mexico in the second half.

Gymnastics: The women’s beam final is about to start, and Simone Biles will be competing. She’s out there now getting ready.

On the below point, Guy Wilkinson emails in.

“Looks like 3 cyclists in a group have to be within 1 metre of the caught rider – whether this is 1st or last is unclear. UCI regulations 3.2.081: “A team is caught when the opposing team (at least 3 riders riding together) arrives at or within a distance of one metre of it.”

I’d say that definitely means any of the riders in the front team. But the front Dane crashed into that rider, meaning the other two couldn’t have been within a metre. They were at least a bike length behind. They then passed that rider when he was sliding across the ground.

Cycling: Formally, there is still no result between Denmark and Great Britain in the men’s team pursuit. Denmark is apparently arguing that point catching the last rider means the end of the race. However, usually ‘catching’ them doesn’t mean putting them through the floor of the velodrome.

Silver again for Great Britain. They were never in that race, their three riders broke up almost immediately and that means they couldn’t help one another around the circuit. The Dutch moved as one orange menace. They burn through in a new Olympic record, 41:369.

Cycling: It doesn’t come together for Australia in the men’s team sprint final, with France taking the bronze medal. Nearly two seconds faster than Australia, and a second outside the world record. Huge French support in the stands as well, must be a lot of other athletes stopping by or something. Australia’s team broke up on the circuit.

Sports climbing: Thank you climbers! I have received approximately 36 emails telling me about the strappy thing. Now I can tell you. This is the wonder of the internet. The strappy thing is called an auto-belay. It retracts automatically as the climber ascends, so there is a very light tension but not enough to give them any lift. If they put weight on it then it rolls out the other way. And if it moves quickly, as when they fall, it locks off and holds them. It is very much a big giant boingy seatbelt.

So these human beings floating up a vertical 15 metre (not 50) fake rock face are floating entirely under their own steam.

Cycling: Another update from reader Thomas Atkins. “Chris Boardman said on the BBC that he believed the Danes had won as they had caught the rearmost GB rider just before they crashed, hence they won the race. You don’t have to finish the 4k if you catch the team in front.”

This is a new development. You can win a race by just torpedoing straight into the back of the next rider. That’s what you’d have to call a flex.

Another world record! They’re falling like pennies from heaven. The Germans faster than ever before: 4:04:402, over six seconds ahead of the British. They’ll have to settle for silver, but what a duel it has been all day. The Great Britain reign over this event comes to an end, they’ve dominated it since 2012, but there is now a different Olympic champion.

The parallel bars final for the men has a late twist, fittingly, as Lukas Dauser competes last and lands a 15.700 to take silver. Ferhat Arican is something of an anomaly as a Turkish gymnast, and he takes home a medal as well. But Jingyuan Zou’s routine was astounding: difficulty 6.9, execution 9.333.

Cycling: The UCI Track Cycling twitter account says that Denmark will ride for gold in the men’s team pursuit. Doesn’t say why, and there’s still no formal result on the Olympics website.

Gymnastics: The men’s parallel bars final is well underway, China in gold and bronze positions so far.

Cycling: Women’s team pursuit, and Australia very narrowly beat Italy for fith spot.

Cycling: Thomas Atkins is watching a different broadcast to me. On his telly, regarding the men’s team pursuit heat with the crash, “they’re saying that the Danes would be recorded as the winners of the pursuit, but they’re in danger of being disqualified for riding into the back of the opposition (and, presumably, being berks about it afterwards). I’d be surprised if GB got to ride in the final here.”

There’s still no time recorded for either team by the IOC. But one team actually finished the race, the other didn’t, and one team caused the crash. Still waiting, even Kieran Pender at the velodrome has no word yet.

Cycling: The women’s team pursuit medals are about to be contested. USA and Canada for bronze, Germany and Great Britain for gold.

Sport climbing: Can someone who knows anything about this sport email and let me know: does the strap thing help pull them up at all? Is there any tension in it? Or is it slack and purely for safety? Like, it definitely retracts as they climb, but I can’t tell if it’s… boingy, for want of a better word.

Sport climbing: Bassa Mawem of France has basically sprinted up that vertical wall in 5.42 seconds. So maybe the wall is 50 metres but surely the whole climb can’t be 50 metres? Otherwise they’re climbing almost as fast as Olympic sprinters can run.

Ah, ok, they said fifteen metres. That makes much more sense. Otherwise these guys should be climbing on the athletics track.

Sport climbing: We’ve got a big wall. Apparently it’s 50 metres high. We’ve got a bunch of coloured plastic indoor-rock-climbing bits sticking out of it. And we’ve got athletes in harnesses attacked to some sort of strap to stop them falling down if they lose their grip.

And somehow, these human beings are going Spiderman up that wall in a time of… 6.19 seconds is the fastest so far. That’s absurd.

Sport climbing: <=== Now here’s one I’m excited about. My first look at this particular sport. It’s nice to come into something completely fresh. This is the men’s combined speed qualification. Let’s have some first impressions.

Cycling: And another Olympic record, as the Dutch go around in 41.431. So Netherlands and Great Britain will race for gold in the men’s team sprint, Australia and France for bronze. The Australians can’t take a trick.

Cycling: Records as well as riders keep tumbling, this time in the men’s team sprint. They’re racing to see who will get into the gold medal race later today. Australia set an Olympic record with 42.103 to beat Russia, but then Great Britain betters that record with 41.829 to beat Germany.

Cycling: Still no confirmation on that last race result, which dictates who will face Italy for gold. But the crash certainly wasn’t GB’s fault, they were just riding along in front, being well beaten. Madsen just didn’t look up, which velodrome cyclists rarely do for aerodynamics. But you’d think that having a look around once in a while mightn’t be a bad idea.

Cycling: This is extraordinary. The Danish team was absolutely flying. They were towelling up the Brits. Both teams had dropped down to three riders, and the third British rider had broken well off the back, lagging behind his teammates. The Danes were about to lap them, in the heats of the team pursuit. Presumably, Frederik Madsen didn’t know he was about to lap GB, because he ran straight up the back of Charlie Tanfield. Full speed, crashed them both to the deck. Then the Danish rider had a tantrum and yelled and stomped around, while the bruised and dirtied British rider got back on his bike and finished the lap. That means three British riders finished, and only two Danes – which only leaves one result, surely?

Cycling: Great Britain and Denmark are racing for a spot in the gold medal showdown, and there’s a collision! A rider from each team down.

Cycling: Another Olympic record, this time in the heats for the team pursuit for the Australian men. They had that crash yesterday that means they had to retake their race and come fifth in qualifying. This means the best they can do in the finals would be bronze, but they give themselves a good shot with 3:44:902.

Italy follow that up with a fierce ride against New Zealand, and that’s the world record! They fly into the gold medal race with 3:42:307, juuuust edging out the Kiwis with 3:42:397. So NZ would have had a world record in any other race at any other time in this event, but came up against a team that went a few hundredths better.

Cycling: An Olympic record for the Netherlands men’s team sprint riders in the qualifying for that event, coming in at 42.134 seconds. Great Britain qualify second, Australia third, then France, New Zealand, Russia, Germany, Poland.

Max Laugher collects third place in the men’s 3-metre springboard, holding his nerve near the end with his highest degree of difficulty for the finals: 3.9. He registered 87.75 points for that dive, 518 in total.

There was pressure on the eventual gold medallist next, as his compatriot Zongyuan Wang scored 102.6 with an incredible forward 4-and-a-half somersault dive, landed to perfection. But Siyi Xie performed exactly the same dive and registered exactly the same score with his sixth and final appearance on the board, and retained his overall lead to take gold.

Cycling: Ok, scrap that previous post, it’s already out of date. Things move fast at the velodrome. That’s kind of the point, but still. They’re handing out world records like Oprah cars. The old record, the 4:10ish mark that Great Britain set at the Rio Olympics and that got broken by the German women yesterday? That was bettered today by Australia, New Zealand, Canada, the USA, Great Britain, Italy, and Germany.

The new world record from yesterday was 4:07:307. Team GB just beat that with 4:06:748, then the Germans took it back again in the very next heat with 4:06:159.

Stunning. So Germany and GB will ride for gold. USA and Canada for bronze.