The Unofficial 2008 Beijing Olympics Blog

Tirunesh Dibaba of Ethiopia has won gold and set a new Olympic record in the Women’s 10000m at the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games on August 15.

Dibaba’s time of 29:54.66 was enough to break the old record of 30:17.49 set by fellow Ethiopian Derartu Tulu and hold off silver medalist Elvan Abeylegess of Turkey who ran a time of 29:56.34. Bronze went to Shalane Flanagan of the United States in a time of 30:22:22.

The world record of 29:31.78 seconds in this event is held by China’s Wang Junxia China, set in 1993.

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Michael Phelps will have to fight his “great friend and great competitor” Ian Crocker in the Men’s 100m Butterfly on Saturday morning in his quest for eight gold medals.

The world record holder of this event, Crocker won’t allow an easy win for Phelps, as this is Crocker’s only chance to win an individual gold medal at the Beijing Games.

In the Women’s 200m Backstroke final, defending Olympic champion Kirsty Coventry of Zimbabwe will encounter the close competition from two Americans — world record holder Margaret Hoelzer and the 16-year-old rising star Elizabeth Beisel.

Great Britain’s Rebecca Adlington will go for her second gold at the Water Cube in the Women’s 800m Freestyle, after winning the Women’s 400m Freestyle on Monday. Camelia Alina Potec of Romania will be her biggest rival, with the absence of world champion Kate Ziegler of the United States and Olympic champion Ai Shibata of Japan, who failed to qualify.

The Men’s 50m Freestyle final will see the close match of Thursday’s 100m Freestyle champion Alain Bernard of France, world record holder Eamon Sullivan of Australia, and Brazilian Cesar Filho Cielo who qualified fastest for the final in an Olympic record.

Simon Aspelin and Thomas Johansson of Sweden made history on August 15 in their epic 7-6(6), 4-6, 19-17 defeat of Arnaud Clement and Michael Llodra of France to book their spot in the Men’s Doubles final at the Olympic Green Tennis Center.

The last was the longest set ever played in Men’s Tennis at any Olympic Games and set a new record for the most number of games (59) played in a Men’s Olympic (best-of-three sets) match.

Aspelin and Johansson won on their second match point as the clock approached 10:30 p.m. (UTC/GMT +8). Johansson jumped into his teammate’s arms as the crowd gave a standing ovation.

This is only the Swedish team’s third tournament playing Doubles together. They reached the semifinals in Doha and Bastad earlier this year.

for more http://en.beijing2008.cn/news/sports/headlines/tennis/n214547652.shtml

The first gold of the Beijing Games was put under Chinese shooter Du Li’s name even before the Games started. However, Du finished fifth in the Women’s 10m Air Rifle last Saturday, August 9. The honor of winning the Games’ first gold medal eventually went to Katerina Emmons of the Czech Republic.

Chastened by her performance in the Women’s 10m Air Rifle, Du did not pass up her second chance of a winning a gold medal. Du won the gold medal with a new Olympic record for the final score of 690.3, while her qualification score of 589 equaled the Olympic record. Du broke both the Olympic qualification record set by Renata Mauer of Poland at Atlanta 1996 and the Olympic record for a final score set by Russian Lioubov Galkina at Athens 2004.

Following Du in second and third place were Emmons with a final score of 687.7 and Cuba’s Eglis Yaima Cruz with 687.6.

The final started badly for Du when she shot 8.7, the worst single shot of any shooter in the final. Cuba’s Cruz caught up and took the lead with her first shot scoring 10.3. Du soon regained first place when she scored 10.4 on her third shot, while Cruz could only manage 9.3. Cruz’s last taste of the lead was on her fifth shot when Du scored 9.9 and Cruz made 10.5.

Du’s timely 10.8 on her sixth shot set up her victory and 10.8 on her ninth shot secured the gold medal. Emmons fought back to beat Cruz for the silver medal.

Chinese Wang Feng and Qin Kai won the Men’s 3m Springboard Synchronized gold medal at the Beijing Olympic Games on Wednesday.

The Chinese duo collected a winning total of 469.08 points in the six-dive final.

Russians Dmitry Sautin and Yuriy Kunakov took the silver in 421.98, and Ukrainians Illya Kvasha and Oleksiy Prygorov bagged the bronze in 415.05.

A lot of people have been waiting for these, but with just a few days before the opening ceremony, the Olympics officials have finally released the official posters for the event.

There are, basically, over 30 posters depicting all the sports present at the games, as well as cultural representations from the Chinese life, like a poster pairing the Temple of Heaven and the futuristic Aquatics Center, You can view all the posters here.