This time there were no question marks hanging over Annemiek van Vleuten’s celebrations, only exclamations of joy that after the pain of Rio 2016 and the mild embarrassment of last weekend, she is finally an Olympic cycling champion. The Dutch cyclist dominated an experienced field on her way to winning gold in the women’s individual […]

On 3 August 2016, when skateboarding was officially approved for inclusion in the 2020 Olympics, Momiji Nishiya was looking forward to her ninth birthday later that month. Five years and one pandemic postponement later, she became her sport’s first female gold medalist, winning the street event in Tokyo earlier this week. She is just 13

Fiji’s rugby sevens team wrote another chapter in one of the great Olympic stories at the Tokyo Stadium, when they won the country’s second gold medal by beating New Zealand 27-12 in the final. Their captain, Jerry Tuwai, who played in 2016 too, reckoned this victory was “even more special” than their famous first because

Three years ago, reflecting on a career that, until that point had been defined by adversity rather than triumph, Rohan Dennis insisted: “If you keep knocking on the door, one day it will open.” It was an apt mantra for Dennis, a mercurial cyclist from South Australia. In the three years since, the door has

Team GB’s goalkeeper Ellie Roebuck has said she needed to be patient to earn the No 1 shirt as an international, after conceding her first goal at the Olympics in Team GB’s 1-1 draw with Canada. In 2019 the Manchester City keeper was named as a 24th player in the 23-woman squad for the Women’s

When Dina Asher-Smith ran her first cross-country race in primary school she hated it so much she nearly stopped – only for her parents to bribe her with an ice cream to keep going. It worked – and then some. Asher-Smith ended up sprinting through the field to finish fifth out of 400 and a

An Olympic skateboarder who was put in quarantine after testing positive for Covid-19 called the conditions at the hotel “inhuman” on Wednesday. Candy Jacobs has been in isolation for eight days and missed the street event in skateboarding’s debut as an Olympic sport. The Netherlands athlete said she had to force officials to allow her

Double Olympic champion Charlotte Dujardin has cemented her place in the history books as the most decorated British female Olympian of all time, winning a bronze in the individual dressage – her sixth Olympic medal. Dujardin and her horse Gio, riding together in their first Olympics, danced their way to legendary status in the Grand

US athletes across the Games have shown support for gymnastics star Simone Biles after she withdrew from the Olympics to focus on her mental health.  ‘I can only imagine the immense amount of pressure she is under’ said gold medal surfer Carissa Moore, ‘she is on every commercial, and billboard, and bag I see, and

South Americans will almost certainly disagree, but this summer of cycling surely belongs to Slovenia. After Tadej Pogacar followed up his second successive Tour de France title with bronze in the Tokyo 2020 road race at the weekend, Primoz Roglic has given the country its first Olympic gold medal in cycling. With Roglic finishing more