India's Yogeshwar Dutt put up a brilliant display of power-packed freestyle wrestling in the London Olympics last night and won a bronze medal to give a late spark to India's campaign. In the men's 60kg freestyle category, Yogeshwar fought back strongly in the repechage rounds to notch up three successive victories in the space of less than an hour to provide India its fifth medal. The medal came when Yogeshwar pulled off a spectacular 3-1 victory over North Korea's Ri Jong Myong in his third bout of the repechage.
Earlier in the day, Yogeshwar lost against reigning world champion Besik Kudukhov of Russia in the pre-quarters. But the Indian stayed in the race for the bronze as the Russian had reached the final. The Haryana government has announced one crore rupees award to Yogeshwar Dutt for winning the Bronze for the country. Yesterday's bronze has taken India's tally to a record five medals which include one silver and four bronze. It is also India's third wrestling medal at the Olympics after Kashaba Jadhav's bronze in the 1952 Helsinki Games and a similar feat by Sushil Kumar in Beijing. In the Beijing Games, four years ago, India won one gold and two bronze medals. Otherwise, the penultimate day was a gloomy day for India at the Games. The men's hockey team finished 12th and last in the competition when they were defeated by South Africa 3-2 in the classification match. Earlier, in the group phase, India had suffered an unprecedented white wash by losing all the five pool games.
In the 50 kilometre walk, Basanta Bahadur Rana set a new national mark but overall, he ended up at the 36th position. Rana clocked 3 hours, 56 minutes and 48 seconds. Sergey Kirdyapkin of Russia clinched the gold clocking 3 hours, 35 minutes and 59 seconds, which is a new Olympic record. Meanwhile, Germany retained the Men's Olympic Hockey gold medal. In the final played at the Riverbank Arena, the defending champions beat the Netherlands 2-1. This is Germany's fourth Olympic gold medal in men's hockey. It makes them the second most successful nation in Olympic men's hockey behind India's record of eight gold medals.
In Athletics, Usain Bolt-led Jamaican quartet created a New World Record in the men's 4 x 100 metres relay. The team comprising Bolt, Yohan Blake, Michael Frater and Nesta Carter clocked 36.84 seconds to win the Gold medal. For Usain Bolt, it was the third successive gold in the sprint event of the London Olympics. Earlier, he won both the Men's 100 metres and 200 metre finals.
Another world record came yesterday in the Women's 20 kilometre Walk with Russia's Elena Lashmanova clinching the Gold. Mexico clinched the Men's Football Gold as they stunned favourites Brazil 2-1 in the finals.
