Christian Taylor of the United States retained his Olympic men’s triple jump title yesterday, recording the longest jump of the year to claim the podium top spot.

Taylor, the defending Olympic champion, made his mark of 17.86 metres with his first jump, staking a claim for the gold medal that his rivals were unable to match.

His US team-mate Will Claye took silver and China’s Dong Bin went home with bronze after they recorded 17.76 and 17.58 respectively, also at their first attempts.

“I wanted it so much. It came together, the stars aligned,” Taylor told reporters.

In what soon developed into a predictable tussle for silver and gold from within the U.S. team, the rest of the field in Rio fell behind to join the spectators watching Taylor and Claye reenact their Olympic duel from London four years ago.

A notable absentee was world silver medallist Pedro Pablo Pichardo of Cuba, who would have been a challenger for the gold having posted several marks at 18 metres and further in 2015.

The 23-year-old has reportedly been struggling with an ankle injury and opted not to jump in Rio, smoothing the way for Taylor.

Croatia’s Sandra Perkovic flirted with disaster before snatching gold in women’s discus, successfully defending her London Games title despite fouling five of her six throws in the final.

The 26-year-old Croatian was the hot favourite heading into the final but was on the brink of early elimination after fumbling her first two throws.

Perkovic appeared nervy but dug deep to hurl her third effort 69.21 metres and retain her crown, winning by 2.48 metres ahead of rivals who never looked like matching her.

Perkovic, who has dominated women’s discus since London, becomes only the second woman ever to successfully defend her Olympic discus title.

France’s 37-year-old Melina Robert-Michon set a national record of 66.73 metres to take silver medal.

Cuba’s Denia Caballero, who won a surprise victory at last year’s world championships, had to settle for bronze.

Bolt through

Usain Bolt roused a quiet morning as only he can, remaining firmly on course for his historic ‘triple triple’ by coasting through the 200 metres heats in 20.28 seconds.

Racing in the ninth heat and cheered every step of the way by the sparse but vocal crowd, the Jamaican led coming off the bend and was able to take his foot off the gas to progress comfortably to Wednesday’s semi-finals.

Bolt secured the 100 metres title on Sunday to take another step on the path to an unprecedented third successive sweep of all three sprint titles – 100, 200 and 4x100 metres.

The man most likely to beat him, Justin Gatlin, also had no problems getting through, even if he coasted through the final 20 metres to win his heat in a relatively pedestrian 20.42.

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