Athletics finals

We visited the Bird's Nest stadium for the last time on Friday to see the athletics finals. The evening's program did not disappoint, and we saw one world record and one olympic record broken. By far the most exciting event was the men's 4x100 relay. We knew Jamaica would be strong, but after Usain Bolt received the baton from his teammate, it immediately became clear that the race for the gold was over and the race for the world record was beginning. By the time Bolt passed the baton over they were nearly a second ahead of the next team. Three golds and three world records for this amazing athlete.

We also saw the finals of the men's pole vault, which we realized is the slowest track and field event ever! It was going on the entire time the other events were on and then some. In the end the contest was between Steve Hooker of Australia and some Russian guy. The Australian was definitely the dark horse because he barely made it out of the qualifying rounds. But he clenched the gold medal by completing his jump of 5.90 after the Russian had failed to clear this height. The Australian boxers in our section went nuts and everyone was cheering loudly, but the show was not over. Hooker decided to try to break the Olympic record by clearing 5.96,
one cm over the record. He missed the first attempt and took a scratch on the second to give himself and extra 5 minutes to prepare. The atmosphere was electric and everyone was filled with anticipation. The third jump came and he cleared it! New Olympic record and we were there to witness it!

We also saw the final two rounds of the men's decathlon. American Bryan Clay came in leading by a good margin and maintained it to take the gold! In fact, he was so far ahead going into the 1500m run that he finished last and still took the gold. Congratulations Bryan!

The USA women long jumpers did not deliver any medals, and Brazil took the gold by 1cm over Russia with 7.04.