RIO DE JANEIRO — Kazakh weightlifter Nijat Rahimov snatching gold from China’s Lyu Xiaojun was too much to take for a couple of Chinese journalists who engaged in a full-on brawl in the mixed zone afterward. An armed policeman guarding the entrance to the venue had to be quickly called to break up the pair who went careering through the barriers separating athletes from journalists, trading proper punches to the face and even drawing blood.
Gold comes first
US gymnastics star Simone Biles made it clear where priorities lie when fleeing a burning building — save your gold medal.
Biles, who won her first Olympic title Tuesday, grabbed the medal before evacuating the Athletes Village, she revealed on Snapchat. Teammate Laurie Hernandez had her gold around her neck during the evacuation which turned out to be a false alarm.
“The fire alarm’s going off, but we got our gold,” Biles said in the video. After they realized it was a fire drill, Biles, 19, posted on Twitter: “When a fire alarm goes off in your building, grab your medal and gym bag. #everythingisokay.” Biles went on to win the women’s individual all-around title later Thursday.
Color me blue
The Rio Games diving pool was gradually turning a lighter shade of green Thursday, but was still far from the normal aqua-blue.
Its sudden transformation to a disturbing green this week prompted concerns, but officials said tests proved the water safe. They blamed a chemical imbalance caused by the sudden infusion of humanity for the competitions and said it would be normal again within days. But that may give some athletes the blues. The British and American men’s 3m synchronized springboard competitors — they won gold and silver, respectively, Wednesday — both said the deep-green hue helped with visualizing the pool’s surface, which can aid divers.
“The water was easy to see that’s for sure,” said the USA’s Sam Dorman.
My bags are packed, I’m ready to stay
British tennis player Heather Watson was on the verge of leaving Rio when she and men’s star Andy Murray unexpectedly found themselves in the mixed doubles draw after the withdrawals of Romanians Florin Mergea and Monica Niculescu.
“I had a flight tonight. I had all my stuff packed but I came here with my bags just in case. I had no idea, wasn’t sure if we’d get in and then just got told, ‘Get your kit on, you’re on’.”
Watson will have to stay a little longer as she and Murray qualified for the quarterfinals by beating Carla Suarez Navarro and David Ferrer in straight sets.
India minister draws flak over behavior
India’s sports minister drew widespread criticism Friday after the organizers of the Rio Olympics reportedly accused his entourage of “aggressive and rude” behavior at the Games and threatened to cancel his accreditation.
The Rio organizing committee said it had received multiple reports of Vijay Goel trying to get unaccredited people accompanying him into Olympic venues.
“We have had multiple reports of your minister for sports trying to enter accredited areas at venues with unaccredited individuals,” the Press Trust of India news agency quoted committee manager Sarah Peterson as saying in a letter to India’s chef de mission Rakesh Gupta.
“When the staff try to explain that this is not allowed, they report that the people with the minister have become aggressive and rude and sometimes push past our staff,” she said.
“Should our protocol team be made aware of further examples of this type of behaviour, the accreditation of your minister for sports will be canceled and his privileges at the Olympic Games withdrawn.”
Goel has denied any wrongdoing, saying it was a “misunderstanding.”
“What is being said is that my staff may have done something wrong, but I am not aware of this or any misbehavior. Nothing is being said about me, it is about my staff,” he told the NDTV news network in Rio.
But the charge has led to an outpouring of anger on social media in India.
