Keely Hodgkinson surges to 800m glory on golden day for Britain in Paris

Keely Hodgkinson pumped her fist in the air as she cemented herself as the figurehead of British athletics with a stunning victory in the women’s 800m final, kicking off Team GB’s cycling campaign with a world record gold medal.

Hodgkinson, already the world number one at 22, took an early lead at the Stade de France, but Kenya’s Mary Moraa and Ethiopia’s Tsige Duguma stubbornly held on to her right shoulder throughout the first round.

It wasn’t until the final stretch of the final leg of the biggest race of Hodgkinson’s career that the British middle-distance runner pulled away, testing her opponents’ ability to keep up with each long stride. Hodgkinson, from Atherton in Greater Manchester, punched the air as she flew across the finish line, clocking a time of 1min 56.72sec.

Duguma ran a personal best of 1:57.15, but that was simply not good enough against Hodgkinson, whose gold in Paris adds to three European titles and silver medals at the Olympics, world championships and Commonwealth Games. Moraa, the world champion, took bronze.

With her impressive run, Hodgkinson became the first British woman to win an Olympic 800m title since Kelly Holmes in Athens 24 years ago – two years before Hodgkinson was born.

“I’ve worked so hard this past year and you could see how much it meant to me when I crossed the line,” Hodgkinson said. “I can’t believe I’ve finally done it. It means so much to me. And to do it here, what better place could it be? The crowd was absolutely incredible, it felt like a home crowd to me. So I’m super happy.”

“I trusted myself, I could feel Mary [Moraa] coming at me on the straight. But I showed composure and I crossed the line first this time. I looked at the screen boldly to make sure, but you can’t do anything until you cross that line.

“I am now the Olympic champion for the next four years and no one can take that away from me.”

The thrilling triumph followed an unbeatable start to the women’s track cycling campaign. Katy Marchant, Sophie Capewell and Emma Finucane broke the world record twice in the qualifying rounds at the Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines Velodrome and went even faster in the final, with a time of 45.186 to beat New Zealand by five-tenths of a second.

It was the first medal for Great Britain in an event they failed to qualify for at the last two Games.

Finucane, who has been announced as the successor to Victoria Pendleton and Laura Kenny as Britain’s queen of the velodrome, said: “We’ve worked really hard on this. The process is really essential for us and we nailed that finale.”

The triumph on the track followed a glorious five-minute race at the Vaires-sur-Marne Nautical Stadium a few hours earlier, when Joe Clarke and Kimberley Woods emerged from the chaos of the men’s and women’s canoe slalom with a silver and bronze medal respectively.

Woods said: “Two medals in Team GB in the space of five or 10 minutes is pretty incredible. I’m really proud to have come away with another bronze medal.”

Clarke, a three-time gold medallist, saw his dream of repeating his former glory dashed when he was pushed down a slope by German rival Noah Hegge in the men’s race. However, he fought back to take second place behind New Zealand’s Finn Butcher.

“I’ll be honest with you,” Clarke said, “I went into this event wanting to win gold and that didn’t happen today, but I’m not disappointed in any way.”

He said Hugo, his one-year-old son, wore a supporter T-shirt with his face on it every race day. “He picks it up in the morning, says ‘dada’ and gives it a hug,” Clarke said. “It’s the cutest thing you’ll ever see. I’m very proud he’s here because he’s my absolute world and I can’t wait for some family time with my wife and son.”

There was also bronze in the mixed triathlon for Team GB’s Alex Yee, Georgia Taylor-Brown, Sam Dickinson and Beth Potter, although it looked like silver would be the case for a while. Three teams battled it out as they approached the finish line of the final run on the Pont Alexandre III, but Germany’s Laura Lindemann took gold.

Taylor Knibb of the US and Potter finished second in a photo finish, with organisers initially awarding Britain second place, but this was reversed shortly before the medal ceremony. Potter said: “The running part was tough, I guess I was a bit tired from the bike. I thought we might have got silver, but we got bronze. Still a medal.”

There will be no British entry in the women’s final as gold favourite Molly Caudery, 24, and Tokyo bronze medallist Holly Bradshaw failed to reach their usual level.

Bradshaw was devastated to miss out and was consoled by Caudery as her fourth and final Olympics drew to a close. “I’m devastated,” she said. “I knew this was going to be my last championship. I’ve only got a few more games left, so I’m devastated.”

Caudery, the reigning world indoor champion, was the only competitor who opted to skip the 4.40m height attempt and start at 4.55m, but she failed to clear the bar.

It turned out that 4.40 was enough to advance, leaving Caudery devastated but defending her decision. “If I’ve been jumping 4.80 and 4.90 all year, 4.55 shouldn’t have been a problem,” she said. “It’s just a really unlucky day.”

She also experienced an ambiguous afternoon in the Bercy Arena when American gymnast Simone Biles received her 11th Olympic medal of her career, but not the gold she had earned for her redemptive story at the Games.

Biles, who was forced to withdraw from the Tokyo events due to “twisties” – a condition where she feels unable to perform movements that she previously found easy – was defeated by Brazilian rival Rebeca Andrade in the floor exercise final by 0.033 points.

The 27-year-old, the most decorated female gymnast and the oldest American woman to make an Olympic gymnastics team since the 1950s, said she felt no disappointment in winning her fourth medal in Paris after gold in the team event, the all-around and the vault. A fall on the balance beam had left Biles in fifth place on that event. “I couldn’t be more proud of how I did,” she said.