DFL

Celebrating last-place finishes at the Olympics. Because they're there, and you're not.

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Late Results for Tuesday, August 19

Athletics: In the men's high jump, three athletes jumped the minimum 2.1 metres in the preliminary round on Sunday, but, as I did with the women's high jump, I'll award the DFL to the one athlete who needed three attempts rather than two: Oleksandr Nartov, 20, representing Ukraine, who did so in group A. The gold medallist cleared 2.36 metres. One jumper had no mark. In the men's discus, British Virgin Islander Eric Matthias, 24, had a best throw -- is that what you call it? -- of 53.11 metres in group B of the qualifying round on Saturday. The gold medallist's best in the final was 68.82 metres. In the women's 400 metre, 19-year-old Ghada Ali of Libya finished heat four on Saturday with a time of 1:06.19; the gold medallist's time in the final was 49.62 seconds. In heat four of the women's 100-metre hurdles, held Sunday, Honduran Jeimmy Julissa Bernardez, 21, finished in 14.29 seconds; the gold medallist's time was 12.54 seconds. There was one DNF in the heats. Heats for the men's 1,500 metre were held last Friday, which seems like forever now. The slowest time came in heat four: 21-year-old Jeffrey Riseley of Australia finished in 3:53.95. The gold medallist's time was 3:32.94; there were two DNSes in the heats.

Diving: In the preliminary round of the men's three-metre springboard, South Korean diver Son Seongchel, 21, finished 29th with a score of 353.35, 70.55 points behind the lowest qualifying score.

Equestrian: Choi Junsang, 20, also representing South Korea and riding Cinque Cento (which is Korean for "delicious with kimchi") finished 46th in the first round of the individual dressage event, with a score of 57.333 percent. There was one withdrawal and one retirement in this event.

Gymnastics: 27-year-old Henrik Stehlik of Germany finished 16th in the qualification round of the men's trampoline event. His score of 67.6 was 5.1 points behind the lowest qualifying score.

Weightlifting: The final event in this sport was the men's +105 kg, where Tongan weightlifter Maama Lolohea, 40, finished 13th with a combined total of 313 kg. The weakling. The gold medallist's score was 461, and there was one DNF.

Standings to date: South Korea and Germany move into second and third place with six last-place finishes each; Australia's fourth DFL moves it into 9th; with three, Ukraine moves into 11th. Honduras and Libya add their second last-place finishes and now sit 22nd and 17th, respectively.

Labels: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Monday, August 18, 2008

Early Results for Monday, August 18

Cycling: Lee Minhye of South Korea, 23, finished 19th in the women's points race with a score of –40; there were three DNFs. In the men's team pursuit, the Colombian team of Juan Esteban Arango, 21, Arles Castro, 29, Juan Pablo Forero, 25, and Jairo Perez, 35, was 10th in the qualifying round and did not advance.

Sailing: 470 women: Toh Liying, 23, and Deborah Huimin Ong, 18, representing Singapore, finished 19th. 470 men: Canadians Stéphane Locas and Oliver Bone, both 27, finished 29th.

Triathlon: In the women's triathlon, Lisa Mensink of the Netherlands, 31, was 29th after the 1.5-km swim, but fell to 45th place during the 40-km race. She ended up finishing 45th with a total time of 2:10:18.98 -- 11:51.32 behind the gold medallist. Five triathletes were lapped, and there were five DNFs, all during the bike portion of the race.

Standings to date: Colombia and the Netherlands add their second DFLs; South Korea's fourth moves it into fifth place; Canada's sixth solidifies its hold on first place in a non-tie-breaking manner.

Labels: , , , , , , , ,

Sunday, August 17, 2008

Late Results for Sunday, August 17

Athletics: In Friday's qualifying round for the men's hammer throw, Juan Ignacio Cerra of Argentina, 31, had the shortest final distance in group B: 70.16 metres. Compare with the gold medallist's best in the final Sunday night: 82.02 metres. Three athletes had no mark. In heat two of the women's 3,000-metre steeplechase on Friday, China's Zhao Yanni, 21, put in a time of 10:18.60. The gold medallist's time in the final Sunday night was a world-record 8:58.81. There were four DNFs in the heats and one in the final. The lowest score in the women's triple jump came in group B of the qualifying round Friday: Irina Litvinenko of Kazakhstan, 21, had a best jump of 12.92 metres -- nearly 2½ metres shorter than the gold medallist's best jump Sunday night. Four athletes had no mark in the qualifying round. The slowest heat time in the women's 100 metre was less than a second behind the gold medallist's time of 10.78 Sunday night; that time, 11.71 seconds, was put in by 30-year-old Sasha Springer-Jones of Trinidad and Tobago in heat five. It was a competitive field: several other sprinters were within a few hundredths of a second of this last-place time. And finally, the men's 10,000 metre, where 27-year-old Alejandro Suarez of Mexico finished 35th with a time of 29:24.78 -- 2:23.61 behind the gold medallist. There were three DNFs and one DNS.

Cycling: With an average speed of 45.598 km/h, El Salvadoran cyclist Evelyn Garcia, 25, was 13th in the qualifying round of the women's individual pursuit and did not advance.

Diving: Spanish diver Jenifer Benitez, 19, finished 30th in the preliminary round of the women's three-metre springboard; her score of 194.05 was 179.85 points behind the leader.

Rowing: Women's double sculls: Ko Youngeun, 21, and Ji Yoojin, 20, South Korea, fifth in the C final. Lightweight men's double sculls: Mohamed Ryad Garidi, 30, and Kamel Ait Daoud, 23, Algeria, second in the D final. Lightweight men's four: Mike Altman, 33, Patrick Todd, 28, Will Daly, 25, and Tom Paradiso, 28, USA, fifth in the B final. Women's quadruple sculls: Rachelle de Jong, 29, Anna-Marie de Zwager, 31, Janine Hanson, 25, and Krista Guloien, 28, Canada, second in the B final. Men's quadruple sculls: the young Slovenian team of Janez Zupanc, 21, Jurnej Jurse, 20, Janez Jurse, 19, and Gaspar Fistravec, 21, did not make it out of the repechage. Women's eight: the German team did not make it out of the repechage. Men's eight: Germany was second in the B final.

Sailing: Yngling: the Italian team of Chiara Calligaris, 36, Francesca Scognamillo, 26, and Giulia Pignolo, 28, finished 15th. Finn: Venezuelan Jhonny Senen Bilbao Bande, 33, finished 26th. 49er: Li Fei, 25, and Hu Xianqiang, 26, finished 19th.

Weightlifting: 26-year-old Ravi Bhollah of Mauritius lifted a total of 275 kg in the men's 94 kg and finished 16th; the gold medallist's score was 406. There were two DNFs.

Standings to date: Canada, Germany and China move into first, second and third with five last-place finishes each. Italy adds its fourth to stand in sixth place, and South Korea its third to stand eighth. Argentina, Kazakhstan, Mauritius, Spain and Venezuela each add their second DFLs; the U.S. finally has its first.

Labels: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Saturday, August 16, 2008

Evening Results for Saturday, August 16

Athletics: In the women's shot put, the lowest result was put in by Lee Miyoung in group A of the qualifying round. The 29-year-old South Korean's best put was 15.1 metres; the gold medallist's best was 20.56 metres. Two athletes had no mark. In the staggering women's heptathlon, 19-year-old Yana Maksimava of Belarus finished 35th with 4,806 points -- 1,927 points behind the gold medallist. There were eight DNFs. The slowest time in the men's 100-metre heats came in heat five, where Shanahan Sanitoa of American Samoa, 19, ran a time of 12.6 seconds -- which I think is the only 12-second-plus time in the heats. Still, not bad for a non-Jamaican.

Cycling: In the men's keirin, 34-year-old Roberto Chiappa of Italy was relegated in his heat and finished 25th. In the qualifying round of the men's individual pursuit, Jenning Huizinga, 24, of the Netherlands had the slowest speed: 51.967 km/h. The gold medallist's average speed exceeded 56 km/h.

Weightlifting: 23-year-old Cristina Cornejo of Peru finished 10th with a total combined lift of 225 kg in the women's +75 kg; the gold medallist's total was 326 kg. There was one DNF.

Standings to date: Italy moves into 6th place, South Korea into 16th.

Labels: , , , , , , , , ,

Wednesday, August 13, 2008

Results for Wednesday, August 13

Cycling: The final two road cycling events ran today. First, the women's individual time trial, in which 24-year-old Chinese cyclist Meng Lang finished 25th. Her time of 40:51.61 was six minutes behind the gold medallist; her average speed was 34.507 km/h, compared with the gold medallist's 40.445 km/h. In the men's individual time trial, Fumiyuki Beppu, 25, of Japan finished 39th with a time of 1:11:05.14 and an average speed of 39.923 km/h; the gold medallist's time and speed were 1:02:11.43 and 45.633 km/h, respectively. These results are all more than twice as fast as I'm able to maintain on my bike, over a much shorter distance. (The women's event is 23.5 km; the men's, 47.3 km.)

Diving: The final synchronized diving event ran today: the men's three-metre platform. Here, the Australian team of Scott Robertson, 21, and Robert Newberry, 29, finished eighth. From the detailed results, it looks like their third dive did them in.

Gymnastics: To apply the DFL for the women's team medal, I go to the lowest-scored full team in the qualification round. That was Germany, for which the total team score was 230.8; the top score in that round was 248.275. For the individual events, I have a few ideas on how to apply DFL; if I can't make them work, this will be it for artistic gymnastics.

Shooting: In a turn of events that is going to make sports columnists in my country go batshit insane, Canadian Avianna Chao, 33, finished 41st in the women's 25-metre pistol. Her score was 558; at least 582 was needed to make it to the final.

Swimming: Of the four events in which medals were awarded today, three had their heats on Monday. In the women's 200-metre freestyle, heat two had the slowest time -- 2:05.71, which was put in by South Korean swimmer Lee Keora, 19. For comparison, the gold medallist's world-record time in the final was 1:54.82. Heat two was the venue for the slowest time in the men's 200-metre butterfly as well: Indonesia's Donny Budiarto Utomo, 29, finished in 2:03.44; the gold medallist in this event set a world record as well with a time of 1:52.03. Indonesia picked up another DFL in the women's 200-metre medley: in heat one, Fibriana Ratna Marita, all of 14 years old, finished with a time of 2:28.18, nearly 20 seconds behind the gold medallist's world-record final time was 2:08.45. There was one DNS. And finally, the men's 4×200-metre freestyle relay, where there were only two heats, which ran yesterday: not every country can field a full team. And the country that fielded the slowest team in this event was Brazil; their time in heat one was 7:19.54. For comparison, the gold medal final time, a world record like the others, was 6:58.56.

Weightlifting: In the women's 69-kg event, Japanese weightlifter Rika Saito, 25, finished eighth with a score of 209; the gold medallist's score was 286. There were two DNFs. A lot more competitors in the men's 77 kg, where Monegasque -- that means he's from Monaco -- weightlifter Romain Marchessou, 22, was 24th. His score was 250; the gold medallist's was 366. There were four DNFs.

Standings to date: Canada adds its fourth DFL, as many as Britain, but since Canada's team is larger it's in second place. Indonesia and Japan jump onto the board with two last-place finishes apiece; Brazil, Germany and China add their second last-place finishes.

Labels: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Saturday, February 18, 2006

Correction: Ski Jumping

The problem with being a tyro is that occasionally you screw up magnificently.

In ski jumping, I derived my last-place finisher from the first round of each event. Trouble is, if I had known anything at all about ski jumping at the Olympic level, I'd know that there was a qualification round before the first round. (How much sense does that make?) In any event, a lot of athletes get eliminated in that round, and, if I'm looking at the lowest score generated at the Olympics, then I have to include them.

Which means that my previously reported results for two ski jumping events -- for the normal hill (K90) and the large hill (K120) -- are incorrect. Not only that, but the overall last-place standings have been out of whack all week.

Well, it wouldn't be an Olympics if I didn't bollix up my coverage at least once. Anyway, here are the corrected results:

In the NH individual qualification round, which ran a week ago (the final was Sunday), 16 jumpers did not advance. Last among these was Bulgarian Georgi Zharkov, 29, whose jump received a score of 77.5. He finished 51st.

In the LH individual qualification round, which ran yesterday (the final ran today), a total of 18 jumpers did not make the cut. Last among these was 23-year-old Choi Yong-Jik of South Korea, whose jump received a score of 22.8. He finished 53rd.

In both events, 35 jumpers qualified; another 15 were pre-qualified.

Impact on the standings: Guess what? As of today, South Korea's back atop the standings, with as many last-place finishes as Russia but one-quarter the athletes. Bulgaria, with its second last-place finish, moves up the board to eighth. Estonia moves back down (to 23rd; it shouldn't have made its debut until today) and Canada leaves altogether.

Thanks to this anonymous commenter for pointing out my boo-boo.

Labels: , , , ,

Monday, February 13, 2006

Late Results for Monday, February 13

Speed Skating: The men's 500-metre competition consists of two races, with the final score being the sum of both runs. South Korean skater Kwon Sun Chun, 22, fell during his first race and ended up finishing 37th, with a combined time of 94.79 seconds. That's 25 seconds behind the gold medallist, and nearly seven seconds behind the next-to-last-place finisher, who fell during the second race.

Figure Skating: The North Korean pairs team, in last place after the short program, withdrew after an injury during practice. That left the field open for Bulgarians Rumiana Spassova and Stanimir Todorov, who finished 19th in the pairs event with a combined score of 111.25. For comparison, the gold medalllists' total score was 204.48.

Standings to date: South Korea's lead strengthens with a third last-place finish -- will anyone be able to catch them? Bulgaria joins the standings, where, except for South Korea, every country has only one last-place finish. But the Olympics are still young; we've only completed day three.

(Post corrected. I mistakenly identified Ukrainians Andrei Bekh and Julia Beloglazova as the last-place finishers in pairs figure skating; they only finished last in the free skate. Thanks to Electric Landlady in the comments for the correction.)

Labels: , , , ,

Saturday, February 11, 2006

Results for Saturday, February 11

Biathlon: In the men's 20-km individual event, Stavros Christoforidis, 31, of Greece, finished 88th with a time of 1:13:13.3, nearly 19 minutes behind the gold medallist. Christoforidis, ranked 43rd on the Nations Cup circuit, apparently didn't shoot well, receiving a total of 11 penalties. There was one DNS.

Volodymyr TrachukNordic Combined: The Individual Gundersen event works like this: your score from two ski jumps determines how far behind the leader you start in the 15-km cross-country ski race. An athlete who's a strong skier but a weak jumper would start further behind but catch up during the race, and vice versa. It all takes place in a single day, and your result is determined by the race result. After two jumps, Ukrainian Volodymyr Trachuk, 21, was last with a score of 140. As a result he started 8:10 behind the leader, and remained at the end of the pack, finishing 48th with a time of 43:45.2, just over 12 minutes behind the gold medallist. There was one DNS before the second jump, and one DNF during the race.

Speed Skating: South Korean Yeo Sang Yeop, 21, finished 28th in the men's 5,000-metre event with a time of 6:58.13 -- 43½ seconds behind the gold medallist.

Yoon Chae RinFreestyle Skiing: In women's moguls -- the official sport of reconstructive knee surgeons everywhere -- Yoon Chae Rin finished 30th in the preliminary round with a relatively low score of 7.07 (out of 30; the gold medallist got 26.67 in the preliminary round and 26.50 in the final). But here's the impressive part: Yoon is only 15 years old.

Standings to date: These four results open our last-place standings for the Torino Winter Games -- and, so far, South Korea has opened an early lead with two last-place finishes. But I expect that this will change in fairly short order.

Labels: , , , , , , ,

Sunday, August 29, 2004

Results for Saturday, August 28

Athletics: Women's high jump: Australia's Petrina Price and one other athlete cleared 1.80 metres, but she finishes last because she took more attempts to do it. The winner's final height was 2.06 metres. Women's 1,500 metre: Sumaira Zahoor of Pakistan had the slowest heat time of 4:49.33, about five seconds behind the next-slowest time; the winner's time in the final was 3:57.90. Men's javelin: Edi Ponos of Croatia -- his best throw was 71.43 metres; the winner's best in the final was 86.50 metres. Men's 800 metre: Cornelius Sibe of Surinam had a heat time of 2:00.06, the only result above two minutes; the winner's final time was 1:44.45. Men's 5,000-metre: Sergiy Lebid of Ukraine with a heat time of 14:10.23; the winner's final time was 13:14.39. There was one DNF. Men's 4×100-metre relay: The only result above 39 seconds came from the relay team from Russia: 39.19 seconds, which they put in in the heats. The winner's final time was 38.07 seconds. Doesn't that seem close to you? Women's 4×400-metre relay: Greece had a bad run in the final, finishing at 3:45.70, but they did make it there; the slowest heat time was put in by Senegal at 3:35.18. The fastest final time was 3:19.01. Men's 4×400-metre relay: Spain had, at 3:05.03, the slowest heat time; the winning final time was 2:55.91. And that's it for track and field except for one event -- the marathon today.

Basketball: On the women's side, South Korea finished 12th with an 0-6 record. It was the same result for Angola on the men's side: they too finished 0-6 and 12th.

Canoe/Kayak (Flatwater Racing): Men's 500-metre K1: For some reason the Athens 2004 site isn't covering the results of heat four, where Steven Ferguson (see previous entries: New Zealand Kayaking Controversy, Steven Ferguson Update) finished last with the slowest time of 2:06.937. He had to work at it to finish last, though, because the next slowest kayaker was only four seconds ahead of him, and though that kayaker was a good 15 seconds behind everyone else, he qualified for the semifinal. Ferguson was the only one not to do so -- which is, of course, what he wanted. Men's 500-metre C1: This one's tricky, because everybody made it out of the prelims and posted different results in the semis -- i.e., the person with the slowest time in the prelims was not the same as the one slowest in the semis. To square this circle, I'm going to go to the slowest semifinal time, which was put in by Emanuel Horvaticek of Croatia and which was the slowest time overall: 2:06.347. Women's 500-metre K1: Thi Cach Doan of Vietnam had the slowest heat time, 2:06.126, but Indonesia's Sarce Aronggear was the only competitor not to advance from the prelims, so the last-place finish goes to her rather than Thi. (I'm really having to split hairs in these events!) Men's 500-metre K2: The Chinese twosome of Yijun Yin and Lei Wang had the slowest time in the prelims, made the semis, and finished last there. They were about eight seconds behind the winner in each case. Men's 500-metre C2: Americans Jordan Malloch and Nathan Johnson finished last in the repechage here, too. Women's 500-metre K2: Paula Harvey and Susan Tegg of Australia also finished last in their repechage.

Cycling: In the men's mountain bike event, Emmanouil Kotoulas of Greece placed 45th, three laps back, with no time recorded. There were five DNFs.

Diving: In the prelims for the men's 10-metre platform, Andras Hajnal of Hungary finished 33rd with a score of 305.79 -- 207.27 points behind the leader in the preliminaries (who went on to win silver). No diving accidents, just low marks.

Football: Serbia-Montenegro finished 16th.

Rhythmic Gymnastics: Poland finished 10th in the group all-around qualification with a total score of 41.775; qualifiers had scores of between 44.600 and 49.875.

Sailing: In the tornado class, Mauricio Santa Cruz Oliveira and Joao Carlos Jordao finished 17th with 172 total points and 155 net points -- the winners had 48 and 34 points, respectively. And in the star class, Mark Mansfield and Killian Collins finished 17th (142 total, 125 net; the winners had 60 total, 42 net).

Volleyball: Kenya was 0-5 and had less good results than the other 0-5 team, so instead of awarding an 11th-place tie to both, I'm assigning the last-place finish to Kenya.

Standings to date: More than half the countries at these Games now have at least one last-place finish. Australia moves into third place and China moves past Uzbekistan and France to make the top five.

Labels: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Saturday, August 28, 2004

Results for Friday, August 27

Athletics: Men's 50-km walk: Janos Toth of Hungary finished 41st with a time of 4:29:33, nearly 51 minutes behind the winning time of 3:38:46 and a bit more than 9 minutes behind finisher number 40. There were eight DNFs and five DQs for breaking into a run. Men's pole vault: Several vaulters only cleared the opening height of 5.30 metres and no more, but the last-place finish goes, in a tie, to Kim Yoo-Suk (pun not intended) of Korea and Marios Evaggelou of Greece, because they only cleared 5.30 metres on their third attempt. The winner cleared 5.95 metres in the final. Five vaulters received no mark. Women's long jump: Svetlana Pessova of Turkmenistan's best jump in the prelims was 5.64 metres; the winner's best jump in the final was 7.07 metres. Two jumpers received no mark. Women's javelin: Samoan Patsy Selafina Akeli had a best throw of 45.93 metres; the winner's best final throw was 71.53 metres. One athlete received no mark. Men's 110-metre hurdles: Edy Jakariya of Indonesia had the slowest heat time of 14.11 seconds; the winner's final time was 12.91 seconds. Women's 10,000 metre: Natalia Cherches (mais elle ne le trouve pas) of Moldova finished 27th with a time of 34:04.97; the winner's time was 30:24.36. Four DNFs (including Paula Radcliffe, since some of you are probably wondering). Women's 4×100 relay: Greece widens its lead with a reasonably respectable (it seems to me) 44.45-second result in the prelims; the winning time in the final was 41.73 seconds, and there were three DNFs, two in the heats and one in the final.

Canoe/Kayak (Flatwater Racing): I'm guessing that wind was a factor in these events, because in many cases the slowest times were in the final -- everyone, including the winners, was slower. In many cases I'm going to have to go to place rather than time. Men's 1,000-metre K1: Tony Lespoir (Seychelles) had the slowest time in the prelims at 4:17.128, at least half a minute behind anyone else; the winner's final time was 3:25.897. Men's 1,000-metre C1: Paddling for Croatia, Emanuel Horvaticek's time of 4:27.115 was just marginally slower than the next-slowest preliminary result, but both of them were well back; the winner's time in the final was 3:46.201. Women's 500-metre K4: The foursome from the United States were the only team not to advance to the final. Men's 1,000-metre K2: Danila Turchin and Michail Tarasov (Uzbekistan) were the only team not to advance from the first round. Men's 1,000-metre C2: Jordan Malloch and Nathan Johnson (United States) finished last in the repechage. Men's 1,000-metre K4: The foursome from Uzbekistan did not make it out of the repechage. (I'm not sure they call it a repechage, but it functions as one: top finishers in the prelims get a bye to the final, where the bottom end competes in a semifinal where one or more may be eliminated.)

Cycling: In the women's mountain bike event, Cypriot Elina Sofocleous finished 24th. No time was recorded; she was two laps back. Six riders did not finish.

Equestrian: Argentina's Federico Sztyrle finished 77th; he and his horsie, "Who Knows Lilly", retired after the first qualifier.

Field Hockey: After an 0-5 record in the pool matches and losses to South Africa and Argentina in the classification round, Egypt finished 12th in men's field hockey. George Brink wrote in with the following commentary about Egypt's feat in qualifying for the Games:
The automatic qualifiers for the Games are the Continental Champions so while the other game features the European Champions and the Oceania Champions the last place game had the Pan American Champions, Argentina, and the African Champions, Egypt, in it. Egypt won the African Championships as a complete surprise by beating African powerhouse South Africa so it would have been difficult to get a decent bet on them coming last in the Games. Egypt happily fulfilled expectations by losing the 11th/12th place playoff to Argentina, who for most were complete surprise contenders for this position. Still congratulations to Egypt for getting to their first Olympic Games ever.
Indeed.

Modern Pentathlon: Thanks to a DNF in the equestrian portion, Federica Foghetti of Italy finished 32nd with 4,228 points and was 5:05 behind the winner, who had 5,448 points. Due to the horsey problems in both modern pentathlon events, competitors will be given a choice of mounts in 2008: (1) horse; (2) camel; (3) yak; and (4) Komodo dragon -- cloned velociraptors are not likely to be ready by that time.

Synchronized Swimming: Only eight entrants in the team synchronized swimming event, and Greece finished eighth; their score of 92.750 was 6.751 points behind that of the winners.

Standings to date: What can I say? Greece, Greece and more Greece: Greece's lead widens with three more last-place finishes, eleven overall. The United States and Uzbekistan, with two more last-place finishes each from the canoe/kayak events, take third and fourth places. Croatia, Indonesia and the Seychelles make their first appearances. And Samoa joins Brunei and Somalia in the 100 per cent club -- with as many last-place finishes as athletes.

Labels: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Sunday, August 22, 2004

Results for August 20-21

Archery: In the women's team event, Poland finished fourth in the ranking round but ended up 15th and last in the 1/8 eliminations. On the men's side, the archers from Greece stayed in 13th place in both rounds.

Athletics: Lots of heats going on in some events but, as with swimming, I'll wait until the final results before reporting the slowest heat times. Men's 20-km walk: Park Chil Sung of South Korea finished 41st with a time of 1:32:41, 13:01 behind the winner. Men's 10,000 metre: David Galvan of Mexico finished 21st with a time of 29:38.05, more than 2½ minutes behind the winner. Women's discus: Tsvetanka Khristova of Bulgaria threw the shortest final distance -- 43.25 metres -- in the qualifying rounds; the winner's distance in the final was 67.02 m. Women's 100 metre: Somali sprinter Fartun Abukar Omar had the slowest heat time of 14.29 seconds; the winner's final time was 10.93 seconds. Women's heptathlon: In this gruelling two-day event, Shen Shengfei of China finished last with 4949 points [Correction]; the winner had 6952 points.

Canoe/Kayak (Slalom Racing): In the men's C2, Australia's Mark Bellofiore and Lachie Milne finished 12th in the heats with a combined time of 278.36 seconds, more than 77 seconds behind the fastest heat time. In the men's K1, Jens Ewald of Germany finished 25th in the heats with a combined time of 250.09 seconds, more than 63 seconds behind the fastest heat time.

Cycling: Tamilla Abassova of Russia finished 12th in the women's 500-metre time trial with a speed of 51.213 km/h; the winner's speed was 53.016 km/h. In the men's 1-kilometre time trial, Radoslav Konstantinov of Bulgaria's speed of 54.327 km/h earned him 17th place; the winner's speed was 59.297 km/h. In the men's individual pursuit, Hossein Askari of Iran did not advance to the heats after his 15th-place result in the qualifiers (there was one DNS). Nor did the team from Slovakia advance after their 12th-place finish in the qualifying round of the men's team sprint.

Equestrian: In the team dressage event, Switzerland finished 10th with a score of 65.653 per cent; the winning team's score was 74.653 per cent.

Gymnastics: In the complicated event of jumping up and down on a trampoline, very low scores on the second routine during the qualifying round (indicating an incomplete routine on account of bouncing off the damn thing, presumably) pushed the following competitors into last place. Tatiana Petrenia finished 16th with a score of 32.90 (the highest qualifying score was 66.80); on the men's side, it was Peter Jensen of Denmark with a score of 32.70 (the highest score during that round was 69.10).

Rowing: I wish I knew what I was doing. If I read the results right, everyone in rowing makes it to a final, it's just a matter of which. So for our purposes, it's a matter of finding the last-place finisher in the lowest (e.g., D or E) final. Women's single sculls: Doaa Moussa, Egypt (D final). Men's single sculls: Ibrahim Githaiga, Kenya (E final). Men's pairs: Czech rowers Adam Michalek and Petre Imre did not make it out of the repechage. Women's pairs: Sophie Balmary and Virginie Chauvel finished last in the B final, but their time of 7:17.94 would have placed them fifth in the A final. Women's double sculls: Ironically, the B final was faster than the A final (where the medals were awarded), but Russian rowers Olga Samulenkova and Yulya Kalinovskaya finished last there; if they had rowed that time in the A final, they'd have won the silver. Men's double sculls: Lithuanians Kestutis Keblys and Einaras Siadvytis had the slowest time in the repechage and did not advance to the semis. Men's fours: Romania did not make it out of the repechage.

Sailing: In the men's 470, Peter Czegai and Csaba Cserep of Hungary finished 27th. Elisabetta Saccheggiani and Myriam Cutolo of Italy finished 20th in the women's 470. In the men's finn class, Estonia's Imre Taveter finished 25th. And in the yngling class, the three-woman crew of Lisa Ross, Chantal Léger and Deirdre Crampton (Canada) finished 16th.

Shooting: We have a tie for last place in the women's 50-metre rifle, three positions event: both Divna Pesic of Macedonia (we've seen her before) and Kim Frazer of Australia finished 32nd with 555 points in the qualifying rounds. In the men's 50-metre rifle, prone, Reinier Estpinan of Cuba finished 46th in qualifying with 581 points. And Australia's Bruce Quick finished 17th in the men's 25-metre rapid-fire pistol: he had 571 points.

Swimming wrapped up during these two days. Women's 200-metre backstroke: It looks like something happened to Shu Zhan of China during her heat: she led at the 100-metre mark but was seventh at 150 metres. She ended up with the slowest heat time, 2:31.56, even slower than the Uzbek. For comparison, the winner's final time was 2:09.19. Men's 100-metre butterfly: Palestinian Rad Aweisat had the slowest heat time at 1:01.60; the winner's final time was 51.25 seconds. Women's 800-metre freestyle: Khadija Ciss of Senegal had the slowest heat time, at 9:20.05; the fastest time in the final was 8:24.54. Men's 50-metre freestyle: Lots of competitors in the heats here from countries that, shall we say, are not known to be swimming powerhouses. (Okay, which wiseacre said "Canada"?) But someone had to have the slowest time, and it was Yona Walesi of Malawi, at 34.11 seconds; the winner's final time was 21.93 seconds. Women's 50-metre freestyle: Ditto. Laotian swimmer Vilayphone Vongphachanh's time was 36.57 seconds; the winner's final time was 24.58 seconds. Men's 1,500-metre freestyle: Not an event for guys who've just learned to swim. The slowest time -- 16:26.52 -- was put in by Juan Carlos Miguel Mendoza of the Philippines. Compare that to the winner's time of 14:43.40. Women's 4×100-metre medley relay: It's Switzerland with a time of 4:15.54; the winning time in the final was 3:57.32. Men's 4×100-metre medley relay: Brazil's team had the slowest heat time, 3:44.41; the winning time in the final was 3:30.68. Relay team results are a lot closer, yes? And that's it for swimming.

Weightlifting: In the women's 75-kg event, Marie Jesika Dalou of Mauritius was well behind the pack, lifting a combined weight of 130 kg; the next-to-last competitor lifted 207.5 kg and the winner lifted 272.5 kg. In the womens plus-75-kg category, Ivry Shaw of Fiji lifed 185 kg; the winner lifted 305 kg -- the results were more spread out than in other categories, but then so were the competitors' body weights. And Julian McWatt of Guyana finished last in the men's 85-kg event, lifting 272.5 kg; the winner lifted 382.5 kg.

Standings to date: Remind me not to do two days at once again, would you? Anyway, all countries in the "top" 20 have more than one last-place finish. About one-third of the countries participating in Athens now have at least one last-place finish. The top five -- with four or more last-place finishes -- have large teams: their last-place finishers tend to come from their second or third entries in an event, or they're finishing last in a team event with limited entries -- Burkina Faso tends not to enter equestrian competitions -- and with pre-Olympic qualifications.

Labels: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,