BMX, Men

The Organizing Committee for the Rio Games produced a spectacular and challenging course for the 3rd appearance of BMX at an Olympic Games.

Māris Štrombergs of Latvia had won gold at each of the two preceding Games but world champion Joris Daudet of France and young Dutchman Niek Kimmann were more favoured for success in Rio.

Daudet topped the time sheets in a relatively uneventful qualifying session; however, the quarter-finals could not remotely be called uneventful. The first heat saw Daudet crash in two of his three runs and be eliminated whilst Kimmann survived only by carrying what remained of his bicycle after a bone crunching crash in his second race. Štrombergs’ chance of a third successive title ended in a pile-up that caused 2013 world champion Liam Phillips to be stretchered off with concussion and a broken collarbone. Another crash in the first run of the third heat saw two more cyclists withdraw with injury.

The semi-final stage was dominated by the two Australians, Sam Willoughby and Anthony Dean, who were both undefeated in their respective semi-finals and would start the final as joint favourites.

The American pair of Connor Fields and Nic Long eclipsed the Aussie pairing at the start and sped away from the field. Fields held the lead from start to finish while Long saw his dream of an Olympic medal foiled in the final straight as first Jelle van Gorkom and then Carlos Ramírez edged ahead of him. Fields, a student at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas was the first American Olympic champion at this discipline.