USA Takes Medal Count Lead

The United States of America officially has the lead in the medal count. They have taken over the overall medal lead and replaced China. For gold medals though the United States is now tied with China. Both countries have 18 gold currently. China had a huge lead in gold, so how did the US catch up? I'm about to tell you.

Yesterday, was the best day of the Olympics so far for the US. Going into the day, China had a lead in golds and overall medal count. However, the United States took 6 gold medals yesterday! Two of those gold medals were somewhat unexpected. We got gold in women's rowing and judo (women's 78kg). Neither of those were expected to happen for sure. Then some familiar faces won the rest.

I'll start with the most prominent. Michael Phelps, won his 20 medal, providing more ammo for those that want to argue he is the greatest Olympian ever. Phelps won another gold, his 16th of his career. Can you imagine that? 16 golds! This guy is amazing. Only Michael Phelps. I am a big fan of his. This gold happened in the 200 IM. Guess who came in 2nd in the event? Ryan Lochte, another American. Total US domination. Just the way I like it. At this point it is near impossible to argue that Michael Phelps is not the greatest Olympian ever. I'll help you out and just say that he is.

The United States dominated a couple more events on the evening in swimming. The 200m backstroke was another great performance for the men. That final was won by American Tyler Clary. Ryan Lochte again came up just short as he finished 3rd. Clary broke an Olympic record with his swim. This win was Clary's 1st gold medal. Congratulations to Tyler Clary!

The final swimmer to win gold on the night was a female. The amazing Rebecca Soni broke a world record in the 200m breaststroke. I hope most of you saw this race. Soni absolutely blew away the competition. This is Soni's second world record. She also holds the world record in 100m breaststroke. Soni became the 1st female to repeat as 200m breaststroke champ in the Olympics. It is Soni's 2nd gold medal and 5th overall medal. She also has 3 silvers.

Finally, I get to perhaps the biggest story of the night. Gabby Douglas won the gold medal in the all-around competition. She is the first American ever to win gold in the team and all-around competition. Gabby had an amazing Olympics obviously. It sure would have been nice to see Jordyn Wieber in this event though. More on that another day though. Also I find it incredibly odd that Ali Raisman was tied with the Russian girl in 3rd, but they gave the medal to the Russian girl. Very strange. Oh well, congrats Gabby!

-Noland

Olympics: Medal Count Update

It is about 7:12 on the East Coast after the first full day of Olympic Games. Sounds like a good time to update the medal count.

The United States is currently tied for 2nd in most total medals and tied for 3rd in gold medals. The US only has one gold and that was behind a wonderful swim by Ryan Lochte. Phelps finished in 4th in the 400 IM (which he set the record for in 2008). Lochte's win was a big one for the US and he did it in dominating fashion. The United States has 5 total medals. Our country has 1 gold, 2 silver, and 2 bronze at this point.

Expect the United States to get much better as the games go on. I don't expect Michael Phelps to get shut out of medals. We should also pick up a ton of medals as we get deeper into swimming and gymnastics. In volleyball, basketball, and track we should also pick up a large portion of medals. Those 5 sports are where Team USA should pick up a lot of ground. Our fencers were looking pretty fierce yesterday too.

China leads everybody in the medal count, booooooo! They have 6 total medals right now including 4 golds. Make that 7 total medals and 5 golds as I am typing this. China has won the 10m Air Rifle, Men's 400m Freestyle, Women's 400m IM, Women's 48kg lift, and 10m Air Pistol Women. Right now we need to pick up the pace to catch the Chinese.

We need people like Lochte to close the gap and come through again. Congrats to Lochte for putting us on the board.

-Noland