Olympic debuts galore: Japan wins skateboarding gold, Brazil leads in surfing
Tokyo, Jul 25 (EFE).- The second day of the Tokyo 2020 Games saw the Olympic debuts of the skateboarding discipline, with gold for local hero Yuto Horigome, and surfing, where Brazil dominated the first rounds.
Current street skateboarding world champion Yuto Horigome overcame American global icon Nyjah Huston to claim the first gold medal in skateboarding in Olympic history, which will go to Japan, a country where the sport is generally prohibited in most streets and public spaces.
Surfing also made its debut in the Games, as Brazil athletes Italo Ferreira and Gabriel Medina earned the highest scores and took a shortcut to the podium skipping the second round, alongside Peruvian surfers Lucca Mesinas and Miguel Tudela.
US gymnast Simone Biles under delivered in her Tokyo 2020 debut with a score of 14.133 in the floor exercise, as she sets out to cement her position as the greatest gymnast in the world and defend the gold titles she claimed in Rio 2016 in Team, All-Around, Vault and Floor Exercise disciplines.
Austria’s Anna Kiesenhofer took gold with an unexpected first place in women’s cycling road race, while Tunisian teenager Ahmed Hafnaoui shocked the world as he was first in the men’s 400m freestyle, swimming ahead of Australia’s Jack McLoughlin and Team USA’s Kieran Smith.
In another unexpected turn of events, the US basketball team took their first defeat in the Olympics in 17 years at the hands of France, with an 83-76 score unveiling the weaknesses of the favourites to win gold.
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