Olympics 2024 live updates: Track and field events continue as ...

Australia's Keegan Palmer, 21, successfully defended his gold medal from the 2020 Olympics, winning the men's park final after an impressive first run score of 93.11 that he never relinquished.

His gold in Paris marks Australia's second in park, after Arisa Trew, 14, won the women's park final on Tuesday.

USA's Tom Schaar won silver in his Olympic debut, with a best score of 92.23 in his second run, getting cheers from Snoop Dogg, NBA star Devin Booker and skateboarding legend Tony Hawk who were in attendance.

Brazil's Augusto Akio earned bronze with a best score of 91.85 in his third and final run.

Twenty-year-old weightlifter Hampton Morris became the first American man to win an Olympic weightlifting medal in four decades, after winning the bronze in the men’s 61-kg division.

After finishing the snatch session in fifth, Morris' podium chances rested on his clean and jerks. He missed his first clean attempt but increased his second to 172 kg and made the lift, boosting him to third place. For his final clean and jerk, he attempted a world record of 178 kg but was unable to follow through. Still, Morris celebrated his historic bronze medal.

China's Li Fabin won gold, defending his title from Tokyo, after setting an Olympic snatch record of 167 kilograms, or 315 pounds. Thailand's Theerapong Silachi won silver after not missing any of his six lifts.

One U.S. athlete’s bid for Olympic gold is being fueled by his father’s voice. 

But Salif Mane’s father won’t be in Paris to cheer on his son when he competes, for the first time, at the Summer Olympics in the triple jump against some of the world’s top athletes.

Instead, Mane will perform the same ritual he did when he won a spot in June on the U.S. track and field team and struck gold at the Olympic trials: He will listen to the voicemails his father left him in December 2019, a few months before he died from Covid.

Read the full story here.

After two runs, Australia's Keegan Palmer remains in the lead despite a disappointing performance, maintaining his best score from run 1 of 93.11. USA's Tom Schaar and Tate Carew are second and third after scoring 92.23 and 91.17.

After the first of three runs in the men's park final, Australia's Keegan Palmer leads with a score of 93.11. American Tom Schaar is second and Brazil's Augusto Akio is third.

This evening, at the Champions Park in Paris, nine U.S. athletes were awarded gold medals for the 2022 Winter Games team figure skating event following a doping scandal involving a Russian skater.

The nine members of the U.S. team are Nathan Chen, Vincent Zhou, Karen Chen, Alexa Knierim, Brandon Frazier, Madison Chock, Evan Bates, Madison Hubbell and Zachary Donohue.

It is the first time in history that Olympic athletes weren’t awarded their medals onsite, according to Team USA.

Wearing podium outfits from the current Games, the 2022 Beijing Olympians from the U.S. and Japan gathered on the stage at Champion’s Park for a special ceremony in front of a cheering crowd.  Gold medals were placed around the necks of the U.S. athletes, and silver for Japan. After the ceremony and all smiles, they posed for photos with the Eiffel Tower behind them.

In 2022, the U.S. finished second to the Russian Olympic Committee, or ROC. However, ROC athlete Kamila Valieva tested positive for a banned substance, leading the International Olympic Committee to declare that no medals would be presented for the team event.

Team USA launched the More Than Medals campaign to push for a final decision, and on July 25, the Court of Arbitration for Sport ruled that the U.S. would be awarded gold.

The final podium was announced Friday, with the ROC awarded bronze and Japan silver. Canada finished fourth and, despite an appeal from the Canadian Olympic Committee, wasn't moved up to third place.

Everyone is on the edge of their seats at the Paris Expo, as the U.S.' volleyball team makes a last minute comeback to take the second set of the match against Poland, tying with them 1-1.

The Americans won the set 27-25, reigniting hope of moving to the finals.

The two teams will play for best of five sets.

Kevin Durant assisted the U.S. in its quarterfinal victory against Brazil, earning a new Olympic record in the process.

Durant scored 11 points, bringing his Olympic career total to 494. With that, he surpassed the record set by Lisa Leslie and became the top American scorer of all-time in Olympic competition.

Durant gave Leslie a shoutout on X, saying, "Records are meant to be broken, I'll hold on to this until another great comes along and passes me up.

"Lisa Leslie you are the gold standard in basketball."

The athletes at Gabby Thomas' alma mater cheered her on as she outran her competitors to gold in the 200-meter race on Monday.

Thomas, who graduated in 2019, ran track and field for Harvard. She was named All-American seven times and became the first Ivy League athlete to win an NCAA sprinting championship, setting a record time in the event.

Is there anything Gabby Thomas can't do?

After winning a gold medal, Thomas sat down with Savannah and Hoda to talk about her accomplishments in Paris, which included topping a podium for the first time ever.

Thomas, a Harvard grad and University of Texas master's degree-holder, said that winning gold was the thing she is proudest of.

"This took a lot of years and it took a lot of patience, and people don't see that journey," Thomas said. "Every year, every month, every minute was very intentional for this moment."

"I don't think I've ever worked this hard for anything in my life," she said.

World No. 1 team Poland takes the first set in its match against the U.S.

The gold medal favorites are facing off against Team USA, which must make a comeback in this set to stay in contention for the top two podium spots.

Some might say that goalies are the unsung heroes of soccer, but the internet is singing for U.S. goalkeeper Alyssa Naeher after she managed to block a shot with the side of her cleat.

It was an opportunity for Germany to tie the game in the last minute of extra time against the U.S. women's soccer team in yesterday's game, but Naeher saved the day. She jumped into the air but the ball went low, so she just managed to tip the ball in the other direction.

The goal would have been likely called offside anyway, but that doesn't take away from how cool it was.

"Alyssa Naeher or BRICK WALL. Save of a LIFETIME," one X user wrote.

Some spectators were just in pure disbelief, one writing simply, "Alyssa Naeher are you joking."

"that's america's foot," one person captioned the image.

The semifinal match between the U.S. and Poland is underway.

The U.S. faces a challenge against gold-medal favorite Poland. Neither of them took a spot in the podium last Olympics, but both have a shot this year.

Poland last took home an Olympic medal in 1976 when they won gold, and the U.S. is looking to break a comparatively shorter 20-year streak without hardware.

Poland beat Slovenia 3-1 yesterday, and the U.S. beat Brazil by the same margin.

Olympic open water swimmers trained in the long-polluted Seine River today after Paris organizers determined it was safe to dive in.

A two-hour training session was held on a cool, cloudy morning, providing the only chance for swimmers to familiarize themselves with the picturesque course through the middle of the French capital.

World Aquatics canceled a test run yesterday because of concerns over fluctuating bacteria levels in the waterway. Despite massive efforts to clear the Seine, water quality has been a constant concern throughout the Games.

Dozens of swimmers — from 2016 Olympic champion Sharon van Rouwendaal to Ireland’s Daniel Wiffen, competing in open water for the first time — dove into the Seine one day before the women’s 10-kilometer marathon event. The men’s race is set for Friday.

“I think if anyone’s saying they’re not concerned at all, they’re probably lying,” Austrian swimmer Felix Auboeck said. “I am concerned. I just hope and trust the organization in the sense that they let us in when it’s safe enough to do so. But, of course, you’re concerned because no one wants to get ill or sick.”

Olympic skateboarding has been dominated by teens both in its debut in Tokyo and again here in Paris, but that hasn’t stopped 51-year-old Andy Macdonald, a father of three who is representing Britain in the men’s park event, from making his Olympic debut in Paris.

A skateboarding legend who won the first of his eight X Games gold medals in 1996, Macdonald was born and raised in Massachusetts and lives in southern California, but switched his allegiances to Britain earlier this year to make the Games through his English-born father.

"People come at me like: Is it weird? You’re the old guy at the skate park, you’re 50 and there are all these teenagers. No, it’s not weird because I was there first and I never left," Macdonald told the Financial Times. "I’m like a sponge, just taking it all in. Just the experience of being an Olympian. If they have a medal for who has the most fun, I got the gold locked up for sure."

A medal for fun? Maybe, but unfortunately, an Olympic medal will be beyond his grasp. Macdonald hasn’t made the final — his best run of 77.76 in today’s prelims was not enough to qualify. Team USA will have two riders, though, with Tom Schaar and Tate Carew in the final at 11:30 a.m. ET.

Today marks the final of the team acrobatic routine event of synchronized swimming — known as artistic swimming in the Olympics.

One burning question you may have after watching is how the swimmers' hair remains intact without swimming caps. Well, former Team USA athlete Mariya Koroleva revealed all to Vogue back in 2016. The answer? Gelatin!

"It’s like unflavored Jell-O — we mix it with water, and it turns into a gooey mixture," she said. "You comb or brush that into your hair, put it up in a bun, and put a headpiece over that, so when it dries, it gets really hard and your hair doesn’t fall out when you swim."

The final of the team event will begin at 1:30 p.m ET and the U.S. swimmers will need to get past China if they want to notch another gold.

The men's steeplechase is one of the Olympics' most eye-catching track and field events. The 3,000-meter race takes athletes over fixed barriers and a water jump.

The barriers are not to be confused with hurdles — they span several lanes and are fixed in place so don't fall down. They are slightly lower than hurdles and athletes need to clear them 28 times over the race's seven laps. The water jump is unique to the steeplechase: A sloping, 2-foot-deep water pool lies behind one of the barriers. Racers have to make it over the water once each lap.

The event evolved in the 1800s as a race between two towns' church steeples that would traverse hedges and streams. Today's steeplechase originated at Oxford University in England and made its Olympic debut in 1920.

Team USA's men last medaled in 2016 — Evan Jager took silver — but first-time Olympian Kenneth Rooks will be hopeful after he claimed the NCAA title for the event last year. The gold may be a battle between world-record-holder Lamecha Girma of Ethiopia and reigning Olympic champion Soufiane El Bakkali of Morocco. Bahrain's Winfred Yavi broke the world record to claim gold in the women's event last night. The men's event is today at 3:43 p.m. ET.

America’s Erika Reineke crossed the finish line in sixth place at the end of the women’s dinghy medal race in Marseille. The 30-year-old from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, placed ninth overall in her Laser dinghy.

She came behind the Netherlands' Marit Bouwmeester, who won gold, with Anne-Marie Rindom of Denmark in second and Line Flem Hoest of Norway in third.

Reineke qualified for the U.S. Olympic Team this year after three previous unsuccessful attempts. Her philosophy: “Never. Stop. Fighting.”

The Bercy Arena in Paris had been home to Simone Biles and company for the gymnastics events of the Games.

But with the gymnastics over, the arena has been transformed to host the final stages of the basketball tournament after the group stages were hosted in Lille. Check out the epic transformation below.

All sailing events in Marseille were delayed this morning because of a lack of wind, further disrupting competition. But there is good news: The wind has picked up and race organizers have given the go ahead for competition to start. 

America’s Erika Reineke is in ninth place ahead of the Women’s Dinghy medal race.

There are four medal races today in the women’s and men’s dinghy, mixed multihull, and mixed dinghy. 

The men’s and women’s dinghy medal races were already delayed on Tuesday because of the lack of wind.

Team USA gymnast Suni Lee has seen the funny side of her fall from the beam, joining the viral TikTok trend that has seen would-be athletes post their sporting fails to joke about why they didn't make the Olympics.

Lee slipped off the beam during Monday's final and has made light of the moment, sharing the clip of her fall with the caption, "Unfortunately I was selected for the Olympics."

Poland's Aleksandra Miroslaw, who broke her own world record twice in qualifying, has taken gold in the women's speed climbing.

Having dominated the competition up to this point, the final was a close-run thing — Miroslaw edged out China's Deng Lijuan by just 0.08 seconds to take the title with a climb of 6.10 seconds.

Miroslaw's world record, set on Monday, sits at 6.06 seconds. It is the first time an individual medal has been awarded for speed climbing after the discipline was combined with lead and boulder for its Olympic debut in Tokyo.

Two-time Olympic gold medalist Charles Barkley says the U.S. men’s basketball team should win gold in Paris, but need to guard against complacency in Thursday’s knock-out game. "They only have to beat you one time," he told NBC’s Maria Taylor.

Barkley also praised the women’s basketball team, and reflected on his own experience as an Olympian. Check out the rest of his conversation with NBC News.

Tomoa Narasaki, the seven-time Climbing World Cup winner, has been knocked out of the sport climbing men’s combined in the semifinal, despite earning second place in the boulder round Monday.

After Wednesday's lead round, the 28-year-old Japanese rock climber's overall points placed him tenth overall. Only the top eight athletes advance to the final.

Sport climbing men’s combined consists of two disciplines: lead and boulder. Athletes must compete in both, with their scores combined to determine their overall ranking.

Here's the footage of that big men's 5,000m collision we told you about. The tangle happened in the final stretch of the heat and involved Great Britain's George Mills.

Chinese police arrested a woman on Tuesday for allegedly defaming athletes and coaches on social media after the women’s singles table tennis final.

According to a statement on X-equivalent Weibo from Beijing’s security authorities, the 29-year-old female surnamed He, "maliciously fabricated information" and is now under criminal detention. Authorities didn’t reveal what specific online remarks He is being investigated for.

Many Chinese social media users hailed this decision, with one posting on Wednesday that "that’s exactly how it should be... they deserve to be severely punished."

In recent years, toxic fan culture has spread across Chinese social media and has led to a rise in cyber-abuse and the spreading of rumors against athletes.

Sophia Smith's game-winning goal late Tuesday took the USWNT through to the women's soccer gold medal game. Smith's goal was the difference when Team USA beat Germany 1-0 in extra time. America's women will face Brazil on Saturday.

There's still a long way to go, but Team USA's Nelly Korda's Olympic title defense has gotten off to a poor start. She sits at two-over-par through the first nine holes of the opening round.

The defending Olympic champion bogeyed the first hole at Le Golf National with further bogeys following at holes four and seven. The world number one has just birdied the par-five ninth, however, so perhaps her round is about to get back on track.

Team USA's Lilia Vu is in the early stages of her opening round. The current leader is Norway's Celine Borge, who sits at three-under-par through 10 holes.

Sean Nevin and Jean-Nicholas Fievet

An Australian hockey player has been arrested in Paris, the Australian Olympic Committee has confirmed, with local authorities saying the player was arrested after attempting to obtain cocaine.

In a statement, the country's Olympics committee said: "The Australian Olympic Committee (AOC) has confirmed an Australian hockey team member is in custody after being arrested in Paris on August 6th."

"No charges have been laid. The AOC is continuing to make enquiries and arrange support for the Team member," the statement said.

The public prosecutor’s office in Paris told NBC News that overnight police officers witnessed a drug deal involving cocaine in the ninth arrondissement of Paris, with the alleged buyer being a 28-year-old member of Australia's hockey team. Both the seller and the buyer were arrested and remain in police custody.

Australia’s men's and women’s field hockey teams — known as the Hockeyroos — were knocked out of the Olympics earlier this week at the quarterfinal stage.

A group of four athletes were sent tumbling to the ground after being caught in a tangle of legs on the final straight of a dramatic men's 5,000 meters heat.

The fall seemingly put the athletes out of contention for the final.

After the race, Great Britain's George Mills was furious and confronted France's Hugo Hay, who Mills believed was responsible for the incident. Hay didn't fall and qualified for the final, but Mills and the other fallers failed to finish in the top eight of the heat. Mills finished 30 seconds behind the leaders.

Officials could reinstate them for the final, but it is up to their discretion. There was more drama in the second of the two heats with a cameraman caught crossing the track right as the athletes ran past.

An Indian wrestler has been disqualified from the gold medal bout of the women's 50kg freestyle event after failing to make weight this morning.

Vinesh Phogat, who on Tuesday became the first Indian woman to qualify for an Olympic wrestling final, was due to take on Team USA's Sarah Hildebrandt for gold this evening, but the Indian Olympic Association confirmed in a statement on 'X' that Phogat would not be allowed to compete after weighing in 'a few grams' over the 50kg weight limit this morning.

Phogat had stunned reigning Japan's Olympic champion Yui Susaki, who is seen as the best female wrestler in the world having never lost a bout, in the quarterfinals and had been guaranteed either gold or silver having made the final. Rules dictate wrestlers have to make weight on the morning of both days of the two-day event and failure to do so results in instant disqualification.

Hildebrandt will now face Cuba's Yusneylis Guzman Lopez, who had been beaten by Phogat in the semifinals, in the gold medal bout at the Champ-de-Mars Arena tonight.

Israel’s Olympic team has said some athletes have received threats, as they compete in Paris amid broader tensions over the war in Gaza and the threat of wider conflict in the Middle East.

Yael Arad, president of the Israeli National Olympic Committee, told The Associated Press on Tuesday that team members had received "centralized" threats meant to generate "psychological terror" in athletes, without giving further details.

Tom Reuveny, a 24-year-old Israeli athlete who won a gold in windsurfing over the weekend, was among those who said he’s received threats. Politics "should be put aside" during the Games, he told AP during a memorial Tuesday for 11 Israeli athletes killed during the 1972 Olympics in Munich, Germany.

"Unfortunately, there is a lot of politics involved — not in the Games — of the people who don’t want us to compete and don’t want us to be here," Reuveny said. "I’ve gotten quite a few messages and threats.”

Masai Russell is safely through to the semifinals of the women's 100-metre hurdles after winning her heat at the Stade de France this morning.

Russell, who ran the fastest time in the world this year at the U.S. Olympic trials, posted a time of 12.53 seconds, qualifying third fastest overall.

Teammates Alaysha Johnson, 12.61 seconds, and Grace Stark, 12.72 seconds, also did enough to qualify for Friday's semifinals.

This is an event that Team USA has a strong pedigree in, winning at least one medal in each of the last six Olympic Games in the women's 100m hurdles, even sweeping all three podium positions in Rio. It's the longest active medal streak for Team USA in track and field events.

Romania's Prime Minister, Marcel Ciolacu, has said he will boycott Sunday's closing ceremony after a "scandalous situation" saw a Romanian gymnast lose out on a bronze medal to Team USA's Jordan Chiles.

Ana Barbosu had started celebrating a bronze medal as she sat in third place with all of the routines completed in Monday's floor final. However, her celebrations proved to be short-lived after an inquiry into Team USA gymnast Chiles' score was granted by judges.

That meant Chiles' score was upgraded by 0.1 points, enough to leapfrog Barbosu into the bronze medal position, leaving the Romanian in tears.

"I decided not to attend the closing ceremony of the Paris Olympics, following the scandalous situation in the gymnastics, where our athletes were treated in an absolutely dishonorable manner," Ciolacu said in a Facebook post. "To withdraw a medal earned for honest work on the basis of an appeal ... is totally unacceptable!"

Spanish duo Alvaro Martin and Maria Perez have taken gold in the race walking mixed relay event this morning, comfortably seeing off pairs from Ecuador and Australia to top the podium.

Martin, who also won gold in the men's 20km race walk earlier in the Games, and Perez took the victory in two hours and 51 minutes, finishing 51 seconds ahead of Ecuador's Brian Daniel Pintado and Glenda Morejon. Australia claimed bronze.

Gabby Thomas was golden in the women’s 200m final on Tuesday, winning her first Olympic title as Julien Alfred of Saint Lucia finished second and America's Brittany Brown took third. The men's 200m final takes place tomorrow, with heats happening today.

The first medals of Day 12 will be awarded in a brand new event for these Games, the marathon race walk mixed relay.

Replacing the men's-only 50km race walk, the mixed relay event sees teams of one male and one female complete a relay over a marathon distance (around 42 kilometers or 26 miles). In the race, each participant completes two alternating legs of just over 10km with the male athlete starting the race and the female athlete finishing.

The race is now in its final stages, with Spain's pair looking likely to win as long as the Ecuadorians and Australians, currently in second and third, don't stage a late surge.

Team USA did not qualify for this event, nor did they qualify for the individual 20km race walk events held earlier in the Games.

After Scottie Scheffler produced an incredible final round to take gold in the men’s golf event Sunday, Team USA are hoping to sweep the golf golds for a second straight Games. Now it's the women's turn. Their event got underway this morning and takes place through Saturday.

Team USA's Nelly Korda is hoping to defend her title from Tokyo. She has had a historic year on the LPGA tour becoming the first player since 2013 to win six LPGA titles since January. It was the perfect start to the year, but the Floridian's form has tailed off in recent months and she missed the cut at both the U.S. Open and the PGA Championship. Still, if Korda is on it at Le Golf National, she will be hard to stop.

Team USA's Lilia Vu is also worth looking out for. The world number two was the breakout star of 2023, taking two of the five majors on her way to being named LPGA Player of the Year. A back injury has hindered her this year, but she returned in June coming second at the PGA Championship. "To me, an Olympic Gold would rank a little higher than a Major," Vu said. "It’s more than just golf. It’s the Olympics which is the best athletes all over the world."

South Korean duo Amy Yang and Jun Young Ko pose a threat to America's golfers, while New Zealand's Lydia Ko (a silver medalist in Rio and a bronze medalist in Tokyo) will hope to complete the set in Paris.

Good morning! It’s Day 12 of the 2024 Paris Olympics. Here’s what you should be looking out for today.

There are 23 medals on offer today, including five in track and field, and weightlifting and skateboarding finals also take place.

There's a handful of track and field finals today. In women's pole vault, Katie Moon will be hoping to bring home the gold for Team USA, and that final happens at 12:15 p.m. ET and 6:15 p.m. local time. Separately, men's discus is at 2:25 p.m. ET and 8:25 p.m. local time; America's Quincy Hall will be racing in the men's 400m final at 3:20 p.m. ET and 9:20 p.m. local time; and the men's 3,000m steeplechase is at 3:43 p.m. ET and 9:43 p.m. local time. Mixed relay marathon racewalking starts off the day and is already underway.

In non-medal events, the U.S. women's basketball team will be looking to extend its run to eight consecutive golds, having won the event at every Games since Atlanta 1996. The American team faces Nigeria in its quarterfinal game at 3:30 p.m. ET and 9:30 p.m. local time. The winner will play either Serbia or Australia, who play earlier in the day.

Cuban wrestler Mijain López Núñez retired after the 130-kilogram Greco-Roman wrestling final at the Paris Olympics — going out as a wrestling legend and his competitor’s hero.

López Núñez, 41, defeated Chilean Yasmani Acosta Fernández 6-0. The win earned López Núñez his fifth consecutive gold medal, as he made history as the first Olympic athlete to win gold in any event at five consecutive games and the first wrestler to win five gold medals.

Acosta Fernández said being the last person to fight López Núñez was an honor, calling him “a legend in the sport.”

After the fight, López Núñez unlaced his shoes and placed them in the center of the mat, symbolically indicating his retirement from wrestling. 

Read the full story here.