Olympic 2016 Results: Medal Winners, Highlights for Each Event After Tuesday
Tuesday's events at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro saw a lot of close battles as well as some of the biggest names living up to expectations.
The United States women's gymnastics team was as close to a sure thing as you can see in the sport, and they had no issue reaching expectations with a dominant gold medal. Katie Ledecky and Michael Phelps had tougher challenges than we are used to seeing from the swimming superstars, but both defeated fellow gold medalists to win their respective events.
A loaded day featuring medals in equestrian, shooting, diving, judo, weightlifting, fencing, canoe and swimming also made Day 4 a memorable from Rio.
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| Team Eventing | France | Germany | Australia |
| Individual Eventing | Michael Jung (GER) | Astier Nicolas (FRA) | Phillip Dutton (USA) |
| Women's 25-Meter Pistol | Anna Korakaki (GRE) | Monika Karsch (GER) | Heidi Diethelm Gerber (SUI) |
| Synchronized Diving Women's 10M Platform | China | Malaysia | Canada |
| Women's Weightlifting 63 KG | Deng Wei (CHN) | Choe Hyo Sim (PRK) | Karina Goricheva (KAZ) |
| Men's Judo 81 KG | Khasan Khalmurzaev (RUS) | Travis Stevens (USA) | Sergiu Toma (UAE)/Takanori Nagase (JPN) |
| Women's Judo 63 KG | Tina Trstenjak (SLO) | Clarisse Agbegnenou (FRA) | Yarden Gerbi (BRA)/Anicka van Emden (NED) |
| Men's Individual Epee | Sangyoung Park (KOR) | Geza Imre (HUN) | Gauthier Grumier (FRA) |
| Women's Gymnastics Team | United States | Russia | China |
| Men's Canoe Whitewater | Denis Garguad Chanut (FRA) | Matej Benus (SVK) | Takuya Haneda (JPN) |
| Women's 200M Freestyle | Katie Ledecky (USA) | Sarah Sjostrom (SWE) | Emma McKeon (AUS) |
| Men's 200M Butterfly | Michael Phelps (USA) | Masato Sakai (JPN) | Tamas Kenderesi (HUN) |
| Women's 200M IM | Katinka Hosszu (HUN) | Siobhan-Marie O'Connor (GBR) | Maya Dirado (USA) |
| Men's 4x200M Relay | United States | Great Britain | Japan |
Equestrian—Team Eventing
Germany entered the week as the favorite and two-time defending champion in eventing at the Olympics, but it was France that pulled off the upset to win with a score of 169—3.8 ahead of Germany, which won the silver.
Astier Nicolas was leader for France, also winning an individual silver later in the day. Thibaut Vallette, Mathieu Lemoine and Karim Florent Laghouag also did their part to win the first medal in Rio for France.
Australia also came through with an impressive performance to take home the bronze.
Equestrian—Individual Eventing
Although Germany didn't bring home the gold in the team competition, Michael Jung earned his hardware in the individual battle. Riding Sam FBW, Jung posted an impressive score of 40.90 in a nearly flawless performance to win the title.
Nicolas of France had a strong finish to end up with a silver medal, while Phillip Dutton surprised with a bronze medal along with his horse Mighty Nice.
Shooting—Women's 25-Meter Pistol
Anna Korakaki led all competitors with a score of 297 in the precision portion of the competition and then 19 in the semifinals of the 25-meter pistol event. In the finals against Germany's Monika Karsch, the Greek star once again came through with an 8-6 win.
Zhang Jingjing, who set an Olympic record with a mark of 592 in the rapid competition, ended up in fourth place after losing the bronze-medal matchup against Heidi Gerber Diethelm of Switzerland.
Diving—Women's Synchronized 10-Meter
Some countries are just dominant in certain events. The United States is almost unbeatable in basketball. China is pretty much at that level in synchronized diving.
Both the men and women have already brought home some golds, with the latest being the tandem of Chen Roulin and Liu Huixia. NBC Olympics provided a look at just how good the last dive was on Tuesday:
The combined score was a 354, well ahead of the silver medalist from Malaysia. Canada managed to add a bronze medal, but this entire competition was really China's to win.
With one more synchronized diving medal to be won on Wednesday, China could go for the sweep.
Weightlifting—Women's 63 KG
Deng Wei put together a world-record performance in the 63-kilogram weight class to win gold. The Chinese star lifted 262 kilograms, well clear of silver medalist Choe Hyo Sim who topped out at 248 kilograms.
Karina Goricheva came close with 243 kilograms but was clearly outmatched by the eventual champion.
Judo—Men's 81 KG
American Travis Stevens had an incredible run through the 81-kilogram bracket, defeating top-ranked Avtandil Tchrikishvili of Georgia with a submission in the semifinals. No United States athlete has ever won gold in judo, and it's been eight years since anyone even medaled.
While he wasn't able to win gold, his silver medal was still impressive.
Of course, the real honor goes to eventual winner Khasan Khalmurzaev, who defeated Stevens in the final match with an ippon.
Sergiu Toma and Takanori Nagase both won bronze medals.
Judo—Women's 63 KG
Slovenia's first medal of the 2016 Olympics goes to Tina Trstenjak, who overpowered her competition with dominant wins in each of the last three matches. The final victory came against Clarisse Agbegnenou of France, ending the match with an ippon in the first couple of minutes.
Hometown favorite Marian Silva of Brazil lost in the semifinals and then struggled again in the bronze-medal match to finish outside of the podium.
Fencing—Men's Individual Epee
Sangyoung Park and Geza Imre battled all three periods in a dramatic final, but in the end it was Park who came through with a 15-14 victory that came down to the last point.
Imre, who knocked off top-seeded Gauthier Grumier in the semifinals, had a 13-9 lead after the second period and went up 14-10 in the third. He only needed one more to win, but Park came back with five straight wins to take home the gold.
Grumier battled back in the consolation round to earn a bronze medal.
Gymnastics—Women's Team All-Around
The United States wasn't just expected to win, they were expected to dominate. Despite the pressure, they did just that with an easy victory in the women's team all-around competition.
The difference in talent was obvious during qualifications when Simone Biles, Aly Raisman and Gabby Douglas finished with the top three scores in the individual all-around. Meanwhile, Laurie Hernandez and Madison Kocian were just as good.
Once the finals rolled around, the Americans were as close to perfect as possible to tally a score of 184.897, more than eight points better than Russia in second place. For reference, the difference between second and last place (eighth) in the finals was less than five points.
"I don’t think anybody could have asked any more of us," Biles said after the win, per Ben Cohen and Louise Radnofky of the Wall Street Journal. "I do think we performed at our best."
You know the team is good when the least known athlete on the team can provide efforts like this:
Extra difficulty on each event gave the Americans a high starting score on just about every apparatus, leading to the easy win.
Canoe—Men's Single Whitewater
One excellent run helped France's Denis Chanut Gargaud take home a gold medal in the individual canoe race.
Matej Benus of Slovakia had just the eighth-best time in the semifinals, but he had a clean run in the finals to put himself in first place with a time of 95.02. With just a few competitors left, it seemed as though he would have a chance to end up with gold.
However, Gargaud Chanut put together the run of his life to get through the gates and end with a time of 94.17, less than a second clear of Benus for the win. The remaining competitors couldn't make up ground, and the French star ended up on top of the podium.
Swimming—Women's 200-Meter Freestyle
This was clearly Katie Ledecky's worst individual event. The 19-year-old superstar is better at long distances, while top competitor Sarah Sjostrom of Sweden is more of a sprinter.
However, that didn't stop Ledecky from earning a late lead and then holding on in the final seconds to beat Sjostrom by 0.35 seconds.
ESPN Stats & Info's Paul Carr notes just how good the American swimmer has been:
Ledecky will return to the pool for the 800-meter freestyle, which is clearly her best event after winning four years ago and dominating at the World Championships. This is bad news for her competition.
Swimming—Men's 200-Meter Butterfly
Even at 31 years old, Michael Phelps is still the best in the sport.
This race was billed as Phelps versus Chad Le Clos of South Africa, who won this event in London and hasn't been shy directing trash talk toward the decorated Olympian. Interestingly, Phelps came through with a first-place finish, while Le Clos didn't even finish on the podium after ending up in fourth place.
NBC Olympics provided a replay of the final:
The toughest challenge came from Masato Sakai of Japan, who put the pressure on late and came incredibly close to taking the gold. However, Phelps finished 0.04 seconds ahead to win the 20th gold medal of his career.
Swimming—Women's 200-Meter Individual Medley
Katinka Hosszu is known as the "Iron Lady." So far in Rio she hasn't even seemed human.
The Hungarian swimmer set a world record in the 400-meter individual medley earlier in the week, won gold in the 100-meter backstroke and now adds another gold in the 200-meter IM—this time only setting an Olympic record.
Unlike the longer IM, Hosszu faced a lot of competition in this one, most notably from Siobhan-Marie O'Connor of Great Britain. The 20-year-old made it extremely close down the stretch and seemed like she could possibly pull the upset, but in the end it was Hosszu who came away with a 0.3-second victory.
After winning three gold medals, the Iron Lady should get some much-needed rest.
Swimming—Men's 4x200-Meter Relay
Phelps gets most of the headlines while winning his 21st career gold medal. He anchored the squad only about an hour after securing his win in the 200-meter butterfly. Still, this was an outstanding team effort by the United States to earn the victory.
Conor Dwyer led things off against some of the toughest competition in the field and got the Americans off to a lead, while Townley Haas extended the margin with a dominant second leg. Ryan Lochte did his job in the third section. So by the time Phelps was up, he just simply had to cruise to his second gold medal of the night.
Great Britain closed well after a poor start to earn the silver, but at more than two seconds off the lead, this was never really a close contest.
Follow Rob Goldberg on Twitter for year-round sports analysis.
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