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ATHENS, Aug. 28 (Xinhuanet) -- Norway's Andreas Thorkildsen won the men's
javelin title with a huge throw of 86.50m at the OlympicGames here on Saturday.
Vadims Vvasilevskis of Latvia, led the competition after round one with a
personal best of 84.95m, which finally earned him the silver.
Sergey Makarov of Russia, one of the favorites, finished third place
following his first throw of 84.84m.
With both Jan Zelezny of Czech Republic, the world record holder and winner
of the last three Olympics, and Steve Backley ofBritain, a medallist in the last
three Olympics, struggling with throws under 80m in round one, it was
Thorkildsen again who stunned the others in round two.
The Norwegian's personal best of 86.50m could not have come in a better
place than this. It destroyed the field.
Vvasilevskis had another good throw of 83.95m in round two and Makarov
threw 84.32m in round six, but that was all they could offer and Thorkildsen
walked away the Olympic champion passing hislast two throws in the competition.
Steve Backley came back with a big season's best of 84.13m in round three,
but the Briton was left out of the medals this time placing fourth.
However, Zelezny did not make it into the last three rounds this time. He
was 9th with 80.59m. Enditem |