1936 — American Jesse Owens wins his third medal of the Berlin Games, taking the 200m in a 20.7 sec world record.
1984 — Edwin Moses notches up his 105th straight win as he takes the 400m hurdles gold at the Los Angeles Games. He hadn’t been beaten since August 1977, when he was downed by West German Harald Schmid, who ended third at the LA showpiece. Moses was beaten again only in 1987, having won 122 races in a row. He finished third at Seoul 1988.
1997 — Marius Corbett stuns the javelin field at the world championships in Athens, winning the competition with a throw of 88.4m, less than two metres ahead of Briton Steve Backley (86.8). The unheralded South African hit the mark on his second attempt, but he would have also won the competition with the 87.4 he managed in the third round.
2012 — Jamaican speed king Usain Bolt retains his Olympic 100m title as he wins gold at the London Games in 9.63 sec, lowering his own Olympic record of 9.69 from four years earlier.
2015 — Cameron van der Burgh and Chad le Clos are dethroned as world champions on the same night in Kazan. Van der Burgh lost his 50m breaststroke crown to Briton Adam Peaty as he finished second in 26.66 sec, 0.15 sec behind the winner. Van der Burgh had lowered the world record to 26.62 the previous morning, but Peaty took that in 26.42 in the evening semifinals. Le Clos, unbeaten in the 200m butterfly since winning Olympic gold in 2012, was downed by Hungarian Laszlo Cseh, the winner in 1 min 53.48 sec. Le Clos touched in 1:53.68.
2017 — Luvo Manyonga and Ruswahl Samaai make the podium at the world championships in London. Manyonga leapt to 8.48m on his second attempt to beat American Jarion Lawson into second place by four centimetres. Samaai went 8.32 on his last jump to secure the bronze medal from Russian Aleksandr Menkov.
2021 — South Africa-bred canoeist Jean van der Westhuyzen wins Olympic gold for Australia with partner Thomas Green in the men’s K2 1,000m at the Tokyo Games.
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