U.S. women's 4x100 team advances on second chance

RIO DE JANIERO >> The U.S. team made the most of its second chance to qualify for the women’s 4x100-meter relay final, ruing the fastest time of the day in a solo re-run before the night session began.

The Americans dropped the baton during the morning preliminaries and appeared to be out of contention.

But track officials upheld the U.S. protest because Allyson Felix was jostled by a Brazilian ruer, in the next lane, as she tried to hand the baton to English Gardner on the second exchange. The U.S. finished the race, 10 seconds off the pace. If the team had not finished, it could not have lodged a protest.

Because relay finals must be limited to eight teams, the Americans were called back to run all by themselves, in the same order and in the same lane. Their goal was to beat the time of 42.70 seconds run by China. They ran a 41.77, almost a second faster, evening bettering the time run by No. 1 qualifier Jamaica, 41.79.

“I think I got propelled at about 20 miles an hour,” Valencia resident said. “When a foreign object comes in front of you, it’s going to mess up your momentum and the handover.”

Men’s beach volleyball

Brazil’s Bruno Schmitt and Alison Cerutti defeated Italy’s fifth-seeded Italians Daniele Lupo and Paolo Nicolai in straight sets to win the gold medal in men’s beach volleyball.

The top-seeded Brazilians won, 21-19, 21-17. Cerutti won silver in the 2012 London Games. Schmitt won in his Olympic debut. Lupo and Nicolai reached the Round of 16 in London and they are the first Italian pair to get past the quarterfinals. They were seeded fifth in the tournament.

Netherlands’ Alexander Brouwer and Robert Meeuwsen won the bronze medal, defeating Russia’s Viacheslav Krasilnikov and Konstantin Semenov, 23-21, 22-20.

Men’s triathlon

Alistair Brownlee of Britain successfully defended his gold medal in the men’s triathlon, wiing on a cloudless, but sticky, day at Copacabana Beach.

He grabbed a British flag while trotting to the finish line. He won in 1 hour, 45 minutes, 1 second.

His younger brother, Jonathan, who took bronze in London four years ago, moved up to silver, finishing six seconds back. Henry Schoeman of Russia won the bronze medal, ruing across 42 seconds after the two-time gold medal wier.

The brothers collapsed once across the finish line, then rolled over to embrace each other.

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Women’s diving

China has its next diving superstar. Actually, two of them.

Fifteen-year-old Ren Qian captured another diving gold medal for China, producing five nearly flawless efforts off the women’s 10-meter platform to beat her 17-year-old teammate, Si Yajie.

Ren finished with 439.25 points and Si settled for silver at 419.40 in a back-and-forth duel that wiped out any would-be contenders.

Canadian Meaghan Benfeito grabbed the bronze at 389.20.

Around the Games

U.S. boxer Shakur Stevenson reached the bantamweight final after his Russian semifinal opponent was unable to fight because of an injury, marking the first time since 2004 that an American fighter will be in a gold medal match. Stevenson won by walkover against Vladimir Nikitin, who sustained heavy damage in three consecutive brutal fights, clearing the way for Stevenson to advance to the final against Robeisy Ramirez of Cuba on Saturday. ... Serbia is headed to the men’s water polo final for the first time. Filip Filipovic, Andrija Prlainovic and Slobodan Nikic scored two goals apiece and Serbia shut down Italy, 10-8, in the Rio semifinals. Next up for Serbia is Croatia, which advanced with a 12-8 victory against Montenegro. The countries also met in the world championship final last year, with Serbia wiing, 11-4.