KEY POINTS:
BEIJING - Boardsailor Tom Ashley gave the Olympic Games medal haul a traditional look when he won New Zealand a third Beijing gold off Qingdao yesterday.
His triumph meant New Zealand had won Beijing golds in yachting, athletics and rowing, the three sports that put the black singlet on the top of the podium 22 times, 15 more than all the other sports combined.
But while New Zealand has now won nine athletics golds, seven in yachting and six at the rowing, never in 100 years of going to the Olympics have all three sports won gold at the same Games.
While rowing golds came at Athens in 2004 and Sydney in 2000, the last yachting gold was in 1992 at Barcelona, while athletics had to go back to John Walker in 1976, until Valerie Vili blew the world away in Beijing on Saturday.
Ashley notched an ice-cool victory on day 12 of the Olympics, finishing third in the double-points medal race to secure gold by a single point from Frenchman Julien Bontemps, with Israeli Shahar Zubari a further five points back in third.
Ashley, the world champion, had gone into the race tied for second with Briton Nick Dempsey, a point off the lead held by Bontemps and eight ahead of fourth-placed Zubari.
"It's incredible, I don't know what to say," Ashley said.
He admitted to relief more than anything else when he crossed the line in the quickfire medal race, which was over in just 19 minutes.
With only the medal race to come, Star sailors Hamish Pepper and Carl Williams lie ninth overall after finishing three races yesterday in 13th, 5th and 11th. They cannot win a medal from there.
Barbara Kendall placed sixth in the women's boardsailing medal race, finishing sixth overall.
At the Bird's Nest, 5000m runner Adrian Blincoe last night finished seventh in the slowest heat, well outside his best time. He failed to qualify for the final.
There was joy for New Zealand at the stadium in the lithe form of Nick Willis, when the 1500m medal ceremony was held.
Willis had his bronze hung around his neck by the great Hicham El Guerrouj, the Moroccan who won gold in Athens. They shook hands and shared words.
At Shunyi, canoeist Ben Fouhy showed glimpses of his best form in the K1 500m semifinals.
Fourth at the 750m mark, Fouhy looked to be in trouble but accelerated past South African Shaun Rubenstein and Swede Markus Oscarsson to claim second, 0.29 seconds behind Australian Ken Wallace.
"I'm a lot happier, I'm through to the final. You can't win lotto if you don't have a ticket," said Fouhy, who was in despair after finishing third in his heat on Monday.
K2 1000m crew of Steven Ferguson and Mike Walker also made Friday's final when they finished second in three minutes, 23.511sec behind Latvia after easing up in the closing stages.
Ferguson, son of quadruple gold medallist Ian Ferguson, and Walker were leading so comfortably going into the final 100m that they were able to manipulate the finish, deliberately finishing second to earn a spot in lane one for their final.
Their theory is that the winds favour that side of the course.
New Zealand's BMX riders came through their first day of competition at the Laoshan track in style. Marc Willers advanced to the men's semifinals as second seed after completing the three quarterfinal runs with nine points.
Sarah Walker also went through in the women's qualifying with the fourth fastest time of 37.187sec, and will contest the three-race semifinals as second seed.
- NZPA
