Alistair Brownlee (GBR) makes history with Rio triathlon Gold

Great Britain’s Alistair Brownlee has become first triathlete to successfully defend his Olympic title, with a crushing performance across all three legs leading him to Gold in the triathlon event in Rio on Thursday.

Back to his best form at Copacabana beach, Brownlee was in the lead from almost the very start to the very end – pulling away from younger brother Jonathan Brownlee before the halfway mark of the run, to eventually win in a time of 1 hour 45 minutes and 1 second. His result means he claims a rare place in triathlon history, not only as the first athlete to win two Gold medals in the triathlon event, but the first to do so at successive Olympic Games.

Jonathan Brownlee claimed the silver to make it a banner day for British triathlon and the Brownlee family, adding to his bronze medal in London. Behind the Brownlees, it was South Africa’s Henri Schoeman who was having the race of his life to claim South Africa’s – and Africa’s – very first medal in triathlon. It was the first major podium place in Schoeman’s career, having not made a podium in the World Triathlon Series. Just behind him was teammate Richard Murray (RSA), who recorded the fastest run split of the day to finish fourth. It was the first time ever that South Africa had placed two men in the top 10 of an Olympic event.

While previous Olympic races had shown anything could happen in the race, this one was much more clear cut from the start. The Brownlee brothers sat just behind the leaders in the swim, then set a race-defining pace in the first half of the 40km bike leg. Driving up the tough hill on the Rio course, they were part of a lead group of 10 that rode the first 20km more than 90seconds faster than the fastest athlete on the bike course in last year’s test event. It saw them double their gap on the chase group over the first two laps, stretch it to a minute on the third, and then keep it around 75 seconds for the rest of the bike.

Even though they had established a clean break on the field, the Brownlees’ didn’t let up on the run. While France’s Vincent Luis initially kept up in the first lap, they broke before it ended and were never headed. Alistair then decided to pull away from Jonathan with plenty of time to go, but slowed …

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