BAHRAIN signed off from the 2016 Rio Olympic Games yesterday with mixed sentiments.
Albert Rop and Birhanu Balew put up solid performances in the men’s 5,000 metres final although both missed out on a medal while countrymen Alemu Bekele and Isaac Korir could not finish the men’s marathon.
Also on the Games’ final day, Bahraini wrestler Adam Batirov bowed out of medal contention after losing his first and only match in the men’s freestyle 65kg category.
Bahrain return home with a gold and a silver won by Ruth Jebet in the women’s 3,000m steeplechase and Eunice Kirwa in the women’s marathon respectively.
The national team’s two medals are the most won at any Olympics by Bahrain. Maryam Yusuf Jamal was previously the only Bahraini medallist at the Summer Games. She had clinched the bronze medal, later upgraded to silver, in 2012 in London.
In the men’s 5,000m final held early yesterday morning, Rop and Balew did well to finish in the top 10.
Rop paced himself among the leaders until late on, and in the end dropped to seventh in 13 minutes 08.79 seconds. Balew trailed for most of the run but managed to push late to claim ninth place and a personal best of 13:09.26.
In the men’s marathon, Bekele paced himself with the leading group for more than an hour while Korir trailed not far behind. But Bekele began having problems with his shoelaces and had to stop multiple times on the sidelines to try and fix the problem without success.
He eventually lost too much time to regain his place amongst the leaders and dropped out along with Korir.
On the wrestling mat, Batirov fell to Ikhtiyor Navruzov of Uzbekistan. Batirov was able to fight back and even take a 7-5 advantage.
Both men finished 7-7 but Navruzov won on points decision.
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