David Rudisha hit turbo charge in the final 300m to defend his men's 800m title, as Shaunae Miller brought out the dive seen in cricket and baseball, to take home the win in the women's 400m on another dramatic day of athletics action at the Rio 2016 Olympics.
Rudisha has not been his usual self since setting a world record time to clinch the gold medal at the London 2012 Olympics, but after finding something resembling form just head of the Rio Games, the Kenyan showed why he is one of the best of all-time at this distance with a devastating sprint in the final fourth of the race to leave Taoufik Makhloufi of Algeria and American Clayton Murphy in their wake.
The 27-year-old won in 1:42.15, with Makhloufi coming home in 1:42.61. Murphy had a late blitz to thank for getting the bronze medal in a time of 1:42.93.
"It's been very difficult," Rudisha said on the injury problems he has had to overcome to get to Rio. "I have stayed focused and positive. My coach has been great and given me hope.
"I am so excited. It is the greatest moment of my career."
The same feeling will be pervading through Miller as well, after the woman from the Bahamas kept up her recent brilliant form to take the gold medal at the expense of Allyson Felix, who was trying to become the first American woman to win five track and field gold medals.
Felix led for the majority of the race and looked to be heading for a comfortable win only for Felix to put in a late surge. That meant the muscles tightened, so did the mind, and in a final moment of desperation, Miller put in a big dive right at the end to beat Felix by 0.07 seconds.
"I don't know what happened, my legs started to get a little heavy, but I just wanted it so bad," Miller said when asked of her last-gasp dive.
The Bahamian timed 49.44 seconds, with Felix finishing in second in 49.51. Jamaica's Shericka Jackson took bronze in 49.85 seconds.
In the other finals of the day, Anita Wlodarczyk broke the world record in the women's hammer throw to take the gold medal comfortably. The Pole threw the hammer at a distance of 82.29 to win the title, with China's Wenxiu Zhang taking silver, after her longest throw of 76.75. Great Britain's Sophie Hitchon pulled off 74.54 for bronze.
India's Lalita Babar could only finish tenth in the women's 3000m steeplechase final, which was dominated by the excellent Ruth Jebet, who missed the world record by a whisker. Deciding to jump into the lead early in the race, Jebet just increasing the lead more and more with no-one able to keep up with the athlete from Bahrain, who finished nearly eight seconds ahead of the rest of the field in 8:59.75.
Kenya's Kiyeng Hyvin Jepkemoi finished second in 9:07.12 to take silver, while the bronze medal went to Emma Coburn (9:07.63) of the USA. Babar crossed the finish line in a time of 9:22.74.
In the men's pole vault, there was plenty of joy for the home crowd as Brazil's Thiago Braz da Silva won gold with a jump of 6.03m, which took the gold medal away from France's Renaud Lavillenie (5.98), who had to settle for silver. USA's Sam Kendricks (5.85) won bronze.
