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PARIS – Photo finishes are apparently in vogue at the Paris Olympics.
In what was already a dramatic race after a contestant was forced to pull out of the race following her swim in the polluted Seine, the mixed relay triathlon concluded after a contested result and downgraded medals.
Germany came in first place after 1 hour and 25.39 seconds for the gold medal, with Laura Lindemann running the team’s final leg. One second later, American Taylor Knibb and Great Britain’s Beth Potter crossed the finish line at the same time (1:25:40).
The U.S. defended its mixed relay Olympic mixed relay silver, and Great Britain, the Tokyo gold medalist, took bronze.
But that’s not how it happened if you changed the channel too soon.
After the photo finish, defending champion Great Britain was initially awarded silver. But when Team USA challenged that result — successfully — that outcome was overturned. GB was booted to bronze, and the U.S. jumped to silver.
Team Great Britain even announced on social media that its team had won silver before being downgraded.
Seth Rider of the U.S. said there was no official challenge to the results — "It just took some time for the officials to get the photo up and have a look," he said at a press conference after the race.
His teammate Morgan Pearson added, "We were all standing right at the finish line and from our point of view it did look like Taylor (Knibb) out-leaned Beth (Potter) and it said photo finish. So, I think that's a reasonable thing to challenge."
On the eve of the race, Belgium had to withdraw from the mixed relay after one of its athletes fell ill after during the individual triathlon last week. The cause for triathlete Claire Michel was not immediately clear, but the water quality of the Seine River has been an ongoing issue. Although testing that day revealed that the E.coli levels in the waters had met the World Triathlon’s standards, Michel’s illness sparked concerns that the river remained unsafe for the health of swimmers.
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