New Zealand took gold and silver in the men's triathlon this morning in Vouliagmeni, a coastal suburb of Athens. Hamish Carter and his teammate Bevan Docherty were the leaders through the final running stage, along with Switzerland's Sven Riederer. Carter pulled away just at the end to claim the title, Docherty won silver and Reiderer took bronze, just ahead of the fast-advancing Greg Bennett of Australia. British competitor Marc Jenkins received a hero's welcome when he crossed the finish line. He had a collision midway through the cycling leg that left one of his bicycle wheels broken. He ran with his bike on his shoulder for nearly two kilometers to the next repair station, but he valiantly finished the event - in last place.

And the USA made it one-two in the men's long jump competition here tonight - as Dwight Phillips claimed the gold with a leap of 8.59 metres. John Moffitt earned silver with a personal best jump, and Spain's Joan Lino Martinez took the bronze.

Italy's women's water polo team overcame the thunderously cheering hometown crowd to beat Greece 10-to-9 and claim the Olympic gold medal. The game went into extra time after a match in which no team ever gained more than a one-goal advantage. And the American women beat the defending champions Australia 6-5 to win the bronze.

Russia's Andrey Moiseev set an Olympic record as he won gold in the men's modern pentathlon today. Lithuanian Andrejus Zadneprovskis won silver, while the Czech Libor Capalini claimed bronze. The competition involves shooting, fencing, swimming, horse jumping and a 3,000-metre run. Georgia's Vakhtang Iagorashvili won bronze in the pentathlon in 1988 (competing for the Soviet Union), and he came out of retirement to compete here in Athens under his new nationality, the USA. He managed a respectable ninth place finish today, but all eyes are now on his wife Mary Beth Iagorashvili, who finished fourth in Sydney and will go for a medal here tomorrow.

Egypt got its first Olympic gold medal since 1948 when Karam Ibrahim beat Georgian Ramaz Nozadze in the Greco-Roman wrestling 96-kilogram class. And Egypt also took a bronze as taekwondo competition got underway here in Athens. Although it was clearly Taiwan's day, as the country's competitors won gold medals in both the men's under-59-kilogram category and the women's under-49-kilogram class.

At the USA-Spain quarterfinal today, officials had to separate the American and Spanish coaches when an argument about a time-out call escalated into a screaming match with only 23 second to go in the game. In the end, the underdog US team won 102-to-94. The match also set a record for points scored by an American player at the Olympics, as the New York Knicks' Stephon Marbury collected 31 points.

More competitors have left the Olympics due to drug tests. Ukraine's women's quadruple sculls crew was stripped of its bronze medal today after one of the rowers failed tested positive for a stimulant. Australia will now take the medal. And Hungarian weightlifter Zoltan Kovacs was thrown out of the Olympics for refusing to take a drug test.

And finally, new and old Olympic heroes have been elected to the Athlete's Commission of the International Olympic Committee, including Frankie Fredericks, Hicham El Guerrouj and Rania Elwani. Javelin veteran Jan Zelezny will return to the committee after a break during which his seat was filled by four-time British rowing champion Matthew Pinsent.

PERSONAL NOTE: THE VENUES

After all the advance buzz that the Athens organising committee (ATHOC) was never going to finish the venues in time, it's been a very pleasant surprise to discover that they are beautiful spaces that are ideally suited for the Olympics - well, they should be! Virtually all of them have been built from scratch or very heavily rebuilt in the past four years. All have nice design touches - and are festooned with the vivid Athens colour scheme (mostly two shades of blue, with green, pink, orange and yellow accents). And you can't imagine how creative they get with movable fences! These are world-class sports facilities - designed for big events that probably don't happen very often in Greece. But never mind - for two weeks they are being used to the max. Here are comments on four venues in OAKA (the Olympic park). I'll look at others later . . .

VELODROME: This has become my favourite venue and my favourite new sport! I'd never seen track cycling, and it's thrilling to watch - probably because someone truly deranged came up with the rules of each event. They all have little outrageous twists that make you go "huh?" and make sure that you're not quite sure what's going on. But it's so exciting to watch that it doesn't matter. The velodrome is stunning - the top row of seats is at ground level, and there are no external walls, so it's outdoors - sort of. On the sunny side huge blinds shield the heat, and there's a magnificent two-part roof that arches over the whole thing. The shade and the blinds keep it cool - especially in the upper seats where you can feel a breeze. And without walls, you can see out into the sunny and festive Olympic park itself. And down in the centre of the track the fascinating pit area is buzzing with activity as well.

AQUATICS CENTRE AND INDOOR HALL: These buildings are a matching set - and probably become part of a vast conference centre or something. Inside one building is an enormous arena, which is the perfect venue for gymnastics. In another are two pools set in a large arena - for water polo (in a regulation swimming pool) and diving. There's a third, smaller arena around the synchronized swimming pool. And the main aquatics pool is completely outdoors - with large grandstands around it. Not a clue what you do with them after the Olympics! Rock concerts and court games like basketball in the indoor hall. But pools with stadiums around them?

TENNIS CENTRE: Basically a standard tennis centre with 10 courts - two of which are in stadiums. Centre Court is rather huge, while Court One is a lovely, modestly sized, perfectly round stadium that you can imagine being used for all kinds of things like theatre and concerts in the round. As for the rest: The Greek Open maybe? But they should schedule it for April, not August!

[by Rich Cline]