POLE VAULT
A CONTEST delayed by rain and technical problems eventually burst into life close to midnight in Rio when host-nation hope Thiago Braz beat world record-holder Renaud Lavillenie in a stadium buzzing with patriotic fervour.
Braz, 22, rose to the occasion, literally, as he soared to an Olympic record of 6.03m. Earlier, Lavillenie had also set an Olympic record of 5.98m in a dramatic finale to the competition that saw the Frenchman booed from the rafters by the partisan crowd.