Triathlete Ben Dijkstra admitted he gave his all en route to claiming Team GB’s first gold of the 2014 Youth Olympic Games in Nanjing.
And after emerging from the 750m swim down in 19th place,15-year-old Dijkstra shone on the bike and after the 20km cycle he found himself out at the front.
He stayed there throughout the 5km run but had New Zealander Daniel Hoy hot on his heels the whole way.
In fact, the pair crossed the line in the exact same time of 54.43 minutes, but after a photo finish was reviewed Dijkstra was announced as the winner – much to the teenager’s delight.
“Initially the results board displayed that Dan had won but after the photo finish was reviewed my name came up,” he said. “I gave it everything and I am so glad I managed to win gold – I am over the moon.
“My legs were burning up with 150m to go, I just had to give it everything, but that is triathlon, it is one of the hardest competitions around.
“The swim was definitely the toughest part of the race because it was very aggressive. My swim isn’t the strongest so I just had to keep going and then bridge across on the bike.
“The gap was 25 seconds which isn’t massive, so I managed to bridge that gap on the first lap. The run was really tough because in the transition my bike got tangled with two other athletes.”
There were also two silver medals in the pool with Jessica Fullalove more than playing her part in a successful night for Team GB.
Fullalove kicked things off with a second-place finish in the women’s 100m backstroke final with a time of 1:01.23 minutes, just 0.01 seconds off American winner Clara Smiddy.
But she didn’t have time to sit back and celebrate as she was back in the pool to lead off Team GB’s 4x100m medley women.
However, the fast turnaround was well worth at as along with Georgina Evans, Charlotte Atkinson and Amelia Maughan she claimed her second silver medal with a time of 4:05.75 minutes, with hosts China taking gold.
“I am really happy to have won two silver medals and I am really proud of the girls’ efforts in the relay medley as we all worked so hard for it,” she added.
“Winning the silver medal in the backstroke is great but coming that close to the gold is gutting because it was what I dreamed about.
“But it is nice to end on the high and it has been a good night overall.”
Also in action was Luke Greenback, who finished sixth in the men’s 100m backstroke final with a new personal best of 55.38 seconds, however he failed to qualify for the 100m butterfly final.
Duncan Scott was an agonising fourth in the men’s 200m freestyle, missing out on a medal by just 0.82 seconds.
Elsewhere, judoka Lulu Piovesana will be hoping for better luck in Thursday’s mixed international team event after disappointment in the women’s -66kg competition.
Piovesana was ranked third going into the competition but a shoulder injury hampered her preparation and she lost her first fight to Romanian Stefania Adelina Dobre.
That meant that the best Piovesana could hope for was a bronze, but after winning her first repechage fight she was dumped out of the competition by Jennifer Schwille from Germany.
Sailor Hanna Brant was 23rd and 14th in her two Byte CII races while Team GB rowers Anna Thornton and Chris Lawrie were in scintillating form as they safely navigated their way through the repechages and into the semi-finals with a pair of victories. And Ellie Downie qualified for Wednesday’s all-around final in second with a score of 53.500, also making it into three of the four apparatus showpieces with just the uneven bars letting her down.
“I was quite nervous going into qualification and I had a bit of a shaky start on bars but I managed to pull it back with all my other pieces,” Downie said.
“Going into my other pieces I just thought about all the technical things Claire told me. I have done so many beam, floor and vault routines that I knew I could get through them safely.
“For the all-around final I need to get my bars routine right and then do my other pieces the same or better.”
© Sportsbeat 2014