Olympics 2024 LIVE: Latest Paris medal results as Adam Peaty and ...

The first gold medals of the summer will be handed out before lunch, with the mixed 10m air rifle finals taking place at 09:30 BST. The reigning Olympic champions, Chinese duo Haoran Yang and Qian Yang, are not competing, leaving the door wide open for Team GB pair Michael Bargeron and Seonaid McIntosh to bring home the first medals of the summer.

The shooting finals will be closely followed by the women’s 3m synchronised diving final, where the British duo of Yasmin Harper and Scarlett Mew Jensen, who have competed together since 2023, will both look to bring home their first medals.

Perhaps the biggest event of the day at Paris 2024 will be taking place in the pool at the Paris La Defense Arena, with a range of swimming disciplines making their first appearance. The day will include semi-finals in women’s 100m butterfly and 400m freestyle as well as men’s 100m breaststroke, with the day culminating in both the men’s and women’s 400m freestyle and 4x100m freestyle relay finals.

Several Team GB hopefuls will compete in each discipline, including Adam Peaty trying to reach the final in the men’s 100m breaststroke as he goes for a historic third straight gold, while America’s seven-time Olympic gold medalist Katie Ledecky is set to compete in the women’s 400m freestyle, along with Australia’s Olympic champion Ariarne Titmus and Canadian phenom Summer McIntosh.

Check out all the action on Day 1 below:

Jack Rathborn26 July 2024 22:22

Team GB took an early lead in the first quarter of the hockey, Nick Park putting the medal hopefuls ahead, although Spain had the better half and had two or three good chances to score.

The second quarter is underway, and GB have doubled their lead with a penalty corner. There are lots of union jacks in the crowd and they are flying.

Sonia Twigg27 July 2024 09:22

Simon Calder has just arrived on the first British Airways flight to touch down since the main Paris airport re-opened

Airports in Paris have reopened after a six-hour closure for security during the opening ceremony of the 2024 Olympic Games in the French capital. I have just arrived at Paris Charles de Gaulle, which is quiet as the airlines play catch-up.

Normally the final Friday in July would be one of the busiest days of the year, with the three Paris airports handling one-third of a million people. Instead, arrivals and departures were halted at 6pm local time as part of a vast no-fly zone across northern France.

Airlines, particularly Air France and easyJet, cancelled hundreds of flights to and from Paris. This morning CDG airport is quieter than usual because the normal crowds of connecting passengers simply aren’t here. But there will be relief that the airports and the airspace are getting back to normal – the next challenge, according to the pan-European air navigation coordinator Eurocontrol, will be handling the exodus after the closing ceremony on 11 August.

The first British Airways departure from London Heathrow departed full to capacity. The Airbus A321 arrived 15 minutes early, and passport control took two minutes.

Many armed police are patrolling the “landside” areas, including the rail station at Terminal 2.

The only airport hold-up, as usual, was the long queue for public transport tickets.

Sonia Twigg27 July 2024 09:15

The first of Team Great Britain and Northern Ireland are in action in the Pool A hockey opening match against Spain.

Britain’s men’s team have not had the same success as the women’s and have not won a medal since the 1988 Games.

But their match has just got underway, and the umbrellas at the hockey have just come down as well.

Sonia Twigg27 July 2024 09:01

Heavy rain fell throughout the opening ceremony which was a three-and-a-half hour spectacle on the River Seine, which saw 85 boats carry almost 7,000 athletes from 205 countries.

The deluge threatened to dampen the show, and saw flood warnings raised by the French meteorological office for some areas around the city.

Sonia Twigg27 July 2024 08:53

One of the defining features of Paris’s bid to host the Olympics Games was its simplicity: this great city already had the facilities required to host, and so many of the problems associated with building new venues – the spiralling costs, the environmental demands, the white elephants left scattered a decade later – would not be in play. Only one venue needed to be built from scratch: the Aquatics Centre.

The proposal written into the original bid was for an Olympic Aquatics Centre to seat 15,000 spectators, the minimum number required by swimming’s governing body, Fina, for major international events.

It would be based in the deprived northern suburb of Seine-Saint-Denis, the second poorest neighbourhood in France, an area of high crime and poverty, of low education and life expectancy, where only 50 per cent of children under 12 can swim. Long after the Games, the venue would leave a lasting legacy.

Then, in 2020, the plan changed. It became clear that the original budget of €70m (£60m) was nowhere near what was required to build a small stadium fit for the Olympic Games and disassemble it afterwards. So organisers took the decision to complete the project with only 5,000 seats, in order to cap their overspending at around €175m (£150m).

It meant the Aquatics Centre no longer met Fina’s 15,000-seat requirement for major events, or even came close. And so Paris built a brand new Olympic venue, complete with a brand new Olympic pool, that will not host a single swimming race.

By Lawrence Ostlere

Jamie Braidwood27 July 2024 08:45

In the aftermath of the video that emerged of Charlotte Dujardin, forcing her to drop out on the eve of the Olympics.

The eventing dressage competition is underway in Versailles, just north of Paris and does not seem to be affected by the rain.

Here’s what happened to one of Britain’s medal hopes:

Charlotte Dujardin, one of the stars of Team GB ahead of the Olympics, has been banned from the Paris Games and dropped as ambassador for an animal charity over allegations she whipped a horse “24 times” like it was “an elephant in a circus”.

Dujardin, a three-time Olympic champion, earlier withdrew from all competitions due to a video that shows the dressage star “making an error of judgement during a coaching session” for a young rider four years ago.

Sonia Twigg27 July 2024 08:36

A few moments discussing Katie Ledecky’s exhausting training regime will leave you wanting to sit down for a cup of tea and nap.

The greatest long-distance swimmer of all-time – who arrives at her fourth Games with 10 medals, including seven golds – breaks every single French labour law.

A 35-hour working week? No chance.

A minimum daily rest of 11 consecutive hours between two working periods? Behave.

A five-day week? Sacré bleu.

By James Toney

Jamie Braidwood27 July 2024 08:30

Before the action kicks off this morning, let’s take a look at some of the photos from last night’s opening ceremony:

Sonia Twigg27 July 2024 08:23

Saturday highlights and stars to watch

The first gold medals of the summer will be handed out before lunch, with the mixed 10m air rifle finals taking place at 09:30 BST. The reigning Olympic champions, Chinese duo Haoran Yang and Qian Yang, are not competing, leaving the door wide open for Team GB pair Michael Bargeron and Seonaid McIntosh to bring home the first medals of the summer.

The shooting finals will be closely followed by the women’s 3m synchronised diving final, where the British duo of Yasmin Harper and Scarlett Mew Jensen, who have competed together since 2023, will both look to bring home their first medals.

Perhaps the biggest event of the day at Paris 2024 will be taking place in the pool at the Paris La Defense Arena, with a range of swimming disciplines making their first appearance. The day will include semi-finals in women’s 100m butterfly and 400m freestyle as well as men’s 100m breaststroke, with the day culminating in both the men’s and women’s 400m freestyle and 4x100m freestyle relay finals.

Jamie Braidwood27 July 2024 08:15