It’s been a wild night in the athletics with Australia’s Peter Bol missing out on direct qualification for the 800m semi-finals in his Olympic return.

Plus Aussie sailor Matt Wearn was forced to wait before clinching his second consecutive gold medal in the men’s dinghy.

And then Australian skateboarder Keegan Palmer defended his crown in the men’s final.

It was a shaky start to the final, with Palmer and American Tom Schaar the only two to actually complete their opening runs after a number of the skaters couldn’t land high-risk tricks.

Schaar recorded a score of 90.11 on his first run before bettering it with a 92.23 on his second and went for one final trick on his last run to challenge for gold but couldn’t land it, meaning the pressure was off Palmer, who could enjoy a victory lap.

It was Australia’s second gold in the park skateboarding final at this year’s Games after 14-year-old Arisa Trew’s historic win the day prior.

Palmer bested his American rival with a score of 93.11 to take first position on his first run and no one beat him from there.

“Dude, I can’t even believe it bro,” Palmer told Channel Nine.

“I’m speechless. I got really lucky though by everyone kind of falling off on their last two runs, but I had something prepared if need be. But I couldn’t hold it together.

“I don’t know dude. I’m speechless though. I just can’t believe it bro. Everyone’s yelling at me. I’m just happy. Come on Australia, let’s do this.”

Palmer kicked it off with an Alley-Oop Gap to Backspin, then a Backside 5-0 before executing a Kickflip Indy over the spine and ended his run with a number of other tricks including a Backside Nosegrind, Rock ‘N’ Slide, Frontside Nosegrind, Stalefish 540 and Kickflip to Fakie.

Palmer only kicked it up another gear on his second run, which included some serious hang time on one trick where he grabbed onto the board twice in a move which had the commentators Mitch Tomlinson and Nick Boserio stunned.

“How did you hold that? Are you kidding me?” one said.

“How did he honestly… that was humanly impossible. He can do whatever he wants. He can go absolutely crazy.”

Fellow Australian Keefer Wilson fell on his first run, but before nailing enough tricks to score 40.03.

He then had a hard fall on his second run and didn’t beat his opening score before improving to 58.36 on his final run to cap off a successful Olympic debut.

Elsewhere, Wearn had to wait for his gold medal after he saw the medal race delayed a day due to poor weather conditions but things finally got underway around 10:45pm AEST.

Half an hour later, with the race already having been restarted once and the second version nearing its conclusion, the race was then abandoned due to wind conditions being unfair for certain boats.

It left Wearn waiting for the race to be called again, with that moment coming an hour later. Wearn entered the day knowing he could not do worse than a silver medal, and needed a top-seven finish in the field of 10 to clinch gold.

Wearn though ended up finishing first in the medal race to secure his crowning moment, becoming the first ever back-to-back Olympic Champion in the event.

“It hasn’t quite sunk in yet,” Wearn told Channel Nine.

“I was dreaming about one gold medal for such a long time. The last three years (I have) been dreaming about going back to back and it’s just phenomenal.

“The fact that no one else has done it before probably shows how special it is… for me to be the first person to do that, it really hits home.”

“It hasn’t really all sunk in, but he’s just so focused,” added his mother Karen.

“He’s gone back to back. It’s just extraordinary.”

Back to the track, and Bol became a household name in Australia three years ago due to his deeds at the Tokyo Games, as he set a new Australian record over the 800m with a dazzling semi-final run before finishing fourth in the final.

Unfortunately, Bol endured a nightmare 2023 when in January of that year, he was provisionally suspended after being told an ‘A’ sample from an out-of-competition urine test tested positive for EPO (Erythropoietin).

Bol’s finding surprisingly became public. He protested his innocence and a month later, the ban was lifted when the ‘B’ sample was an atypical result.

He wasn’t in the clear yet though – that would come in August when the original ‘A’ sample was found to be negative, meaning Bol seemingly had his name and reputation dragged through the mud for a faulty test reading.

The ordeal did little to help his confidence, and it was a less than ideal lead up for Paris.

That showed on race day as Bol was running second heading into the final straight before fading badly to finish seventh, running a 1:47.50.

He will head into the repechage along with Joseph Deng (1:45.87) but 19-year-old Peyton Craig impressed, directly qualifying for the semis with a 1:45.81 to finish third in the opening heat.

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