Olympics Newsletter: Noah Lyles Wins 100m by 0.005 Seconds

Welcome to our daily Olympics newsletter. I’m your tour guide John Cherwa and it’s a pleasure to have the fastest man alive from the United States.

No matter by how much — in this case 0.005 seconds — Noah Lyles of the United States is the fastest man in the world.

He won the 100 meters on Sunday in a photo finish ahead of Jamaican Kishane Thompson. American Fred Kerley finished third. The winning time was 9.784 seconds. It is the first time the United States has won the event since Justin Gatlin in 2004.

In a major blunder by NBC and the Olympic broadcast services, which carry NBC, the commentator and camera stayed on Thompson after the race for a while before realizing that Lyles could have won. And then they changed direction.

Lyles will compete in the 200, his best event, later in the week.

Our David Wharton has more to tell you about this historic victory, right here.

There were many other highlights.

—Big night for the United States on the final night of swimming. Bobby Finke set a world record in the 1,500-meter freestyle and the women’s 400-meter medley relay also set a world record in their victory. The United States won eight gold medals in the competition, one more than Australia. But it was also the lowest gold medal total for the United States since Seoul 1988. They had two fewer medals overall (28) than they had in Tokyo three years ago.

The United States lost the 400m medley relay to China, a major disappointment for the first time since 1960 in Rome, with the exception of the boycotted 1980 Moscow Games.

—American Suni Lee won her third medal of the Games, finishing third on the uneven bars. Our Thuc Nhi Nguyen tells you about it here.

—Kristen Faulkner of the United States won the women’s road race, becoming the first American cyclist to win the race in 40 years.

— American Scottie Scheffler shot a course-record 62 to win the men’s golf tournament. Our Kevin Baxter tells the story of that comeback.

—Novak Djokovic, 37, of Serbia, beat Carlos Alcaraz, 21, of Spain in straight sets to win his first Olympic tennis gold.

A look at the team competition

Let’s take stock of team play. Most teams are heading to the round of 16, where anything can happen.

3 X 3 Basketball: (Men, because it’s alphabetical, the ultimate tiebreaker) The United States won only two of seven group games and then lost the play-in and was eliminated. Latvia will face France and the Netherlands will meet Lithuania in the semifinals.

(Women) The United States won four of its seven pool games and beat China in the qualifying game. They will face Spain in the semifinals today, and Germany will face Canada in the other semifinal. All medal games are today.

Basketball: (Men) The United States, Germany and Canada finished the group stage with a score of 3-0. The United States will face Brazil on Tuesday in the quarterfinals. The other matches are Germany-Greece, France-Canada and Serbia-Australia.

(Women) The United States are undefeated as usual and will face Nigeria on Wednesday. In the other quarterfinals, Serbia will face Australia, Spain will face Belgium and Germany will face France.

Beach volleyball: (Men) The American team of Andy Benesh and Miles Partain will play today in the round of 16 against an Italian team while the other American team, Chase Budinger and Miles Evans, will face a tough Norwegian duo in the same round. The losers go home.

(Women) Kelly Cheng and Sara Hughes beat Italy in the round of 16 on Sunday. Taryn Kloth and Kristen Nuss will face a Canadian duo in the round of 16 today.

Field hockey: (Women) The U.S. team went 1-3-1 in group play and did not advance to the round of 16. The quarterfinals begin today with Australia vs. China, Argentina vs. Germany, the Netherlands vs. Great Britain and Belgium vs. Spain. The U.S. men’s team did not qualify for the tournament. The men’s semifinals will feature Germany vs. India and the Netherlands vs. Spain.

Soccer: (Men) The United States was outclassed by Morocco, 4-0, in the quarterfinals. Today’s semifinals feature Morocco against Spain and France against Egypt. (Women) The United States beat Japan, 1-0, in overtime and will face Germany on Tuesday. Brazil will face Spain in the other semifinal.

Handball team: (Men and Women) The United States only plays the sport when it is the host nation, which gives it automatic entry into the tournament.

Volleyball: (Men) The United States, Italy and Slovenia all remained undefeated in three matches. The quarterfinals begin today with the United States against Brazil, Italy against Japan, France against Germany and Slovenia against Poland.

(Women) Poland will face the United States in the quarterfinals on Tuesday. The other matches will be between Brazil and the Dominican Republic, China against Turkey and Italy against Serbia.

Water polo: (Men) The men will conclude the group stages on Monday and the table will then be known.

(Women) The United States finished 3-1 in the group stage and will face Hungary on Tuesday. The other quarterfinal matches are Australia-Greece, Netherlands-Italy and Canada-Spain.

Your favorite Olympic sport

We asked you what your favorite Summer Olympic sport was, and you told us. We received about 1,400 responses, and the margin of error for this unscientific poll is about plus or minus 99 percent. Here are the results.

Athletics, 39.7%

Gymnastics, 22.2%

Something else, 15.8%

Swimming, 9.3%

Beach volleyball, 6.6%

Basketball, 3.3%

Football, 2.4%

Skateboard, 0.4%

Boxing, 0.3%

Sport climbing has received a vote.

I’ll try to do another poll tomorrow.

What to pay attention to today

—Simone Biles wraps up her Paris Olympics experience with a competition on the beam and floor. It’s hard to see her not winning the floor event, but the beam is always fraught with danger. If you didn’t know about it in advance, you’ll miss it live. The beam is at 3:38 PDT and the floor is at 5:23 PDT.

—There are four finals in athletics: the men’s pole vault, the women’s discus, the women’s 5,000 meters and the women’s 800 meters. The first final will be at 10 a.m.

–The U.S. women’s 3X3 basketball team, after losing its first three games, is in the semifinals against Spain. You can watch the games at 8:30 a.m. PDT.

Must-read links

Let’s catch up on some stories you may have missed but shouldn’t have:

Your TV guide

How to watch the Games today? Check out Monday’s Olympic TV listings.