There have been a few surprises. One was the appearance of an Iranian in a foot race in which an Israeli was also entered. The men were in different heats, however, and both washed out after those heats, So, they never had to actually face one another.
The hope and expectation has been that Iran would bring home medals in four sports—taekwondo, weightlifting, Greco-Roman wrestling and freestyle wrestling. And it is starting to do just that.
But this year, for the first time at the Olympics, Iran has won a medal outside those core sports—a silver in the discus awarded to Ehsan Hadadi. The gold went to a German with a throw of 68.27 meters. Hadadi was just 9 centimeters (3.5 inches) behind at 68.18 meters. Neither man, however, was close to the world record of 74.08 meters.
Beyond the core sports and Hadadi, the performance of the other Iranian athletes has been considerably short of spectacular.
The best finish of any of the other Iranian athletes this past week has been in the women’s 50-meter three-position competition. With 46 women competing, Iran’s Mahlagha Jambozorg came in 14th. That wasn’t good enough to advance, but it put here in the top third.
Elaheh Ahmadi who ranked an impressive sixth in the world the previous week in another shooting contest, was also in this competition, but finished 43rd of 46.
In the men’s side of shooting, Ebrahim Barkhordari came in 27th among 30 competitors in the 50-meter pistol qualification and was eliminated.
Men’s cycling continued to be a pit of horror. In the men’s individual race, Ali-Reza Naghi came in 36th of 37 cyclists. Last week, he didn’t even finish the 156-mile road race. Of the two other Iranians entered in that race, one didn’t finish and the other finished but took so much time that the Olympic score keepers had stopped timing the cyclists.
In rowing, Mohsen Shadi-Naghadeh ended up ranked 21st of the 32 males in single sculls while Soulmaz Abbasi-azad ended up dead last of the 24 women in singe sculls. The best time for the women was 7:42.57 with the next-to-last sculler coming in 27 seconds behind the lead and Abbasi-azad 20 seconds behind the next-to-last woman.
In athletics:
• Mohammad Arzandeh finished 17th of 42 entered in the men’s long jump qualification round and did not advance;
• Kaveh Musavi finished 21st of 40 entered in the hammer throw qualification and did not advance;
• Amin Nikfar finished 33rd of 40 entered in the shot put qualification and did not advance;
• Leyla Rajabi came in 22nd of 33 women in the shot put and was eliminated;
• Reza Ghasemi finished 33rd of 56 in the 100-meter foot race and did not advance;
• Ruhollah Asgari came in 40th of 53 men in the 100-meter hurdles.
• Ebrahim Rahimian failed even to finish the 200-kilometer walk.
• Sajad Moradi was disqualified during the 800-meter semifinal race. He had advanced when he came in second in his heat in the qualifying race, but he was 33rd in time among the 56 en entered;
• Sajjad Hashemi-ahangari finished 43rd of 47 in the 400-meter foot race and did not advance. Of political significance in this event, an Israeli, Donald Sanford, was also entered. But the Iranian was not drawn in the same heat as the Israeli, which is good enough for the Islamic Republic to say Iran is not competing against an Israeli. But the Israeli’s time was better—45.71 seconds versus 47.75 for the Iranian. Furthermore, if they had qualified for the next round, they might have faced one another.
Tehran news reports earlier said only one Iranian was in any event—in judo—with an Israeli and that Iranian was announced as suffering an illness that prevented him from attending the games. But the fact that both an Israeli and Iranian were in the 400-meter race shows those reports were erroneous and begs several questions. Has the regime perhaps decided that Iranians can compete in a sport where the athletes do not touch one another? Were the Iranian political authorities ignorant of the Israeli’s presence—perhaps because the athletics federation did not tell higher ups? Did the authorities know the Israeli would be in a different heat, sent the Iranian to compete and order him to throw the race so he couldn’t meet the Israeli later?
In judo, it was Javed Mahjub who got ill and could not go to the Olympics to compete in the 100-kilo weight division. Israeli Ariel Zeevi was there and was defeated 100-000 in the first round by Dimitri Peters of Germany, who went on to win the bronze.
Mohammad Rudaki was the second judoka Iran had qualified for the Olympics, but officials announced last month that he had suffered a knee injury and would not attend. He was in London, however, in the over-100-kilo division. He was defeated 100-000 in the first round by El Mehdi Malki of Morocco, who was defeated in the next round.
In archery, Milad Vaziri in the men’s individual was defeated 7-1 in the first round by Luis Eduardo of Mexico and eliminated.
In the women’s kayak 500-meter heats, Arezou Hakimi-Moqaddam was the only competitor to fail to advance. There were 19 entered and 18 were slated to advance. The Iranian had the 13th best time. But she did not advance because of the heat system. There were two heats with six women each, all of whom advanced automatically. There were seven women in the third heat and last one—Hakimi—was eliminated even though her time was better than many others.
In the men’s kayak 1000-meter, Ahmad-Reza Talebian was also eliminated, 22 men entered and 16 advanced. But Talebian ranked 19th in time.