538 20 Gold Medals

The U.S. team was celebrating their gold medal when a steward came from afar towards Dai Li.

"Mr. Li, we have just received complaints from the Jamaican head coach, Fraser. He believes that what your athlete did interrupted the Jamaican athletes' performances and led to their fault in the changeover," the steward said.

"Nonsense! We nearly lost our relay baton," Dai Li replied, the smile on his face disappeared.

"Mr. Li, according to regulations, if someone files a complaint, we have to follow up. Please cooperate and come with us, we need to ask you several questions." The steward had a cold expression on his face.

"All right, I will cooperate. Let's go." Dai Li said. He glared at the Jamaican team.

Dai Li didn't see Fraser in their group, so he must have gone to file his complaint.

"Fraser is such a sore loser." Dai Li curled his lip.

Following the steward, Dai Li went into an office. Fraser was there too. Other than them, a referee, his two assistants, and three other stewards were in the office.

"Everybody is set," the chief steward said. "Both of you please present your arguments. Mr. Fraser, you filed the complaint, so you go first."

Fraser nodded and said, "I believe the U.S. team broke regulations when they purposely interrupted our athletes, which led to a mistake in our changeover. It is very unfair to leave the situation like this, I request a rematch!"

The steward turned around to face Dai Li and said, "Mr. Li, is there anything you wish to say?"

"Mr. Frazer's complaint is unreasonable. Our athlete didn't mean to interrupt anyone." Dai Li continued, "I bet all of you have watched the replay that showed our athlete make a mistake and nearly lose the relay baton. Thanks to her quick response, she grabbed it again. We still lost time. Is there a coach who would formulate a strategy that involved wasting time?"

Then Dai Li turned around to face Fraser and asked, "Mr. Fraser, if you were me, would you arrange such idiot tactics to interrupt your rival?"

Fraser snorted and Dai Li continued. "What's more, if our athlete lost control of the relay baton, we would have lost the race. In addition, if you had succeeded in the changeover, then we would have wasted our time for nothing. Is that reasonable?"

The stewards nodded, discussed it together, then said, "We have listened to both of your statements. We discussed it and we believe that, in this case, the U.S. team did not mean to interrupt the Jamaican team. It was an accident. Mr. Fraser, if you refuse to accept our judgement, you can continue to initiate an arbitration with the IOC after the Olympics."

Fraser knew that there were no grounds for his complaint. Dai Li was right, no coach would formulate such a foolish tactic.

Fraser was not willing to admit defeat, so he replied immediately. "Even though the U.S. team didn't mean to interrupt our athlete, they did. This is unfair to us and violates the principle of fair competition in the Olympic Games. We should get reparations. Even if we can't get a rematch we should get a chance to run again. If our time is better than theirs, you should make the U.S. team give us back the gold medal."

"Give back?" Dai Li sneered and said, "Mr. Fraser, do you mean that the gold medal belongs to your team? I believe there isn't a regulation that stipulates that the gold medal in the women's 4×100m belongs to Jamaica?"

Fraser didn't care about his mockery. He wanted to get the chance to get back the gold medal.

Those stewards discussed again, going over what Frazer presented.

Dai Li knew that he had to do something right now to prevent those stewards from making a foolish decision.

Dai Li said, "Stewards, referee, if my memory serves me right, the IAAF states "an athlete has to run through the whole course with the relay baton in their hand. If one drops his baton, he can leave the track to pick it up, and if he doesn't affect other athletes, he doesn't break regulation." Am I right?"

"It is true." The referee nodded.

"According to the replay and this rule, it can be easily estimated that our athletes didn't break regulations, right?" Dai Li asked.

"Yes, all the technique movements are finished in her own track." The referee confirmed that.

"The regulation makes it plain that leaving one's own track to pick relay baton up without interrupting other athletes doesn't break regulation. If all movements are finished in one's own track, how can he interrupt others?" Dai Li said.

"Why can't it be regarded as a foul if all movements are finished in one's own track?" he retorted.

"If that is counted as illegal, then I can also file a complaint that the Jamaicans broke regulations. In the previous women's 100m, the Jamaican stared at our athlete so intensely it affected our athletes' ability." Dai Li replied.

Fraser snorted again. He didn't retort, even though he wanted to, because there was no ground for him to stand on.

Dai Li continued. "I don't deny that the Jamaican athlete made their mistake after our mistake and that there might be a causal relationship between them. That doesn't mean that we're responsible. In a relay race, it is very common to make mistakes. It is an integral part of the whole competition, we cannot replay whenever a fault happens, right?

"In conclusion, they should bear the responsibility for their own mistake. So I ask that the Competition Committee reject Mr. Fraser's unreasonable request."

In the end, the committee didn't approve Fraser's request because they knew it was unreasonable.

After that episode, the competition went on. The last event of the day was the final of the men's 4x100m.

In this event, the U.S. team was undoubtedly favored. They had, Alexander and Ford, two new Olympic champions, so they were most likely win gold.

What's more, the women's team had won with average athletes. With two champions is men's team, why shouldn't they win the gold medal in the 4×100m?

Faced with the U.S. team, the Jamaican team, the two-time defending champion, lost their spirit. In the men's 100m and the men's 200m, they were beaten by the U.S. team, which made people question their ability to defend their championship.

What's worse was that the women's relay race team was beaten by U.S. team as well. They didn't even win a medal, which was a big shock to them.

In team sports, the athletes' morale is one of the most important factors. Racing when you're confident and racing when you think you're going to lose are two very different experiences.

The way in which women's team was beaten put extra pressure on men's team because now the men were worried about making the same mistake.

People always worry that unlucky accidents will recur, but athletes worry more than most people. If an athlete is injured due to a certain movement, when he recovers he is afraid to do that movement again.

Now, the Jamaican men's team was worried. The women's team had planted a dark seed in their hearts, which germinated and grew gradually. Afterwards, they would hesitate to do the right movements in their changeover, worrying about bad fortune could come again in men's team.

How could the Jamaican team compete with the powerful and confident U.S. team?

When Shawn Ford handed the relay baton over to Alexander, the U.S had such a lead it was clear they had won.

"20 gold medals! We got the 20th gold medal!" Donny was very excited.

This was not the first time for him he had participated in the Olympics with U.S. team and it was the second time he was in charge of the track team. He had never been a part of such a big win. It set him up for a chance of promotion at the U.S. Track and Field Association, a bright career waiting for him when he got home.

The best of all was that he was there to witness the moment when the U.S. was at its most powerful, which was quite an honor.

American journalists were also excited, they had thought of the title in tomorrow's news: "The U.S. Team Back on Top after Waiting 10 Years!"

On the bus back to the hotel, all the athletes on the U.S. team were excited. Dai Li was lost in thought, a file in his hand.

The file contained information about the race.

Tomorrow would be the second-to-last day of the Olympics.

On the last day of the Olympic Games, the closing ceremony would be held at Maracana Stadium. That meant that there wouldn't be any competition on the last day, so tomorrow would be the last day to win events.

There were still another eight events left. The men's marathon was actually held on the last day because it was held outside and they did not need Maracana Stadium. All of the other seven programs would be held on tomorrow.

They were all finals: the women's high jump, the men's javelin throw, the men's 1500m, the women's 800m, the men's 5000m, the women's 4×400m, and the men's 4×400m. According to the schedule, all seven programs were going to be held at night.

For the U.S. team, the good news was that there were talented U.S. athletes in all of the finals.

There were two 4×400m relay races that the U.S. team was favored to win. The U.S. team's domination of the 400m race was suspected to cross over into the 4x400m relay. It might be said that those two gold medals had already been won by the U.S. team.

The women's high jump was a European sport and all but two of the finalists were European. However, the European players were from Spain, Germany, Italy, Great Britain, Croatia, Bulgaria, Sweden, Poland, Ukraine, and Russia; one player from each country made it into the final. This meant that the competition was very intense and no country dared to say that they were definitely going to win the women's high jump project.

The men's javelin was similar to the women's long jump. There were a large number of European athletes entering the final. Generally speaking, there wasn't a big difference between the strengths of the athletes. Everyone was likely to stumble, so it was hard to say who was going to win.

In both the women's high jump and the men's javelin, the state scale could play a role. Every athlete had the opportunity to try many times and one good attempt could make them the champion.

In these two sports, where there was not too much difference in the athletes' talents, it was easier to use the state scale to fish in troubled waters. A good mental state could win an athlete the competition. If there was a big gap in talent, it would be hard for the U.S. to win a gold medal even they had good mental states every time.

Two relay races, the women's high jump, and the men's javelin throw, that's four gold medals in total. That is one gold medal away from my goal of 25. Dai Li frowned and looked at the three other programs.

The men's 5,000-meter race had traditionally been won by a pair of athletes from Africa, one from Ethiopia and one from Kenya. Although all three of the American team's competitors had qualified, it would still be difficult to win the gold medal.

There was good news about the men's 5,000m. The first round went badly wrong and no one from Kenya team made it to the final. So, the U.S. team would only have to face one of Africa's top teams.

The competition was very fierce in the women's 800m and the men's 1500m middle-distance races. In addition to Russia, Africa, South Africa, Kenya, and Uganda, Algeria also had a world-class middle-distance runner who was in the final. All of the athletes were basically at the same level, so it was hard to say who would win.

I've observed all of the athletes in these two events and I haven't found any S level or even A+ athletes. That is very rare in high-level sports. There will be fierce competition tomorrow!