AN Essex Olympian made history this morning, winning Great Britain's first ever gold medal in the BMX event.
Beth Shriever, who hails from Finchingfield, won gold in the women's race at the Tokyo 2020 games.
Teammate Kye Whyte has just delivered Team GB's first ever medal in the event, winning a silver at Ariake Urban Sports Park.
Shriever, 22, led almost from start to finish during her race.
As she collapsed in tears after the final a jubilant Whyte scooped her up and held her aloft in celebration.
“I’m more happy for her than I am for me,” Whyte said afterwards.
“That girl puts in some serious serious graft.”
Shriever had looked like the class of the field in the semi-finals, winning all three races in her semi-final, and there was no change when it came to the moment that mattered.
Shriever led from the first bend, holding off a late charge from defending champion Mariana Pajon of Colombia down the final straight to win by nine hundredths of a second.
“I’m just in bits,” she said.
“I tried my hardest out there today and to be rewarded with a gold medal is honestly mind-blowing. I kept my cool today, kept it simple, and it worked. I’m over the moon. I’ve done my family and my boyfriend back home proud.
“I don’t think it’s registering right now what’s just happened.”
Her proud parents were watching from home in Essex, unable to travel to Tokyo due to Covid rules.
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Former Oasis frontman Liam Gallagher paid tribute to the new Olympic champion, posting on Twitter: “Bethany Shriever what a ledge well done LG x”.
Shriever’s gold came just moments after Whyte had broken Britain’s BMX medal duck in the men’s event.
The 21-year-old from Peckham had shown great pace in qualifying but, as in Thursday’s heats, found himself needing to recover from slow starts in all but the final run.
But come the medal race he had no such issues as he made it in to the first corner in second place behind Kimmann.
This double success, following on from Tom Pidcock’s mountain bike gold on Monday, gives British Cycling quick results in their bid to look beyond the velodrome at these Games.
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