Sports

Thursday is day seven of the Summer Olympics. Another big moment is on tap for American swimmers Michael Phelps and Ryan Lochte. The host country looks to add to its suddenly growing tally of medals. And badminton marches on, its image battered by scandal. Renee Montagne talks to NPR's Tom Goldman about all things Olympics.

In women's archery at the Olympics, a sole American competitor remains. Khatuna Lorig beat many competitors, including the one holding up Bhutan's archery tradition, Sherab Zam. NPR's Mike Pesca reports a Bhutanese tradition may be the reason for its ranking.

New Zealand's Olympians have some extra motivation to win a medal: they are also competing for marmite. The country's only marmite maker was shut down in an earthquake, but one grocery chain found a stash and is awarding the jars to medal-winning athletes.

American swimmer Nathan Adrian's name hasn't been on everyone's mind, the way that Michael Phelps' or Ryan Lochte's has. But he did something that even Lochte couldn't do this week: beat Yannick Agnel in a head-to-head race.

Adrian's time of 47.52 seconds in the men's 100-meter freestyle gave him his first individual gold medal, as he also beat James Magnussen of Australia, who came in second, and Brent Hayden of Canada.

Decorated fencer Mariel Zagunis, who carried the U.S. flag into Olympic Stadium as part of the London 2012 opening ceremony, lost in the bronze medal match in the sabre Wednesday afternoon, falling to Olga Kharlan of Ukraine, 15-10.

The loss means that Zagunis, 27, will leave London without a medal — there is no team sabre medal at this year's Olympics (we'll post more about that situation soon).

U.S. gymnast Danell Leyva has won the bronze medal in the men's all-around competition in London. The gold was taken by Japanese star Kohei Uchimura, while the silver medal went to Marcel Nguyen of Germany.

With a final score of 92.690, Uchimura was nearly 2 points ahead of Leyva, at 90.698. And with his win, Uchimura vanquished the disappointments of his 2008 Beijing, when his struggles on the pommel horse cost him a gold medal.

Transcript

NEAL CONAN, HOST:

Not using one's best efforts to win a match. Few Americans know much about the sport of badminton, but that rule will likely be the subject of a lot of discussion over the next few days. Today, badminton officials at the London Olympics disqualified eight players for tanking. Women's doubles teams from South Korea, Indonesia and China drew boos yesterday when it looked like they deliberately lost preliminary matches to engineer more congenial match-ups later in the tournament.

Weighing 400 grams, the Olympic gold medals that are being doled out at the London 2012 Summer Games are the heaviest ever, according to reports. But that doesn't mean they're the most valuable: at an estimated $620.82, they're nearly $590 short of the $1,207.86 value held by a gold medal from the Stockholm Games of 1912.

The discrepancy stems from the fact that the 2012 gold medals contain only 6 grams of gold; the rest is silver and copper. In fact, the London bling contains more copper than gold, which is only used to coat the medals with a plating layer.

Eight Olympic badminton athletes have been thrown out of the London Games after being charged by the Badminton World Federation with "not using one's best efforts to win a match" — which is against the rules of the sport. Because even some journalists may have forgotten badminton's rules, it seemed time to take a fresh look.

British cyclist Bradley Wiggins has won the gold medal in the men's individual time trial event, beating Germany's Tony Martin by 42 seconds. He took 50 minutes and 39 seconds to cover the course of 49 kilometers (just under 30.5 miles).

Martin took silver, and the bronze went to Britain's Chris Froome, who played a vital support role as Wiggins' teammate in his Tour de France victory last month.