You see a lot of close finishes
in the sprints. 100m, 200m, the hurdles, it's in the nature of sprinting that victory is won
by tiny margins. Fans love it. Kids these days,
always on their phones. Hm, what? For sprinters, microseconds are
their business, their currency. For them, one tenth of a second in the 100m final is an
eternity. It's all a matter of
proportion. You don't see many dead-heats
in the marathon. But there was one long-distance
race, lasting two hours, which really did come down
to the wire. As you'll see, we're talking
close, really close. The triathlon has quickly
become one of the iconic events of the summer Games following
its introduction in 2000. It comes in three sections.
The swimming. The cycling. And the run. To spice it up, it has awkward
little transition sections where so often the race
is won or lost. It's an event virtually
designed to smash the field, to scatter the competitors into one thin line of
athletic torment. The previous Olympic Women's
event was won by well over a minute. No photo required. The Women's Triathlon
at London 2012 was different. Here are the two athletes
to look out for. Lisa Norden of Sweden and Nicola Spirig of
Switzerland. You can barely see them
in the swimming section because neither of them counts
it as their best discipline. There are some very good
swimmers in here, as we say, look out for Great Britain's Lucy Hall,
who's wearing 8. She will more than likely
take Vicky Holland with her. Lucy Hall of Great Britain
emerged from the water with a handsome lead. Spoiler alert -
Hall would finish 33rd. It's a cruel sport. The split times tell us
that Norden and Spirig complete the swimming events
in exactly the same time. The Swiss Spirig considers
the cycling her top event. She's awesome on the bike, quickly making up time lost
on the swim. But Norden is having
a good race, she feels strong,
matching Spirig in her strongest
discipline. Well, here they come back
towards transition. Here comes Nicola Spirig. It comes down to the run. The final 10K of an Olympic
triathlon is a thing of wonder, athletes pushing themselves
to the limit, with unbelievable reserves of
energy and determination. Spirig has both, and puts herself in prime
position for the final section. She is flying. And looking at some of
the runners in that field, the likes of Nicola Spirig, this could literally come down to a sprint finish for
the three medals. She holds off the Australian,
Erin Densham. But, try as she might, she cannot not shake off
her Swedish rival. Lisa Norden - is this going
to be her day? Here they come.
It is a sprint finish. It's all come down to this. Two hours of racing, Nicola Spirig and Lisa Norden,
it would appear. The Australian has gone. Spirig, look...look
for the Norwegian, the big, long
strides of hers, and she's eating into
the Swiss. Look at this, nothing between
them as they go into the tape. Dead heat. Densham bronze,
while Spirig and Norden have to wait for the judges to examine photographic
evidence. Even now it's hard to judge. Eventually, a decision is made, the same time for Spirig
and Norden. The same time to within
one-hundredth of a second but Nicola Spirig wins,
by a whisker. It hasn't sunk in yet, it's... I don't think I really
realise that I'm Olympic Champion now but it's amazing,
it's just amazing. It's been a lot of ups and
downs, and this is amazing. I had so many injuries leading
up to this and I never thought I'd get it together and running
in the last ten laps, I felt amazing and I realised I could
probably get a medal and actually up until the last
couple of metres... It's really amazing. The photo suggests victory
by the tiniest of margins, maybe two centimetres,
to be generous. That's over a race that's
51.5 million centimetres long. You've already worked that out
as a percentage, right? So, if, say, this was
a 100m sprint it's the equivalent of winning
by a margin so slim it's almost beyond human
detection. 38.8 micrometres,
to be precise. The diameter of a typical human
hair is about 50 micrometres, less than a hair's breadth! You could watch
1,000 triathlons, 1,000 races and never see
a finish as close as that.
