Andrei Bahdanovich and Aliaksandr Bahdanovich in the final
(BEIJING, August 22) -- Belarus' Andrei Bahdanovich and Aliaksandr Bahdanovich grabbed the first ever Canoe/Kayak Olympic gold medal for their country in the August 22 final of the Men's Flatwater C2 1000 meter, with a time of 3:36.365 minutes.
Defending Olympic champions Christian Gille and Tomasz Wylenzek of Germany came in second at 3:36.588 minutes, and Hungary's Gyorgy Kozmann and Tamas Kiss claimed bronze.
This is the first Olympic experience for the Belarus pair, who kept third place in the first half and caught up in the latter half to claim gold. They outpaced the German pair in the last several meters and arrived 0.223 seconds earlier.
Germany's paddlers managed to keep the lead for almost the entire race, but were surpassed at the very end of the course and earned the silver medal.
The duo from Hungary finished in third place with a time of 3:40.258 minutes. Sydney gold medalist Gyorgy Kolonics was originally slated to be Kozmann's partner in Beijing, but he died suddenly on July 15 of this year.
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