Yet AGAIN! One More New Nation! Tajikistan wins first GOLD Medal in any Olympic Games!

Boy they are coming here at the end:  Another nation wins first GOLD at any Olympics.

The Republic of Tajikistan, one of the former Soviet Central Asian Republics, has won its first gold medal in any Games – in the hammer throw – Dilshod Nazarov, who won silver in London in 2012, now adds gold to his trophy case.

Of course Nazarov will be a national hero.  And pursuant to the Sanders Olympic Policy, he and his nation gets a tout, their national anthem played and a victory lap!

Here is a brief report:

Dilshod Nazarov of Tajikistan won the Olympic men’s hammer title on Friday to capture the first gold medal for the Central Asian country since it gained its independence with the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union.

Nazarov threw a hammer over 79 meters (about 250 feet) to win gold.  (If you know who wins the election I might be able to give that mark a run for its money!)

Silver went to a Belarus athlete previously suspended for doping and bronze to Poland.

Let me tell you – I knew very little about Tajikistan before reading in preparation for this tout but this nation has ten mountains over 14,000 feet (check out this list from Wikipedia and this tourism site – those mountains are beautiful – sign me up to go!) and one is still named after Lenin the founder of Soviet Communism (but the Tajiks have wisely changed the name to Ibn Sima Peak; the mountain is on the border between Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan and the other nation still calls it Lenin Peak.).

Not far from Tajikistan (in Uzbekistan actually) is the legendary city of Samarkand the capital of the Tamarlane empire in the 14th century.

Sounds like a neat place to visit but I’ll probably never get to go.  Well, maybe when the kids are out of college…

My hearty congratulations to both Nazarov and Tajikistan on their first gold medal!

Here is the Tajik national anthem, played for the first time at any Olympics.  The victory lap should be run here at home on Saturday.