London 2012: Day Six - medals pour in as Britain climb table

Records tumbled and the medals poured in as the Great Britain team lit up London 2012.

After underachieving over the first four days, Britain have now won 11 medals in the last two and yesterday was the host county’s most successful day of the Olympics.

Sir Chris Hoy led the way, winning his fifth Olympic title to match the British-record feat of Sir Steve Redgrave.

There were also two gold medals in the space of five minutes from more unheralded members of Team GB - Tim Baillie and Etienne Scott in the canoe slalom and Peter Wilson in shooting’s men’s double trap final.

A silver for Gemma Gibbons in the -78kg division - the country’s first judo medal for 12 years - and another for the rowers from the lightweight men’s four, saw Britain climb from 11th in the medals table to fifth.

The only sour note was the controversial disqualification of Victoria Pendleton and Jess Varnish in the women’s team sprint.

All set for at least a silver after showing devastating early pace to break the world record, Britain’s golden girl of the track and her partner were denied the chance to ride for gold against China because Pendleton was found guilty of an illegal changeover in their semi-final win over Ukraine.

The despair that engulfed the velodrome lasted only briefly as Yorkshireman Ed Clancy and the team pursuit squad of Geraint Thomas, Steven Burke and Pete Kennaugh lowered their own world record in a thrilling ride in the four-kilometre race.

Rowing provided yet more drama today as Great Britain added to their medal tally with silver in a thrilling lightweight men’s four final at Eton Dorney.

In an incredibly tight finish, Chris Bartley, Peter and Richard Chambers and Rob Williams crossed the line just a quarter of a second behind South Africa, with defending champions Denmark in third.

Richard Chambers said: “That was brutal, really, really brutal.

“We were just fighting and fighting just to get ourselves back in contention and we did a cracking job. To even get the silver was impressive from where we came from.

“(We) struggled to keep to the pace of the three crews on the left-hand side in the first quarter of the race but we just dug our heels in and fought really hard.”

In boxing, Anthony Ogogo sprung a huge surprise by beating world No 1 Ievgen Kytrov at the ExCeL centre to progress to the last eight.

The middleweight boxer matched the Ukrainian’s 18 points and the combined judges’ scores were also level on 52 apiece.

Each of the five judges pressed either a red or blue button to decide the winner, with an emotional Ogogo sinking to his knees in celebration when they called it in his favour.

In swimming Rebecca Adlington clocked the fifth fastest 800 metres freestyle in the world this year to send out an ominous warning to her rivals as Britain’s women had a successful morning at the Aquatics Centre.

Adlington is seeking to become the first Briton to successfully defend an Olympic swimming title and her time of eight minutes 21.78 seconds has been bettered this year only by herself and American 15-year-old Katie Ledecky.

Adlington said: “I’m pleased with that.

“I didn’t know what time I was going during that one at all.

“I was like ‘this could be anywhere from an 18 to a 38’.

“I just put my head down and went for it especially after the 400 heat only scraping in.”

Sheffield’s Ellie Faulkner’s Olympic campaign ended as she didn’t progress through the 800-metre freestyle heats.

Swimming at her first international event, Faulkner said: “It was a great experience, I did the best I possibly could today but my time wasn’t there.

“The crowds have been amazing, it’s great having the British support and experience wise it’s been amazing as my first international and I will hopefully be in Rio in 2016.”

Five-time British champion Lizzie Simmonds of Beverley reached tomorrow night’s final of the 200m backstroke after qualifying seventh fastest from tonight’s heats.

Andy Murray put on a dazzling display for the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge as he crushed Nicolas Almagro to move within one win of an Olympic medal in the tennis.

Murray produced his best performance of the tournament in front of the Royal couple on Court One at Wimbledon.

The Scot raced to a first set win in just over half an hour before Almagro suffered a recurrence of a shoulder injury and crumbled in the second to leave Murray with a superb 6-4 6-1 win.

Sailing, Ben Ainslie got his gold medal charge back on track today by winning his first race of London 2012.

In basketball, Sheffield Sharks’s Nate Reinking and the Team GB men came agonisingly close to their first win, as they were narrowly beaten by Spain.