Wednesday, August 1, 2012

The hopes of the nation have been resting on the shoulders of @TeamGB, and until today an elusive gold medal remained out of reach.

However, a Tweet from BBC sports presenter Clare Balding (@clarebalding1) this morning hinted at what was to come:


And she was right. Helen Glover and Heather Stanning rowed to victory in the women’s coxless pairs, securing Britain’s first Olympic gold of the Games.
Congratulations flooded in across Twitter, with Prime Minister David Cameron sending his own message from @Number10Gov:


And it didn’t stop there! Bradley Wiggins (@bradwiggins) won gold in the men’s cycling time trials this afternoon, and his team mate Chris Froome (@ChrisFroome) took bronze.

@MarkCavendish had this message for the man who has become one of Britain’s most decorated Olympians and the only person to win Olympic gold and the Tour de France in the same year:


Elsewhere in the Olympic Park, celebrations for yesterday’s successes have continued. Zara Philips won silver in the team eventing and was captured on camera signing autographs for fans:

And it was the Royal seal of approval for bronze medalist Rebecca Adlington (@BeckAdlington) as she met with some very special guests in the Olympic village:


We also saw one of Twitter’s most retweeted message of the Games so far last night from Ryan Lochte (@ryanlochte) as he congratulated Michael Phelps (@MichaelPhelps) on his 19th Olympic medal:


Here at Twitter we are very excited by the new cameras that LOCOG installed in Olympic venues all over London. They are tweeting fantastic photos with a “behind the scenes” perspective you can’t get anywhere else. Locations include underwater at the aquatic center, from the backboard of the basketball hoop, and the roof of Olympic Park.

Here are the six cameras you can follow:
@L2012BballCam - over the basketball hoop
@L2012PoolCam - underwater in the aquatics center
@L2012GymCam - looking down onto the rhythmic gymnastics mat
@L2012TableCam - looking down onto the table tennis table
@L2012StadiumCam - on the Olympic Stadium roof, looking down onto the track
@L2012MatCam - looking down onto the judo/wrestling mat

And here are a some of our favorite shots so far:

US Swimmer Ryan Lochte (@ryanlochte)


Team GB Swimmer Rebecca Adlington (@BeckAdlington):


US basketball player LeBron James (@KingJames):



Aside from the medals table, it looks like Tom Daley (@TomDaley1994) has a new fan if this exchange is anything to go by:

And another man bantering with Tom Daley today was showbiz journalist @DanWootton. Dan tweeted this great photo of the stadium up close as he arrived for his first day watching the games:


And finally today, @MayorofLondon Boris Johnson was in London’s Victoria Park today and decided to have a go on their zipline. Unfortunately, it didn’t go quite according to plan…



If you’re already looking ahead to tomorrow’s games, then here’s our top five to follow on Twitter to get closer than ever to the action:

Women’s 800m freestyle swimming: Rebecca Adlington (@beckadlington)
Men’s cycling: Chris Hoy (@chrishoy)
Men’s synchronized 10m platform diving: Tom Daley (@TomDaley1994)
Women’s individual cycling: Victoria Pendleton (@v_pendleton)
Women’s handball: Holly Lam-Moores(@hollyhandball3)

-- Lewis Wiltshire, @LewisWiltshire

Posted by @ at 8:28 AM