Poland's team continues to improve their medal haul in Beijing with two gold, two silver and a bronze in rowing and weightlifting. Poland are fifteenth in the medal table.
Danuta Isler reports.
Crowds of faithful fans gathered at Warsaw's Okecie to welcome the first group of Polish athletes returning from Beijing, including gold medalists in quadruple rowing but the competitions are far from over . Polish gymnast Leszek Blanik has won the Olympic gold medal in the men's vault competition, the first men's gymnastics event not won by the Chinese team at the Beijing Games. Blanik, the reigning world champion on the apparatus, took gold ahead of France's Thomas Bouhail and Anton Galotsuskov of Russia. Blanik's is the first gold Poland has ever one in Olympic gymnastics.
Meanwhile, Kamila Skolimowska and Anita Wlodarczyk qualified to the hammer throw finals in the Bird's Nest stadium in the athletics championship. The Polish men's volleyball team is continuing their streak of success - they defeated Russia 3:2 after a nail-biting match, the last in the elimination phase. The team qualified to the quarter finals from third place in group B after four wins (over Germany, Egypt, Serbia and Russia) and a 0:3 loss to Brazil. Next, they are facing the winner of group A - most probably Bulgaria or Italy tomorrow.
In other news, the 2006 world champion Marcin Dołęga who also lifted 420kg, missed out on a medal due to a higher pre-competition weigh-in.World champion Andrei Aramnau of Belarus broke Dolega's world record in the snatch, becoming the first in the weight class to lift 200 kg (440.9 pounds) in the event. The Pole tried to get the record back but missed his last snatch at 201 kg (443.1 pounds). And hurdler Marek Plawgo ran a season's best of 48.52 to finish seventh.
And on a lighter note, Monika Pyrek, who finished fifth in yesterday's pole vault competition with a jump of 4.70 meters recorded a song before the Olympics. It is performed with a jazz vocalist Marysia Sadowska. The song has a strong pop beat to it and is called "Citius, Altus, Fortus" which can be translated as "Faster, higher, stronger" - the words Monika says are the basic ones in the vocabulary of any athlete.