Another Sprint Medal For Miss Hyman Sporting News From Our Athletics Correspondent ROME. SEPr. 5 Bruised skies, thunder, lightning and torrential rain overshadowed the Olympic athletics in the Stadio Olympico here today, and towards the end of rather a thin afternoon's com- petition the only bright spots to be seen round the great arena were the electric results board and the shivering Olympic flame. It was left to two woman athletes, Miss Rudolph, of the United States, and Miss Hyman. of Great Britain, to make the only indelible mark of the day by winning their second medals. They were the first to win two medals in these Olympic athletics but they were folowed half an hour later by the Russian Miss Tamara Press, who took second place in the discus after winning the weight last week. But for a while we all forgot these and other performances. A furious thunder- storm broke over this city, a storm which TODAY'S EVENTS ai: TH STARTING TI.MES lEoi-TftIAN (7 a.m.) SIIOOTtNG (9 a.M.) W(a.) \RU,-ING (10 a.m) ATULmC I9n..) Xa0nA (9 pon.) flooded the track and sent forked lightning darting towards the joumalists who soon were the only people still seated in the stad;um. The heats of the decathlon 400 metres had to be postponed until after 7 p.m., when a few hundred dedicated spectators came back into the stadium looking drenched but defiant. It would not have been possible to run the decathlon 400 metres tomorrow for there would surely' have been no time, and it would be con- trary to the spirit of this demanding event. Miss Rudolph and Miss Hyman have both had to toil to the top. The American girl, who will surely revolutionize all pre- vious standards in women's sprinting, is the seventeenth of 19 children and claims that she learnt to run fast when she had to get to the dinner table ahead of her family. Miss Hyman, aged 19, is the daughter of a Cudworth, Yorkshire, miner and she has had her problems, too, in such matters as buying spikes and being unable to train regularly on an athletics track. In the winter of 1959 she was training at night when the floodlights were turned off and she cut her bead badly after colliding with an iron post. Such setbacks have not deterred her. For Britain, the running of Brightwell in the semi-finals of the 400 metres was encouraging too. Although he did not qualify for the final he beat by O.lsec,. the Uinited Kingdom record of 46.2sec. which he achieved in the second round. To take the day chronologically, we began with the semi-finals of the 10 metres burdles. In the first race Jones and May, of the United States, were clearly in front all the way, but my eyes went to Gardner, of the British West Indies, who was one of the outstanding athletes of the 1958 British Emnire Games at Cardiff. Gardner kept hopping over the barriers in sprightly fashion for a veteran and qualified for the final in third place. ]n the other semi- final Calhoun beat Lauer fairly comfortably. The women's 200 metres semi-finals pro- vided slow times compared with the earlier heats of this event, but this would have been because of the sirocco wind which sapped the energy and dried the throat. Yet already there had been some rain at 3 p.m. -rather like having a warm showerbath- and the thunder began to growl as the men came to their marks for the first semi- final of the 400 metres. Brightwell was drawn in the fourth lane with Singh inside him and Davis on his right and he went off fast, perhaps a shade too fast as events proved later, but running with determina- tion and his strikingly upright carriage. RUSHING THROUGH Brightwell was first at the end of the back straight and coming into the home straight he kept his form well, moving up on Davis and Singh in the last 25 metres only for Kinder, in the outside lane, to come rush- ing through and take third Place. Davis had done 45.5sec., his fastest, and Bright- well deserves every praise for racing so powerfully after less than a dozen races, and only one summer's experience in this gruelling event. I have never seen a British athlete run so stylishly and so well-apart from that somewhat unwise first 200 mnetres in 21.6sec.-over one lap. If Bright- well remains in athletics he should do great things, The 110 metres hurdles final produced a breathtaking finish between May and Cal- houn, the coloured Americans who were nearest the grass. May was away far better than Calhoun and led clearly until the eighth flight when Calhoun began to close. Over the last flight Calhoun was perhaps six inches behind and then he made his characteristic dip for the tape, diving for- ward at such an angle that he seemed to hit the worsted with his head before falling to the track, while the taller May seemed to be first with his torso. But we knew the result five minutes later when Calhoun stepped on the winner's place, having gained his 1960 gold medal as closely as he won in 1956. The draw from the inside for the final of the women's 200 metres was Miss Rudolph. Miss Leone, Miss Itkina, Miss Hyman, Miss Heine, and Mrs. Jesionowska. Miss Rudolph was soon into her stride and entering the home straight was obviously assured of her second gold medal. The Ger- man Miss Heine, her blonde hair stream- ing behind her, came through strongly in the fifth lane for the silver medal while Miss Hyman kept inches ahead of Miss Itkina all the way to the tape. SURP-RISE FOR U.S. The qualifying competition in the pole vault, which began at 9 a.m. and continued until 3.45 p.m., saw the surprise elimina- tion of two of the three Americans, Clark and Morris. Clark, who has a best per- formance of 15ft. 3n., failed three times at 14ft. Ilin. and Morris, who did 15ft. Sin. in the final United States trials, was out at 14ft. 5-in. The Russian V. Bulatov twisted his ankle while warming up in the morning and had to be taken away from the competition on a stretcher. In the women's discus Miss Ponomareva, who won the Olympic title in 1952 under the name of Romashkova, produced an effort of I Oft. 9-*in. in the fifth round which clinched the competition for her, though she had already done 175ft. loin. with her third throw. The defending champion, Mrs. Connolly, who was now competing for the United States after her marriage to the hammer throwing world record holder, though she represented Czechoslovakia in 1956, finished seventh with 167ft. I-in. ANOTHER SPRINT MEDAL FOR MISS HYMAN BRIGHTWELL SETS 400M. RECORD BIUT FAILS TO REACH FINAL