Beach Volleyball at the 2012 London Summer Games:

London mayor Boris Johnson was able to watch some early rounds of beach volleyball and memorably wrote of the women’s tournament, “As I write these words there are semi-naked women playing beach volleyball in the middle of the Horse Guards Parade immortalised by Canaletto. They are glistening like wet otters.” It was a demeaning description as the event featured one of the most dominant athletic pairs in Olympic history, Americans Kerri Walsh and Misty May-Treanor. Walsh and May-Treanor came in as the two-time defending champions, never having lost a set at the Olympics. But after Beijing they had backed off from the sport a bit, getting married, having babies, and May-Treanor competed on the American television show, “Dancing With the Stars,” before she tore her Achilles’ tendon in the process. But the two came back in 2011 and won the World Championships, and although only seeded third, behind Brazil’s [Larissa] and [Juliana] and China’s Xue Chen and Zhang Xi, they were expected to be formidable.

They were. But in pool play they looked vulnerable after losing their first Olympic set to Austria’s sister pairing of [Doris] and Stefanie Schwaiger. They still advanced to the final, by defeating Xue and Zhang in the semis. In the other semi, Americans [Jennifer Kessy] and April Ross shocked Larissa and Juliana to create an all-USA final. The final was a comfortable victory for Walsh and May-Treanor, winning in straight sets, 21-16, 21-16. Their third consecutive gold medal made them only the second team in Olympic victory to win three straight gold medals with identical team members, after [Pavol] and Peter Hochschorner in Canadian canoe slalom doubles in 2000-08. Third place went to Brazil who defeated China 2-1 in the bronze medal match.