Olympics: Laura Asadauskaite of Lithuania wins women’s pentathlon

LONDON — It’s not quite the fraction of a second that separates medalists from also-rans in other sports, but in modern pentathlon, where the scores accumulated are in the mid-four figures, U.S. competitor Margaux Isaksen missed out on a bronze by a mere eight points.

The women’s modern pentathlon, the final competition of the Summer Olympics, handed out its medals just hours before the closing ceremony Sunday night. Gold went to Laura Asadauskaite of Lithuania, who finished with 5,408 points, an Olympic record. Silver went to Britain’s Samantha Murray, whose performance set the temporary stands at Greenwich Park rocking with enthusiastic home team fans, and bronze was won byBrazil’s Yane Marques.

“I am immensely excited,” Asadauskaite said afterward. “I had a great deal of support from the people of Lithuania. It is only a small country, so this means the world to them.”

The modern pentathlon, which spanned more than 10 hours and three venues, celebrated 100 years as an Olympic sport this year. It was created by the founder of the modern Games, Pierre de Coubertin, who thought its five events — fencing, swimming, horse riding, shooting and running — provided the perfect measure of the well-rounded athlete.

On Sunday, the lead changed after each event as competitors engaged in sports that they were better or worse at than others, or dealt with such inevitabilities as recalcitrant horses — some of which stopped in front of fences and simply refused to jump. Sometimes, riders fell from the horses, and then had to chase them as they ran away.

One competitor, Sarolta Kovacs of Hungary, set an Olympic record for the swim portion, finishing in 2:08.11. But, in a testament to the vagaries of the pentathlon, in the next event, horse jumping, her ride was terminated before she could finish after a mistake. She finished 33rd overall.

The other U.S. competitor, Suzanne Stettinius, finished 28th.

Cycling: Todd Wells was 10th and Sam Schultz was 15th in the men’s cross-country mountain bike competition. The race was won by Jaroslav Kulhavy of the Czech Republic, followed by Nino Schurter of Switzerland and Marco Aurelio Fontana of Italy.

Volleyball: Brazil was unable to do the team double when the men’s team lost to Russia in a five-set match. It was the first gold for Russia since the 1980 Moscow Games. Brazil beat the U.S. on Saturday to take the women’s title. Italy needed four sets to beat Bulgaria for the bronze medal.

Water polo: Croatia won its first Olympic gold medal in men’s play when it beat Italy, 8-6. Croatia finished play 8-0, including two wins over Italy, the 2011 world champions. Italy has won the tournament three times.