g3 － day 7.

Blogging about amazing women doing amazing things at the Olympics means I'm following the Beijing Games more closely than I've followed the Olympics for years － maybe ever. And I'm loving it － especially getting into the lower-profile events, like, well, almost everything except gymnastics, swimming and beach volleyball.

As a big, big, big bonus, I'm temporarily saved from having to comment about John Edwards' baby-daddy drama. Yech.
So, back to Beijing . . .

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Team USA's Shalane Flanagan [above], 27, of Marble Head, MA, knew she had finished the 10,000-meter race, but had no clue how she finished. Following a few moments of reorientation, Flanagan realized she had just won the bronze, only the second medal earned by an American － male or female － on the track in a race longer than 800m since 1984; Lynn Jennings won the same 10K bronze in Barcelona in 1992.

Ethiopia's Tirunesh Dibaba got the gold with an Olympic record and the second-fastest time ever at 29 minutes, 54.66 seconds. Turkey's Elvan Abeylegesse took the silver at 29:56.34. Flanagan's time of 30:22.22 broke her own American record from last May of 30:34.39.

Flanagan's mother, pioneering runner Cheryl Treworgy, was present for her daughter's triumph. Treworgy ran college track at Indiana State and set a marathon world record.

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Cookin' at the 'Cube were Zimbabwe's Kirsty Coventry and Team USA's Margaret Hoelzer, 25, of Huntsville, AL ... former Auburn University roommates and forever rivals, the women finished first and second, respectively, in the 200-meter backstroke. The pair has been trading world records and championships in the event for a couple of years; Coventry defended her Olympic title and won the gold by breaking Hoelzer's world record, touching the wall at 2 minutes, 5.24 seconds. Hoelzer earned the silver about a second later. Japan's Reiko Nakamura got the bronze at 2:07.13.