In the Olympic Games there's a temptation to measure greatness by the number of medals won. This carries a bias towards those who enter many events and do well in most or all of them. And the best of those repeat over two or three Games.

On the other hand, there are those who enter only one event because that's what they specialise in, or that's all that's available. And among those athletes, those who came back Olympiad after Olympiad and keep on winning their one gold. Think Steve Redgrave or Al Oerter, for example.

Think, also, of Ben Ainslie, who on Sunday won gold for Great Britain in the Finn class at Weymouth. After a silver in Laser in 1996, Ainslie won gold in the Laser class on Sydney Harbour, then Finn in Greece and China. His four gold and one silver makes him the most successful sailor in Olympic history (beating Paul Elvstrom of Denmark).

And think, then, of Michael Diamond. The Australian is competing in his fifth consecutive Olympics, having won gold in the men's trap in his first two campaigns - Atlanta and Sydney. Diamond led the field coming into the final day of the London event on Monday. After missing five shots in the final round he lost the bronze-medal shootoff to Fehaid Aldeehani of Kuwait. (Giovanni Cernogoraz of Croatia won gold, Massimo Fabbrizi of Italy the silver.) Chris Barrett of the Sydney Morning Herald has a great report.

Diamond says he will be back for his sixth Olympics in Rio. I hope he is.

On the track Monday night, Kirani James won the 400 metres with a time of 43.94 seconds. This was Grenada's first medal ever. Belgium's Borlee twins, Kevin and Jonathan, finished fifth and sixth respectively. (And it's fun to tab between their London 2012 pages over and over again.) Aussie Steve Solomon was an unexpected qualifier for the final, where he came eighth. The only Jewish member of the Australian Olympic contingent in London, here is a profile of Solomon from the Times of Israel.

One quick plug for my favourite (and most irreverent) American coverage of the Olympic Games, and indeed of all American sports: Deadspin.

Finally, I can't get away from Usain Bolt's 100 metre win just yet. My Youtube do Dia iswas of Bolt's interview by Spain's TVE (in English), which he interrupts to stop and sing along with the US anthem as Sanya Richards-Ross receives her 400m gold medal nearby:

(update: the IOC Rights Police, sadly, have apparently ordered this video to be removed.)