American tennis players Austin Krajicek and Rajeev Ram won their first career Olympic gold medal after earning silver in men’s tennis doubles on Saturday.
Austin Krajicek and Rajeev Ram of the United States leave France with a silver medal after falling to Australia's Matt Ebden and John Peers in men’s tennis doubles on Saturday.
The American tandem started strong in their quest for gold on Saturday winning the first set 7-6, but dropped they dropped the second set 6-7.
Olympics doubles uses a first-to-10, win-by-two tiebreaker in place of a traditional third set, so after multiple tiebreakers dropped the final match tiebreaker 10-8.
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The fourth-seeded American team made headlines when they eliminated Spain's team of Rafael Nadal and Carlos Alcaraz in the quarterfinals in a 6-2, 6-4 victory.
The 40-year-old Ram, who is based in Indiana, was trying to become the oldest player to win an Olympics tennis gold — for men or women, in singles or doubles — since the sport returned to the Summer Games in 1988.
He and Krajicek, a 34-year-old who now calls Allen home, also were trying to become the third U.S. duo to win a men’s doubles gold. The most recent had been the Bryans at London in 2012. The brothers were in the stands Saturday — Bob is the country’s men’s tennis coach in Paris, and Mike has been serving as a hitting partner and helping coach doubles.
Later Saturday, another American duo, Taylor Fritz and Tommy Paul, won the bronze with a 6-3, 6-4 win over Tomas Machac and Adam Pavlasek of the Czech Republic. Machac and Katerina Siniakova won the gold in mixed doubles on Friday night.
