Noble finishes 23rd as Brownlees take gold and bronze for Britain

Alistair Brownlee became Great Britain’s first Olympic champion in triathlon with a brilliant performance in front of a huge crowd in Hyde Park while his brother Jonny picked up a bronze medal as Ireland's Gavin Noble finished in a respectable 23rd position.

The 31-year-old Fermanagh man was well in contention following the first two disciplines - a 1500m swim and a 40km cycle - but lost ground at the beginning of the 10km run as the Brownlee brothers and Spaniard Javier Gomez pulled clear of the pack.

It was Alistair Brownlee that took gold in a time of 1:46:25 ahead of Gomez, who finished 11 seconds later to finish second.

Jonny Brownlee, who was stretchered away with exhaustion at the end, claimed bronze after 1:46:56, while Noble crossed the line in 1:49:47.

The Enniskillen athlete was 15th after the 1.5 km swim and made his way up to seventh and 21 seconds behind the leaders during the 43km cycling section.

At one point Noble lead the chasing pack to within 10 seconds of the leaders in the cycle and eventually took over the lead from the world's top two from Great Britain.

At the start of the running section, a discipline which Noble admits is not his favourite, he was in 11th and only three seconds off the pace but could not keep up the pace to secure a top 20 spot.