Why battle for gold when you can split it with a friend?

Athletes Gianmarco Tamberi of Italy and Mutaz Essa Barshim of Qatar chose to share the top honour in the men’s high jump final on Sunday at the Tokyo Olympics. 

Both Barshim, 30, and the Tamberi, 29 ended with jumps of 2.37 meters. Neither had any failed attempts.

When the bar was raised to 2.39 meters, the Olympic record, neither jumper could clear it. The competition was tied. 

After three failed attempts each at that height, an Olympic official offered them a jump-off to decide the winner.

“Can we have two golds?” Barshim asked him.

“It’s possible. If you both decide…” the official said.

He’d barely finished his sentence before the two men had looked at each other, slapped hands and Tamberi leapt into Barshim’s arms. 

Tamberi later collapsed to the ground, overcome with emotion.

“I still can’t believe it happened,” Tamberi said afterward, according to the Associated Press. “Sharing with a friend is even more beautiful. … It was just magical.”

“For me, coming here, I know for a fact that for the performance I did, I deserve that gold,” Barshim said. “He did the same thing, so I know he deserved that gold.”

Barshim told AP his rival is one of his best friends.

“Not only on the track but outside of the track,” he said. “We’re always together almost. True spirit, sportsmen spirit, coming here and delivering this message.”

The gold makes a full set for Barshim, who won silver in Rio 2016 and bronze in London 2012. 

For Tamberi, it’s is his first Olympic medal, and joins his world indoor and European titles from 2016. His impassioned reaction was understandable, given he had suffered a serious ankle injury weeks before the 2016 Olympics which could potentially have ended his competitive career.

Donald Trump’s former personal attorney Rudy Giuliani is almost broke and Trump doesn’t seem to care all that much, sources have told The New York Times.

Giuliani is currently struggling under a mountain of legal fees as he attempts to fend off a major federal investigation and answer a $1.3 billion lawsuit. Trump, meanwhile, isn’t pitching in a dime of the millions he has raised in his ongoing battle against a legitimate election, according to New York Times White House correspondent Maggie Haberman.

Giuliani’s supporters are “aghast” that Trump isn’t helping out, according to Haberman, given that many of his activities were carried out on Trump’s behalf to push the former president’s “Big Lie” of a rigged election.

But helping Giuliani is “problematic” for the former president (and definitely for his bank account), and Giuliani should have known better than to undertake some of his activities, sources told Haberman.

The Washington Post also reported early this year that Trump had shut out his attorney, even though Giuliani had traveled the country promoting Trump’s tale of a stolen election. Trump was unhappy with Giuliani’s demand for $20,000 a day in fees, and “privately expressed concern” about some of Giuliani’s moves, sources told the newspaper then.

Giuliani is also being investigated by the FBI for his activities on behalf of certain officials – and Trump – in Ukraine. He was part of Trump’s strategy to hold up Congress-approved military aid to Ukraine to pressure officials to launch a baseless investigation into Joe Biden that led to the former president’s first impeachment. 

Audio of conversations released in June revealed Giuliani repeatedly suggesting to Ukrainian officials that the nation could have a “better relationship” with the U.S. if the country’s president would open a Biden probe in 2019. 

In an interview Friday on NBC New York, Giuliani called the investigation “lawless” – and said everything he did was on behalf of his client, Donald Trump.

“I am more than willing to go to jail if they want to put me in jail. And if they do, they’re going to suffer the consequences in heaven,” he declared.

A minister has confirmed the government is considering a new “amber watchlist” category of countries for overseas travel, despite growing anger over the UK’s traffic-light system of Covid controls.

Digital minister Matt Warman told SkyNews that there would be “a spectrum of countries ranging from green to red”, each with different levels of risk for holidaymakers or those visiting family and friends.

Transport secretary Grant Shapps is due to give his latest three-weekly update on the travel list this Thursday, amid fears that he will name more countries deemed to pose a risk from the Beta variant of the virus.

But there is an increasing backlash from Tory MPs, Labour and travel industry figures who say the system is chaotic, confusing and costly.

There is particular worry that an “amber watchlist”, which would put a country on notice that it could quickly go red with compulsory 10-day hotel quarantine, would ruin planned trips to holiday destinations like Spain and Greece this summer.

Under current rules, travel from a green list country is quarantine free, travel from an amber list country is quarantine free for all those who are double-jabbed.

France was last month controversially put in a new category of “amber plus”, which means even double-jabbed travellers have to quarantine at home for at least 5 days.

There is already a green watchlist category, which means a country can at short notice be moved into the amber list, and a new amber watchlist would bring to six the number of different colour categories.

Warman said that the public could actually benefit from moving to a system where there were “not simply three cut and dried categories” of just green, amber and red.

“I don’t accept it is complicated in a way that is not something that people can apply their common sense,” he said.

“Saying to people, if a country is on a watch list there is a risk that it could for instance move from green to amber or amber to red, seems to me to be providing people with really important information when they’re making significant financial decisions because people are of course really keen to get away for a holiday if they can.”

Asked about the confusion caused by the proposed six different categories for countries, Warman replied: “I think you’re going to be hearing more from the transport secretary later on this week about the details of that and I didn’t want to preempt those announcements, but what you’re describing is a spectrum of countries ranging from green to red.

“And I think providing people some indication of the fact that it is not simply three cut and dried categories, actually is giving people more information, it’s helpful information, and it’s what allows them to make some really important decisions.

“The point of the watch list that you refer to is to try and give people a sense of the direction of travel that a country is going in, it’s to try and provide people with as much information as possible when they make those decisions about where they might want to go on holiday.”

But Huw Merriman, Tory chairman of the Commons transport committee, told BBC Radio 4’s The Westminster Hour: “An amber watchlist will be viewed as a massive red flag which is likely to cause bookings to those countries on that watchlist to collapse.

“In my view, we don’t need any more uncertainty, complexity, or anxiety for passengers, or this beleaguered sector. It just needs clarity. I would urge the government not to do anything with it.”

The Sunday Times reported this weekend that Chancellor Rishi Sunak wrote to Boris Johnson to warn that the UK’s entry and exit rules are “out of step with our international competitors” and are hurting the economy.

Labour Party chairwoman Anneliese Dodds warned against creating “additional confusion and chaos” through an amber watchlist.

“The problem is, right now holidaymakers just don’t know who to believe,” she told TimesRadio.

New rules allowing fully vaccinated passengers from the US and amber-list European countries to avoid self-isolation on arrival in the UK came into force at 4am on Monday morning.

But the extra categories of traffic light have prompted warnings of job losses and families losing money from late cancellations.

Travel expert Paul Charles said it would be a “disaster” if the Government introduced a new travel traffic light category.

The chief executive of travel consultancy The PC Agency told ITV’s Good Morning Britain programme: “It would be a disaster to bring in an amber watchlist on top of the amber list, the green list, the red list.

“At the moment the system in the UK is choking off recovery, and it’s not helping the sector because there’s no confidence to book because people are worried about places changing at short notice anyway.”

Airlines UK chief executive Tim Alderslade told TimesRadio: “Because of the way the Government has looked at things over the past couple of weeks with the France decision, which was a total disaster in terms of consumer confidence because people now think with amber, there’s a good chance that whether there’s a watch list or not, that they will be stranded, and that is a real dampener in terms of bookings.

“We’ve now only got six to eight weeks until the end of the summer, and tens of thousands of jobs are under threat in the travel and aviation sector.”

The fact that two of our absolute faves – Paul Rudd and Dan Levy – are (a) mates and (b) enjoy dinner dates together warms our cockles.

After the two actors were snapped at Indian restaurant Darjeeling Express in London’s Covent Garden over the weekend, the picture – unsurprisingly – went viral.

First up, people were living for the fact that the stars were hanging out…

But there was one question everyone had: just how the hell is Paul Rudd 52 years old?

Seriously Paul, what’s your secret?

The actor, who is currently working on the third instalment of Ant-Man in the capital, was a no-show at the recent Friends reunion special, which left many fans disappointed.

Paul played Phoebe Buffay’s husband Mike Hannigan in the series, but did not feature on a list of cameo appearances from supporting cast members.

The reunion’s director Ben Winston explained why Paul wasn’t involved, telling The Wrap: “Well, we couldn’t have everybody on, because it’s only an hour and 45 minutes. And you’ve got to pay attention — the main nub of the show has got to be about the six cast members.

“So you can’t have too many cameos because of course, there were hundreds of amazing people who were in Friends over the years. Sadly, we couldn’t get everybody in.”