article: Media playback is not supported on this device One day, for Great Britain? Hell, in one hour, around one small oval of track in east London, British athletes won three golds in such dizzying, dreamlike succession that all context and precedent disappeared off into the dark London sky. You tried to grab a record book before they all got thrown on the bonfires. In the 16 Olympics from 1928 to 1996, only once did Britain win more than five golds in an entire Games. Not since 1908 had GB won five in a day, and that was an event so unrecognisable it included tug-of-war and real tennis. The greatest single hour, the best night, unarguably, in the long history of British athletics. The best day in British sport? It sounds like hyperbole, so apply what logic you have left. Saturday's medal count, taken just on its own, would constitute Great Britain's ninth most successful Olympic Games tally in 118 years of competition. In three different sports, by men and women, on water and on dry land, the golds kept on rolling in, roared on by partisan crowds at stadiums across the city and its hinterland and by millions on television, radio and electronica. From Eton Dorney to the velodrome at the north end of Stratford's Olympic Park to within toasty distance of the Olympic flame itself, there was the same expression on British faces: I can't believe I'm here, I can't believe I'm watching this. What do you have to compare it to? England's World Cup win in 1966 was precisely that - England's. So was Jonny Wilkinson's iconic drop-goal in Sydney nine years ago. Media playback is not supported on this device This one truly belonged to Britain - a collective grin of national pleasure, a domino-chain of sporting success that had you clapping and cheering new heroes like you'd loved them all their lives. The rowers had started the celebrations with gold in the men's four and the women's lightweight double sculls before track cycling's women team pursuiters added track cycling gold. That was quite good enough. But those lucky enough to be among the 80,000 at the athletics were about to hit the jackpot in quite unprecedented fashion. We knew after the morning's long jump and javelin that Jess Ennis would, barring pestilence and plagues of locusts, be crowned Olympic heptathlon champion. We hoped that Mo Farah might do what no British male had ever done and win a global 10,000m title. A few even lumped some cash on Greg Rutherford to win the long jump, although a gamble was exactly how it felt. That all three came off in 46 minutes left you laughing with disbelief at the madness of it all. When Britain failed to win a single track and field title. Having waited 104 years for an athletics gold, three arrived in the city in such quick succession that the waves of noise barely stopped rolling. When you looked up at one point and saw the women's 100m was about to start, there was genuine surprise.
summary: There was a point in the Olympic Stadium on Saturday evening, at about 9.20pm, when you wanted to put the world on pause and just revel in it all for a moment before the next wonderful thing caught you round the chops.