Nadezhda-OstapchukLONDON: Belarus' Nadezhda Ostapchuk won the women's Olympic shot put title here on Monday with a throw of 21.36m to end the almost two-year unbeaten run of defending champion Valerie Adams of New Zealand.

The 31-year-old - the last person to beat Adams in Lausanne on August 22, 2010 - collected the only title missing from her collection ahead of Adams, who took silver with 20.70m.

Russia's Yevgeniya Kolodko took bronze with a personal best of 20.48m.

Both Ostapchuk and Carter recorded their best throws in the third round in the Olympic Stadium with Carter producing a throw of 20.70m and the Belarusian an impressive 21.36m.

China's Gong Lijiao had led in the first round with 20.13m but was unable to improve on that effort until her penultimate throw when she improved by nine centimetres.

However, Gong was to be denied the bronze when Kolodko put everything into her last attempt and gave a yelp of delight when the personal best flashed up.

Adams was unable to come up with a throw to overtake Ostapchuk and thus handing the title to the Belarus athlete - the latter did a no-throw before setting off to hug her coach.

It completed a disappointing Games for 27-year-old Adams, who overcame an administrative blunder that almost cost the reigning women's shot put champion the chance to defend her title in London.

The New Zealand Olympic Committee (NZOC) said an "administrative error" meant Adams' name was missing from the official start list for her competition, leaving officials scrambling to get her included so she could take part.

It did not reveal who was responsible for the mistake but said in a statement that it was taking the situation "extremely seriously" and was "committed to finding out exactly what occurred".

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2012

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