Rio 2016: Ferry Weertman wins men's marathon swimming

Ferry Weertman completed a marathon swimming double for Netherlands as Spiros Gianniotis suffered a heartbreaking defeat in the men's race on Tuesday.

The Dutch swimmer reeled in the two-time world champion after the Greek made a late break for the line, timing his touch better to snatch victory from Gianniotis.

The 10-kilometre race started in remarkable fashion, with Australia's Jarrod Poort surging clear alone to open up a lead of one minute and 20 seconds.

Poort admirably persisted, but was caught with around 1km left to swim and eventually finished down in 21st.

With Poort having been caught, Weertman, Jordan Wilimovsky, Jack Burnell and defending champion Oussama Mellouli jostled for position, until a leading group of seven stormed side-by-side into the last 200m.

From that group Gianniotis broke clear, but, despite leading by a length, he was denied the win by Weertman at the last possible moment, with Marc-Antoine Olivier taking bronze.

Weertman's gold adds to that won by compatriot Sharon van Rouwendaal in the women's race on Monday.