When Britain’s Alex Yee won a triathlon silver medal in Tokyo, he was asked whether he was the man to take over from the Brownlee brothers, Alistair and Jonny. Back then he was noncommittal. But three years later on the streets of Paris, he finally gave his answer. And it was extraordinary.

On a broiling hot day, it looked like Hayden Wilde of New Zealand was about to win a gold going into the last kilometre. But suddenly and without warning, Wilde seemed to blow up. And Yee, who is such an outstanding runner that he was faster than Mo Farah as a teenager, somehow found an extra gear. The Briton won an astonishing gold medal in 1hr 43min 33sec, with Wilde taking silver and Léo Bergere finishing third for France.

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As they stood on the pontoon before the start, Yee and Wilde shook hands. But their races soon took divergent paths, with the Briton coming out of the water 27 seconds down on the lead in 15th and Wilde a further 36 seconds back.

Soon, though, they were all together in a lead group of 32 on the bike, much to the frustration of Yee, who pushed the race on with the help of his teammate Sam Dickinson.

It all looked to be going to plan as Yee took the lead at the start of the run. But Wilde, who had been 50 metres back, not only caught his rival but pushed past him. Going into the last 2.5km, Wilde was leading by 14 seconds.

However Yee – the fastest runner in the field, having represented Britain over 10,000m at the 2018 European Athletics Championships – had enough left to deliver a dramatic late twist.

Asked what had happened, Yee replied: “I don’t even know. I was in quite a bad place to be fair. I was going through a really bad patch. For me, I rode that wave and just said one more try and let’s see if I can do it. I didn’t give up.

“Almost two laps in I thought silver was on the cards. I owed it to myself to give myself one last chance and with about 2k to go I thought I’d give it everything I had. I’m just so proud I was able to do that for my family, for everyone who has worked hard, for my girlfriend Liv. There’s so many more people than just me that have worked towards this. I am the lucky one who gets to do it.”

Yee also paid tribute to Wilde, adding: “I just have so much respect for Hayden and how much he made me dig for that. Fair play to him, he’s an amazing athlete.”