PARIS -- Tom Green and Jean van der Westhuyzen have fallen agonisingly short of adding another gold medal to Australia's Olympic tally, settling for bronze in the men's K2 500m.
The Australian duo had taken out the K2 1000m in Tokyo three years ago in what was their first race together on the international stage, but that event was replaced with the half distance on the Paris program.
Green and van der Westhuyzen had appeared the class of the field in their semifinal at the Vaires-sur-Marne Nautical Stadium earlier in the day, smashing a 20-year Olympic record time with a time of 1:26.85.
That mark would have won gold in Friday afternoon's final. Instead, they finished in third place with a time of 1:27.29, 0.42s adrift of German pair Max Lemke and Jacob Schopf who took gold, and 0.14s behind the Hungarian boat of Sandor Totka and Bence Nadas.
READ: Who has won Australia's gold medals in Paris?
"Winning an Olympic medal is so special so we're stoked with that but of course we're going to be disappointed," said van der Westhuyzen. "We really thought we were capable for a gold medal but all of the crews on the start line think they're capable of that as well.
"We would have loved to come here and get the gold again but we'll live to fight another day and coming back home with the dirty gold isn't too bad."
Despite missing out on gold, Australia continues to hold third place on the Paris medal tally, having amassed a haul of 18 gold, 14 silver, and 14 bronze. Host nation France and Great Britain sit in fourth and fifth, respectively, with 14 gold medals. Japan and South Korea each have 13.