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18th Commonwealth Games
Host city	Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Nations participating	711
Athletes participating	approx. 4,500
Events	247 in 16 sports
Opening ceremony	15 March 2006
Closing ceremony	26 March 2006
Officially opened by	Queen Elizabeth II
Athlete's Oath	Adam Pine
Queen's Baton Final Runner	John Landy
Main Stadium	Melbourne Cricket Ground
Motto	United by the moment

The 2006 Commonwealth Games were held in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia between 15 March and 26 March 2006. It was the largest sporting event to be staged in Melbourne, eclipsing the 1956 Summer Olympics in terms of the number of teams competing, athletes competing, and events being held.

The site for the opening and closing ceremonies was the Melbourne Cricket Ground which was also used during Melbourne's 1956 Olympic Games.

The mascot for the games was Karak², a Red-tailed Black Cockatoo (a threatened species).

For the first time ever, the Melbourne 2006 Commonwealth Games appointed a Goodwill Partner, Plan International Australia.³

Melbourne 2006 XVIII Commonwealth Game - Fish Boats on Yarra River

Sports

Main article: Events at the 2006 Commonwealth Games

Rugby at the 2006 games

The 2006 Commonwealth Games included 16 sports, with 12 individual sports and 4 team sports. In total there are 247 events at the Games.

Four of these sports are further broken down into separate disciplines, making a total of 24 disciplines:

• Aquatics: diving, swimming, synchronised swimming.
• Cycling: track, road, mountain bike.
• Gymnastics: artistic, rhythmic.
• Shooting: clay target, pistol, small bore and air rifle, full bore rifle.

The athletics, swimming, table tennis and weightlifting sports include fully integrated events for elite athletes with a disability (EAD). These events are included in the official medal tally.

Participating nations

Countries and places competing at the games

There were 71 countries, territories and bodies competing at the 2006 Commonwealth Games [1]. The only difference between the countries competing at these games from the 2002 games is the absence of Zimbabwe, which has now withdrawn from the Commonwealth of Nations. In alphabetical order, these included:

Medals table

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Australia	84	69	68	221
2	England	36	40	34	110
3	Canada	26	29	31	86
4	India	22	17	11	50
5	South Africa	12	13	13	38
6	Scotland	11	7	11	29
7	Jamaica	10	4	8	22
8	Malaysia	7	12	10	29
9	New Zealand	6	12	13	31
10	Kenya	6	5	7	18
11	Singapore	5	6	7	18
12	Nigeria	4	6	7	17
13	Wales	3	5	11	19
14	Cyprus	3	1	2	6
15	Ghana	2	0	1	3
	Uganda	2	0	1	3
17	Pakistan	1	3	1	5
18	Papua New Guinea	1	1	0	2
19	Isle of Man	1	0	1	2
	Namibia	1	0	1	2
	Tanzania	1	0	1	2
22	Sri Lanka	1	0	0	1
23	Mauritius	0	3	0	3
24	Bahamas	0	2	0	2
	Northern Ireland	0	2	0	2
26	Cameroon	0	1	2	3
27	Botswana	0	1	1	2
	Malta	0	1	1	2
	Nauru	0	1	1	2
30	Bangladesh	0	1	0	1
	Grenada	0	1	0	1
	Lesotho	0	1	0	1
33	Trinidad and Tobago	0	0	3	3
34	Seychelles	0	0	2	2
35	Barbados	0	0	1	1
	Fiji	0	0	1	1
	Mozambique	0	0	1	1
	Samoa	0	0	1	1
	Swaziland	0	0	1	1
		245	244	254	743

Calendar

Highlights

Opening Ceremony - 15 March

Both the Melbourne Cricket Ground and the Yarra River were centrepieces for the ceremony, which included many fireworks, and other spectacle. The Games were opened by Queen Elizabeth II, in her capacity as Head of the Commonwealth. The Queen is also Head of State of a number of Commonwealth countries, including Australia.

Day 1 - 16 March

Cycling

England managed a clean sweep of the 4,000 m individual pursuit gold medal on the cycle track. Paul Manning beat fellow team mate Rob Hayles in the final. Steve Cummings won the bronze medal race. Australian Ben Kersten manages to beat the World and Olympic champions in the 1 km time trial.

Swimming

Scotland's Caitlin McClatchey beat Australia's Libby Lenton in the Women's 200 m freestyle final, setting a new Games record of 1:57.25. England's Melanie Marshall came in third. David Carry of Scotland has won the 400 m freestyle final, winning the second swimming gold for his country. Canadian Andrew Hurd picked up the silver in 3:49.08 and David Davies from Wales came third. Moss Burmester from New Zealand won gold in the 200 m butterfly in a new New Zealand and Commonwealth record time of 1:56.64.

Weightlifting

The Games' first gold medal was awarded in the Women’s Weightlifting (48 kg class) to Kunjarani Devi Nameirakpam from India. Marilou Dozois-Prevost from Canada won the silver, and Erika Yamasaki of Australia picked up the bronze.

Day 2 - 17 March

Cycling

Australians Katherine Bates and Rochelle Gilmore get gold and silver respectively in the Women’s 25 km Points Race, repeating their Manchester Games results. Their teammate Alexis Rhodes took ninth place after being seriously injured in Germany in an accident that took the life of Amy Gillett, in whose honour all three dedicated their ride.

Rugby Sevens

New Zealand won the gold medal at the Telstra Dome with a convincing 29-21 win over England. Fiji win the bronze medal with a 24-17 win over Australia in a game marred by a serious injury to Australian player Scott Fava.

Swimming

Australia gets all three medals in both the women's 50 m butterfly and women's 50 m breaststroke.

Day 3 - 18 March

Swimming

Australia swept gold, silver, and bronze in both the women's 50 m breaststroke and the 50 m butterfly. Leisel Jones and Danni Miatke, respectively, won the golds.

Triathlon

Day 3 saw the Australians and New Zealanders completely dominate the triathlon event. After missing out on qualification for the 2004 Athens Olympics, Emma Snowsill took the gold medal with a time of 1:58:02.59. New Zealand secured silver (Samantha Warriner), bronze (Andrea Hewitt) and fourth place for the Women's event. Continuing Australia's dominance in the triathlon, Brad Kahlefeldt won gold in the men's triathlon event with a time of 1:49:16. Australian Peter Robertson was just beaten by New Zealander, Bevan Docherty for silver, while Robertson took the bronze.

Cycling

Australian cyclist Ryan Bayley won the men's sprint, his second gold medal for these Games.

Weightlifting

Australian weightlifter Ben Turner won the men's 69kg Division, the first Australian gold medal for weightlifting at the games.

Day 4 - 19 March

Athletics

Australian Kerryn McCann successfully defends her 2002 Commonwealth Games gold medal title by winning the women's marathon event with a time of 2:30:50.

Athletics

Tanzania retained the men's marathon title, Samson Ramadhani taking the gold. Kenya's Fred Mogaka took silver, and England's Dan Robinson took the bronze.

Cycling

The Isle of Man won their first Commonwealth gold in twenty years, when Mark Cavendish won the men's Scratch Race final. Cavendish held off Australia's Ashley Hutchinson on the final bend to triumph, with Scotland's James McCallum claiming bronze.

Swimming

World champion Jessicah Schipper of Australia swam a Games record in beating team-mate Libby Lenton for the women's 100 m butterfly gold.

Day 5 - 20 March

Athletics

Australian Craig Mottram and crowd favourite, is edged out by Augustine Choge in the men's 5000 m by 2 seconds. Choge won in a Games-record time of 12 min 56.41 s. At one stage during the race Mottram ran with 3 Kenyan racers in front of him and 3 Tanzanian racers behind him.

Athletics

Asafa Powell, world record holder, wins the men's 100 m sprint in a time of 10.03 seconds, ahead of Nigeria's Soji Fasuba and the Trinidadian Marc Burns. His Jamaican compatriot, Sheri-Ann Brooks won the women's 100 m in a personal best time of 11.19 s, ahead of South Africa's Geraldine Pillay and Delphine Antangana, of Cameroon.

Squash

The Grinham sisters (Australia) battled for the Gold medal. Natalie triumphed over Rachel 2-9 9-6 9-1 9-6. Peter Nicol won his third Commonwealth Games gold medal. He previously won the singles title in 1998, and the doubles in 2002. He recaptured the singles title in four games, defeating Australia's David Palmer 9-5 10-8 4-9 9-2.

Swimming

Scotland won two more gold medals in the pool, with Caitlin McClatchey and Gregor Tait each winning their second titles in the 400 m freestyle and 200 m individual medley respectively. Australia's Leisel Jones set the first world record of the swimming competition, breaking her own record in the 100 m breaststroke with a time of 1:05.09.

Day 6 - 21 March

Swimming

The Australian women's swimming team again asserted their dominance in the pool, breaking the 4 x 100 m medley relay world record in a time of 3:56.30, over a second faster than that set by the Australian women's swimming team in the 2004 Athens Olympics. The Australian women completed one of the most successful campaigns in games' history, finishing with 16 gold medals, just 3 short of the entire meet's offerings. The Australian men's swimming team finishes on a successful note, winning the 4 x 100 m medley relay. This was one of their least successful games meets with 3 gold medals.

Athletics

The Kenyan women finish with Lucy Wangui (31:29.66) and Evelyne Nganga (31:30.86) gold and silver respectively in the 10,000 m run. Wangui overtook Nganga in the final straight, after Nganga attempted to break away. Mara Yamauchi of England was third.

Athletics

Dean Macey of England overcame injury to win his first major title in the men's Decathlon. Maurice Smith of Jamaica took silver and Australian Jason Dudley earned bronze.

Day 7 - 22 March

Athletics

New Zealander Valerie Vili won gold in the women's shot put, setting a new Commonwealth Games record of 19.66 metres.

Day 8 - 23 March

Athletics

Australian Jana Pittman delighted the home crowd by retaining her 400 m hurdles title with Britons Natasha Danvers-Smith (England) and Lee McConnell (Scotland) picking up silver and bronze.

Jamaica won gold and silver in the women's 200 m with Sherone Simpson finishing ahead of Veronica Campbell and South African Geraldine Pillay in third.

Cycling

England's Liam Killeen led an England one-two in the men's mountain bike cross country race. The 23-year-old eased home in two hours 13.11 minutes, ahead of team-mate Oli Beckingsale.

Canada's Marie-Hélène Prémont took gold in the Women's mountain bike cross country race at 1:55:04, despite having to dodge a kangaroo on the course. New Zealand's Rosara Joseph finished second and Canada's Kiara Biasro finished third.

Shooting

India's Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore won gold medal in Men's Double Trap.

Day 9 - 24 March

Athletics

Australian