2021 Tokyo Olympics

[Yuli Ban]

This miserable, excuse of an Olympics is coming up.

Tokyo Olympics to go ahead without spectators as COVID cases surge

This summer's Tokyo Olympics will go ahead without spectators after a surge in coronavirus cases, organisers have announced.

The widely expected move was made following talks between the government, Tokyo organisers and Olympic and Paralympic representatives.

Japan has now declared a coronavirus state of emergency for the capital that will run throughout the event.

Overseas fans had already been barred from attending the Games.

Public viewings of the Games have been cancelled and restaurants will be asked to stop serving alcohol under the state of emergency.

Seiko Hashimoto, president of this year's Games, said the situation was "regrettable" and apologised to those who had bought tickets.

Remember how excited everyone was for the 2020 games? I, personally, was hyped for CES + Sports and the formal start of the Future™. And it seemed everyone was talking about what a techno-spectacle it'd be, with robot villages, artificial meteor showers, flying cars, superfast trains, and more. It was supposed to be the Neo-Tokyo Cyberlympics 2020.

And then it all fell apart and Japan's been embarrassingly trying to pretend that no, no, everything's fine, the show must go on.

[Yuli Ban]

Totally Fine Games™

Tokyo Olympics may be held under state of emergency

The Olympic Games in Tokyo could be held under a state of emergency as Japan tackles a rise in COVID-19 infections.

Japan’s government is preparing to issue a state of emergency this month in Tokyo and will keep it in place until August 22, after the end of the Olympic Games, Nikkei newspaper has reported.

[Yuli Ban]

Olympic village workers test positive to COVID-19

Olympic organisers say two staff working at the athletes' village have tested positive for COVID-19, with just 16 days until the opening ceremony.The pair tested positive last week and further investigations revealed they had been eating in a group with two other village workers — in violation of the organising committee's own COVID-19 countermeasures.

The other workers have tested negative for the virus.

So far, an athlete and a coach from the Ugandan team, as well as a Serbian athlete have tested positive.

All were picked up at the airport or in separate accommodation outside the village.

[wjfox]

State of emergency begins in host city Tokyo as Games near

July 12, 2021
1:34 PM BST

TOKYO, July 12 (Reuters) - Olympic host city Tokyo entered a new state of emergency on Monday, less than two weeks before the Games begin amid worries about whether the measures can stem a rise in COVID-19 cases.

Organisers last week announced that spectators would be banned from nearly all venues. Spectators from abroad were already banned months ago, and officials are now asking residents to watch the Games on TV to keep the movement of people, which could spread contagion, to a minimum.

Opinion polls have consistently shown the Japanese public is concerned about going ahead with the Games during the pandemic.

Prime Mininster Yoshihide Suga's handling of the pandemic - including an initially slow vaccination rollout - has eroded his support. The issue is especially sensitive ahead of a national election and a ruling party leadership race due later this year.

"We would ask people to support athletes from home," Chief Cabinet Secretary Katsunobu Kato said on a Sunday TV programme.

https://www.reuters.com/lifestyle/sport ... 021-07-12/

[caltrek]

I can almost hear the groans from some upon realizing the topic of this post Sorry folks, but if you think it is annoying to constantly have to read such news items, think how annoying it is to be the victim in articles.

Olympic Rules Often Leave Out Black Women
by Ina Fried
July 18, 2021

https://www.axios.com/olympics-rules-bl ... 31e38.html

Introduction:

(Axios) The Tokyo Olympics represent a gender milestone, with women representing almost half of athletes for the first time. However, that doesn't mean the playing field is level.

The big picture: Elite sports are all about setting rules and drawing boundaries. But there is growing concern, fueled by recent events, that too often it is women, especially Black women, who are left on the outside looking in.

Driving the news:

• Namibian runners Christine Mboma and Beatrice Masilingi, two of the fastest 400-meter runners in the world, have been banned from competing after having “naturally high testosterone levels.” It's worth noting that the specific rule establishing such limits was created, in large part, as a response to another African woman, Caster Semenya.

• WNBA Most Valuable Player Nneka Ogwumike has been left off Team USA and then blocked by international basketball authorities from joining her sisters on Nigeria's national team.

...

• ... Soul Cap, a swim cap designed for natural African hair, was told by the water sports governing body that it wasn’t suitable because “they don’t follow the natural form of the head.” That decision is also under review, following a blowback.

[Yuli Ban]

^ I don't think anyone's groaning, at least not on this forum. It's not like the article's saying "we need there to be representation quotas or else the Olympics is racist." It raises good points.

Toyota Cancels All Tokyo Olympics TV Ads, CEO Won’t Attend Opening Ceremony

Toyota Motor Corp., a top corporate sponsor for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, has decided to pull all of its Olympics-related TV commercials in Japan.

Japanese media speculated Monday that the decision was made because the car manufacturer fears association with the troubled Summer Games, which are deeply unpopular in Japan, may tarnish its brand rather than burnish it.

“The Olympics is becoming an event that has not gained the public’s understanding,” a Toyota public relations executive surnamed Nagata told Japan’s daily Yomiuri newspaper Monday. The executive added that Toyota CEO Akio Toyoda and other senior executives would not be attending the Tokyo Summer Olympics opening ceremony July 23.

Remember how optimistic the kickoff to this was? They even had Shinzo Abe coming out of a pipe like Mario and the whole thing had this air of "Rio 2016 was shambolic, but Tokyo 2020 will be the Future!"

And now it's just a mess.

[caltrek]

Ugandan Weightlifter Who Fled Pre-Olympics Training Found in Central Japan
July 20, 2021

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/ugan ... n-n1274457

Introduction:

(AP via NBC) A Ugandan athlete who fled during pre-Olympics training in western Japan last week has been found and is being interviewed by police, officials said Tuesday.

Mie prefectural police in central Japan said 20-year-old weightlifter Julius Ssekitoleko was in Yokkaichi, a city 105 miles east of his host town in western Japan. Police are asking him what happened since he fled his hotel in Izumisano in the Osaka prefecture Friday, leaving behind a note saying he didn’t want to return to his country.

Ssekitoleko left behind his luggage and a note saying he wanted to stay in Japan and work, Izumisano officials said. He did not meet Olympic standards in the latest international rankings released after he arrived Japan and was to return home this week.

The pandemic-delayed Olympics open Friday despite mounting concern about an upsurge of infections in Tokyo, which on Tuesday reported 1,387 cases, up 557 from a week ago.

On their arrival on June 19 at Narita International Airport, a member of the team tested positive and was quarantined, while the remaining eight members were allowed to travel more than 300 miles on a chartered bus to Izumisano.

[caltrek]

Olympic Softball Is Back, And It Starts Today. Will It Stick Around?
by Tom Goldman
July 20, 2021

https://www.npr.org/sections/tokyo-olym ... ick-around

Introduction:

(NPR) The Tokyo Summer Olympics officially begin Friday with the Opening Ceremony.

But the sports actually start today (8 p.m. ET).

Host nation Japan kicks off competition with a softball game against Australia.

With three first-day games (the other two are top-ranked U.S. vs Italy and Mexico vs Canada), softball is in the Olympic spotlight after being out of it for the past 13 years.

After 2008, the International Olympic Committee dropped the popular women's sport, which wasn't popular enough with IOC voters who decide what's in and what's out on the Olympic program.

caltrek's comment: I think I actually find softball and/or baseball more exciting as an Olympic sport than is professional baseball. A couple of reasons:

1. The compressed schedule makes every game more important. More consequential games adds to the tension involved in watching the game(s).

2. Because the United States typically refrains from sending its most talented players (on account of they are too busy with their regular season games) the players that they do send tend to be closer to being amateurs. Originally, the Olympics were meant to be games where amateurs played each other. It was only later that professionals were allowed and encouraged to attend. So, a sport in which most players are still "amateurs" is closer to that original spirit.

In some cases, track and field for example, allowing professionals makes for a more interesting contest. I don't think that is necessarily the case for baseball. It is very much more a matter of our B team playing against the A team of other countries. In such circumstances, a country like Cuba or Japan very much has a chance of winning.

[Time_Traveller]

Swimming-Six Polish swimmers sent home from Japan after admin blunder

july 20, 2021

July 20 (Reuters) - The president of Poland's swimming federation (PZP) has apologised after six athletes were sent home from the Tokyo Games due to an administrative error.

Poland had sent 23 swimmers to Japan but the PZP was forced to cut the squad down to 17 based on world governing body FINA's qualifying rules.

PZP President Pawel Slominski apologised and said he fully understood the anger of the swimmers who returned home over the weekend.

"I express great regret, sadness and bitterness about the situation related to the qualification of our swimmers for the Olympic Games in Tokyo," Slominski said in a statement.

"Such a situation should not take place, and the reaction of the swimmers, their emotions, the attack on the Polish Swimming Federation is understandable to me and justified."

https://www.reuters.com/lifestyle/sport ... 021-07-20/

[Xyls]

Lol the IOC should've just cancelled this and given it to Tokyo for 2024 and push Paris to 2028 and Lost Angeles to 2032... complete fucking mess. Now they have announced Brisbane for 2032 and completely screwed the pooch. Maybe they should push it to 2036?

[caltrek]

The Price of Olympic Glory
by Emily Stewart
July 22, 2021

https://www.vox.com/the-goods/22586868/ ... onsors-ioc

Introduction:

(Vox) There is a ton of money to be made at the Olympics, even in a year like this. NBC has paid $7.7 billion for broadcasting rights to show the Olympics through 2032, and it’s already sold $1.25 billion in ads for the Tokyo games. The Associated Press estimates the International Olympic Committee (IOC), which runs the Olympic Games, stands to make $3 billion to $4 billion on television rights for the delayed 2020 Olympics. One NBC executive said they believe this could be the most profitable Games ever.

And yet, much of that wealth won’t be shared with the event’s most valuable assets: the athletes themselves.

Some 11,000 athletes are competing in the 2020 Olympic Games, and 4,000 athletes in the Paralympics (beginning in late August). There are more than 600 athletes just on Team USA’s Olympic and Paralympic roster. (For the purposes of this story, I’m going to focus mainly on American athletes.) The vast majority of those athletes are not rich, or close to it.

You cannot watch TV or exist on the internet right now without running into a Simone Biles ad. The Olympic gold medal gymnast got plenty of well-deserved, high-paying endorsement deals lined up. But she is the exception, not the rule. According to one survey of elite athletes from 48 countries, more than half are financially unstable. And that survey was taken before the pandemic, which made many competitors’ financial situations even worse because so many competitions (that often translate to money) were canceled.

“As impressive as someone like Simone Biles is or Michael Phelps has been, their stories get told and their achievements get reported on and analyzed. But there are incredible stories of people who really have to go work in regular jobs, depending on where they are in the world, to earn money just so they can live, and then they’re doing their training on top of it,” said Lee Igel, a clinical professor at the NYU Tisch Institute for Global Sport.

Olympic coins.
Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ3

[caltrek]

How the COVID-19 Delay of the Tokyo Olympics Helped Some Athletes Break Records
July 20, 2021

https://theconversation.com/how-the-cov ... rds-163861

Introduction:

(The Conversation) After an unprecedented delay due to a once-in-a-century global health crisis, the Tokyo Games are finally ready to begin. Yet the athletes, like the Games themselves, have changed.

…some are thriving.

A year ago, the New York Times reported on the phenomenon of athletes thriving through lockdown.

Their list of examples included four Olympians and Olympic hopefuls who all showed remarkable improvements during the lockdowns precipitated by the pandemic’s first wave in the spring of 2020: 2016 American Olympic champion shot-putter Ryan Crouser; the 16-year-old aspiring U.S. Olympic swimmer Claire Curzon; American discus thrower Valarie Allman; and Ugandan Olympic middle distance runner Joshua Cheptegei.

In the year since, all four have smashed national or world records in the lead up to what will surely be an Olympic Games for the ages.

Valarie Allman, seen competing in June, set the American women’s discus record with a throw of 70.15 metres last August, nearly three metres over her personal best.
AP Photo/Charlie Riedel

[caltrek]

This story (see below) is slightly dated, but since it deals in robotics, a subject that crops up in this forum quite often, I will go ahead an post it. Better late than never.

The Robot Olympics
by Joann Muller
July 14, 2021

https://www.axios.com/olympics-japan-ro ... deepdive=1

Introduction:

(Axios) With no spectators allowed at the Tokyo Olympics, robots might be the only ones on hand to witness the athletic feats at this year's Summer Games.

Why it matters: Organizers had billed the 2020 Olympics as "the most innovative ever," with plans to deploy teams of robots to assist and dazzle visiting athletes and fans.

• While some robots will still provide assistance on-site at the postponed Games, COVID-19 has ensured there will be far fewer humans around to impress.

Driving the news: Tokyo entered a new state of emergency this week, less than two weeks before the start of the Olympics as it seeks to stem a rise in COVID-19 cases.

• International in-person spectators were banned months ago and then last week, organizers said even Japanese fans would have to watch the Games on TV.

[caltrek]

Iranian Refugee Alizadeh Narrowly Misses Out on Olympic Medal

July 25, 2021

https://www.aljazeera.com/sports/2021/7 ... ondo-upset

Introduction:

(Al Jazeera) Iranian refugee Kimia Alizadeh came within striking distance of winning the Refugee Olympic Team’s first ever medal after three impressive wins in the Tokyo Games’ taekwondo tournament on Sunday.

However, she lost her semi-final and the bronze-medal playoff to finish fourth.

Alizadeh beat Iranian opponent Nahid Kiyani Chandeh 18-9 in her opening bout in Tokyo. She then shocked two-time Olympic gold medalist Jade Jones in the round-of-16, beating the British champion 16-12.

She went on to defeat Zhou Lijun of China 9-8 in the quarterfinals, mounting a stirring final-minute rally for the second straight bout.

Alizadeh’s streak raised hopes that the Refugee Olympic Team could take home its first medal in history during the Tokyo games, however she lost her bronze medal bout to Turkey’s Hatice Kubra Ilgun.

Alizadeh, left, of the Refugee Olympic Team beat two-time gold medallist Jones to advance to the quarterfinals.
Murad Sezer/Reuters

[caltrek]

I love stories about long shot upset victories.

Tunisia’s Hafnaoui Wins Surprise Olympic Swimming Gold
July 25, 2021

(Al Jazeera) Nobody was watching Ahmed Hafnaoui in lane eight of the Olympic pool but all eyes were on the Tunisian teenager at the finish.

Hafnaoui was the stunning winner of the 400 metres freestyle at the Tokyo Games on Sunday, beating a field of faster and older swimmers.

The 18-year-old finished in three minutes, 43.26 seconds, punctuating his victory with loud yelling that echoed in the mostly empty 15,000-seat arena.

He was the slowest qualifier to start the final.

“I believed it when I touched the wall and I saw myself first,” he said. “I was so surprised.”

Ahmed Hafnaoui joined Ous Mellouli to be the only Tunisians to win a gold in swimming
Attila Kisbenedek/AFP

[weatheriscool]

Team USA men's basketball falls to France in Olympics shocker https://trib.al/JSfscuA

[weatheriscool]

Shocker: US falls to Nigeria 90-87 in pre-Olympic opener
https://apnews.com/article/2020-tokyo-o ... 5a41349978

This is not how USA Basketball expected to open its Olympic summer.
Nigeria probably didn’t expect it, either.

If there was any expectation of invincibility for the Americans heading into the Tokyo Olympics, it’s already gone — after Nigeria beat the U.S. 90-87 on Saturday night, an international shocker pulled off by a roster primarily filled by little-known NBA players that found a way to beat a group of All-NBA, All-Star and max-contract performers.

“We just wanted to compete,” said Nigeria’s Gabe Nnamdi, who goes by Gabe Vincent when playing for the Miami Heat. “We know what USA Basketball means around the world and what they’ve stood for for so long.”

The U.S. had lost 11 games before Saturday in major international play — Olympics and World Cups, mostly — since NBA players began filling the American rosters with the first Dream Team in 1992. None of those losses came against a team from Africa.

[caltrek]

...and to rub salt into the wound...

Russia Sets Stage for Enticing Gymnastics Final by Outscoring Team USA in Qualifying
by Dan Wetzel
July 25, 2021

https://sports.yahoo.com/simone-biles-t ... 23115.html

Introduction:

(Yahoo!) TOKYO — Four years ago, Russian gymnast Angelina Melnikova watched as the United States women’s gymnastics team steamrolled its way to the team gold medal, winning by an outrageous 8.209 points.

The U.S. was a juggernaut. There was nothing Melnikova, then 16 years old, could do except grow determined to make the next time different.

Well, the next time is here, and while the Americans should remain the favorite to win Tuesday’s team title, it was Melnikova and her Russian teammates who posted the top team score in Sunday’s qualifying, not the United States.

Russia recorded a score of 171.629 to the United States’ 170.562. That’s a 1.067 advantage. Although the scores do not carry over, the Russians clearly should be confident that they can take down the mighty Americans in what would be a monumental upset.

“We hope that,” Melnikova told the media Sunday with a translator. “We’re also going to struggle and fight. We have to. That’s the expectation for us.”

[Yuli Ban]

These Olympics were supposed to be so futuristic... and the fact they're taking place during a global pandemic certainly sells the "cyberpunk" aspect of it all

[caltrek]

Olympic Athletes Learning to Adapt to Hotter Conditions — But There’s a Limit

by Brian Resnick
July 26, 2021

https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/ ... physiology

Introduction:

(Vox) This summer’s Olympic Games could be the warmest in decades. Tokyo, where the Games will be held, may see dangerously high temperatures, in excess of 90 degrees.

The athletes will likely be prepared. Scientists like Oliver Gibson, an exercise physiologist at Brunel University in the UK, have spent decades studying how athletes can adapt to extreme heat conditions. He says that with training, the human body has a remarkable capacity for cooling itself when the temperature rises.

These days, though, Gibson is less worried about the athletes. While running a marathon in 90-degree heat can be dangerous, even with preparation, there’s a much larger threat for everyday people coping with the new realities of climate change. “A lot of what we’re doing now is taking the decades’ worth of insight that we’ve gathered from the athletes and starting to apply it to the general population,” Gibson says.

Coping with heat stress is a growing issue that “will affect more than just your dozen or so Olympic finalists,” he says. “Millions, billions of people are undoubtedly going to be affected by climate change.” Heat emergencies are already the deadliest weather events, and are likely to keep getting worse. To beat the heat, we’ll need to confront it, Gibson says. He believes that research into elite athletes could help make our bodies more resilient in a warming world.

This conversation has been edited for length and clarity. (See article linked above quote box for interview)