[Makedonas 1,678]

On 5/13/2024 at 10:38 PM, Pasolini said:

Brazilian federation did the same thing, asking for a Tripartite reallocation quota for Alexandre CAMARGO after the lost 15-14 in the American Qualifier on a questionable decision.

 

The reply was quite sharp, saying the referee commission decided that  the decision was right (but the head of referee of the event is part of the referee commission lol) finishing basically with "Read the rules, you are not eligible for tripartite".

This is exactly what I was saying earlier, and people complained, but they bent the rules for Kharlan so now this really opened the door to this, now everyone is going to expect them to change the rules and give them wildcards too.

[Makedonas 1,678]

25 minutes ago, Jur said:

I'm sorry but this is going out of hand. If you have two athletes as strong as the greeks, is yours federations blame only for not being able to rise a third athlete with a decent level enough to figth for the team quota.

 

 

Asking for a wildcard is absurd. One is in, the other one is out. They had three years to read the qualification process.

They made a big effort with Paizi and Mpenou, they were not able to become decent enough in 3 years, it's not so easy to rise so quickly, especially because we are a very small fencing country, and that should not be Georgiadou's responsibility.

 

I know the Spanish girl (who is also a fantastic fencer and deserves to be in Paris) got the quota from this since Georgiadou couldn't take it, so I also understand that you would defend this qualification process. It just makes zero sense that in fencing you can qualify 1 athlete or 3 but not 2.

 

And anyways, the 1976 gold medalist giving Kharlan a wildcard against the qualification process (which only happened less than one year ago, not three years ago) opened the door for things like this to happen. No one is saying that they changed the rules at the last minute and we didn't know (the same thing happened with Georgiadou for Tokyo although she wasn't ranked as high, but you keep saying that we didn't read the qualification process, obviously we did), but if they are allowing other exceptions then why shouldn't our federation try it? I think it's unlikely to be successful but at least it can draw attention and maybe cause a change in the future.

[Makedonas 1,678]

https://www.gazzetta.gr/xifaskia/olympiakoi-agones/2323011/despoina-georgiadoy-epistoli-tis-omospondias-xifaskias-gia-na

 

This article is almost three weeks old, but our fencing federation is requesting a wildcard or reallocation spot for Georgiadou and using Bach giving Kharlan a wildcard as an example...

 

Of course I doubt it will make a difference. We knew for the past few years that something like this would probably happen and that one of our two girls would miss out on the Olympics, maybe a change could've been made if they didn't wait until the end to complain about it.

[Makedonas 1,678]

Go Yoana! You can do it!

[Makedonas 1,678]

5 minutes ago, Olympian1010 said:

This is entirely an anecdotal inquiry since qualification isn’t finished yet (and we may need more than one or two cycles of data), but I do wonder if those NOCs will be the ones hardest hit by the quota cuts over the last two/three cycles.

Honestly I think it already has hit us. For example, our athletics and swimming teams we would send to the Olympics used to be bigger or the same size as now, even though now we are way stronger in those sports than we were in say 2008/2012/2016.

 

And look at weightlifting, the reduction of quotas made it so hard and finally for Paris we failed to qualify for the first time in a million years, even though I'd argue Greek weightlifting is slightly stronger now than it was in 2012, 2016, or 2020, when we actually had an athlete qualify each time.

 

Sailing is another one, though we are definitely at a low point right now, this will be our smallest Olympic sailing team since 1980. It's very possible that the quota reduction is a factor for that (but there are also other factors in Greek sailing which I won't get into).

 

And at the same time, we haven't been making any progress in the new sports like breaking, skateboarding, or surfing for example, so we don't get any quotas there.

[Makedonas 1,678]

1 hour ago, Epic Failure said:

As much as the parochial side of me is sad to see Stutchbury miss out, she had her shot and her ranking puts her roughly on the borderline anyway.

 

I feel more for Carlos Llavador from Spain in the men's foil. He's ranked 12th.

 

He's looking likely to miss out. But in the individual event, we'll see 3 Polish fencers and 3 Canadians, none of whom are within the top 30 in the rankings. Nothing against any of those athletes, it's just a weird system.

 

It just seems somewhat perverse that *multiple* lower ranked athletes get to take part in the individual because they are just good enough to get a quota in another event, whereas an individual clearly more talented misses out.

Sad, but at least he had the chance at the European qualification tournament. The same might happen with Ilieva in a few hours, hopefully not, we will see.

 

Georgiadou is 5th (!!!) in the women's sabre, won medals at the World Championships in both 2022 and 2023, won many other medals during that time, but doesn't get to qualify via ranking even though she is the second-highest ranked European (because another Greek is ranked higher, so someone from another country who is ranked below Georgiadou gets the quota instead), and on top of that Georgiadou doesn't get to compete in the European qualification tournament because apparently it's fine for some countries to have 3 fencers in the individual event but God forbid Greece sends two fencers to Paris in the same weapon it would be "bad for the development of the sport" and "decreases diversity" as one other NOC would miss out in the event, because apparently Greece is so important in fencing these days that we must give up one of our spots to another country so they can also be represented. 

 

I don't want to seem insensitive (I fully support Ukraine) and I know these are different situations, but they were able to magically add another quota and give Kharlan a wildcard here, so I guess the athlete quotas are only strict when they want them to be?

[Makedonas 1,678]

2 minutes ago, Cinnamon Bun said:

In sports such as boxing, sailing and a lot of the team sports you get multiple chances to qualify so if 26th in the world didn't qualify they'd have no room to complain. In terms of artistic swimming, judo and taekwondo there are too little quota spots given to those countries as 26th in the world should qualify to the biggest event for each of those sports. Golf, Tennis, Table Tennis and even Beach Volleyball to an extent are able to get the 26th best in the world to the Olympics, Fencing should be no different given its format. But this all wouldn't need to be said if the IOC had increased the athlete quotas by 1000-1500. 

But in fencing there is the ranking, so technically there are many chances to gain points towards an Olympic quota, though of course there are too few spots for this.

[Makedonas 1,678]

Of course as a Greek I am bitter about it, and I feel I have every right to be. I'm sure many of you in my position would also feel this way, I mean some of you even feel this way about fencers ranked much lower who had opportunities to qualify and didn't. Georgiadou really had no chance to qualify unless she was ranked 1 or 2 

 

Greece hasn't won a fencing medal since 1896, it's not like we are some fencing powerhouse. Georgiadou winning an Olympic medal could honestly change the sport in the country. Don't those in charge want to grow the sport, or they just want to keep it amongst the same big countries?

 

I guess that's how it is being a medium-sized European country, it's just so much harder to get Olympic quotas in many sports where there are few spots reserved for Europeans. Not big enough to consistently compete with the likes of Germany, France, Italy etc., and not small enough to get all the universality/tripartite places...

[Makedonas 1,678]

I've discussed it many times here to the point where I think people are tired of it, but since we are staying on this topic, it is absolutely ridiculous that Despina Georgiadou is unable to qualify for the Olympics as a top 5 fencer because Greece doesn't have a good third fencer.

 

If she was number one for Greece, she'd qualify. If she was number three for Greece, she'd qualify. But as number two? No.

 

Why do the NOCs qualified for the team event get to send three fencers to the individual competition, but all other NOCs are capped at one fencer?!

[Makedonas 1,678]

1 hour ago, copravolley said:

The general tendency is that the IOC reduces the number of quotas + introduces some additional preferences for weaker continents and countries. The result is that there are disciplines in which it is more difficult for a European country to qualify for the Olympics than to win a medal. To me this is absurd. I understand the promotion of sports around the world, but then let's just increase the number of quotas in most sports and, for example, throw out weird things like break dancing, surfing, etc.

I've been a member here for 3+ years, and this might be the best post I've ever seen. I agree so much with everything you said!

[Makedonas 1,678]

36 minutes ago, Olympian1010 said:

Of course, you're also talking about qualification to a "one off" event.

 

I personally like that fencers can qualify through by individual ranking or continental tournaments. I think there are some changes you could make to help more top ranked individual fencers qualify through the rankings, but I like that individual athletes get two chances at qualification. 

Unless another person from your country is ranked higher and qualifies through the rankings, then you don't even get one chance, let alone two (see Despina Georgiadou).

[Makedonas 1,678]

54 minutes ago, Benolympique said:

Europe Tournament

Semi Final (Foil Women's)

Are you sure? FIE site says Romania and not Greece

[Makedonas 1,678]

18 hours ago, Adriano said:

many great sailors / judokas and other athletes could say something like this, because has only 1 place per NOC.

Yes but in those sports there is always only 1 athlete per NOC, whereas in fencing you can either have 1 or have 3, but you can't have 2. So it's not the same situation.

 

Well, Georgiadou seems to have gotten a lot of attention with her post, maybe it'll be like our women's water polo team's NQ in 2012 as 2011 World Championships which caused a change in the qualification system for the future  of course it's a shame they always seem to come at Greece's expense though 

[Makedonas 1,678]

2 minutes ago, Josh said:

In judo,  Jessica Klimkait has won bronze medals at the last two World Championships in women’s 57kg, and is #2 in the OQR (approximately 2700 points ahead of #3 Gjakova) but due to the one judoka per NOC rule there’s a possibility that she might not even qualify. Right now, she’s in a fierce internal selection battle with Christa Deguchi, who’s the reigning World Champion, and current #1 in the OQR (approximately 1500 points ahead of #2 Klimkait)
 

Judo Canada has yet to select their athlete though, so they could still pick Klimkait over Deguchi. 
 

Judo Canada Olympic Selection Criteria

Highest Finish at 2022 Worlds (1 pt) - Klimkait

Highest Finish at 2023 Worlds (2 pts) - Deguchi

Highest Finish at 2024 Worlds (2 pts) - TBD

Olympic Ranking (2 pts) - likely will be Deguchi

Now that you mention it there are probably a few other examples in sports like wrestling, judo, etc. where only 1 athlete per NOC is allowed no matter what (unlike fencing where you can either have 1 or 3 but not 2...)

[Makedonas 1,678]

Also last thing I will say for now (sorry for spamming this topic) is that a fencing medal could really change the sport in Greece and bring more attention and sponsors, so that makes it frustrating that we have two serious medal contenders but only one can compete.

 

@phelps gave the great example of Italy in 2016 and that is pretty insane, and I don't want to "play the victim" but for us it means so much more in a way because fencing is so irrelevant in our country, and it feels like we are being denied the chance to make it relevant, while Italian fencing for example is so strong and historic that for them to experience this too is just such a different scenario.

 

In Tokyo we had high expectations for Gkountoura and she crashed out in the first round, hopefully she can do better here...

[Makedonas 1,678]

Also so many of Georgiadou's rivals and also other notable fencers from other weapons commented on the posts, and many people are saying FIE should give her a wildcard, and that the system is unfair, and I approximately half of these people asking for wildcards are not even Greeks, so it's not just the case of "biased fans"

Edited March 29 by Makedonas

[Makedonas 1,678]

11 hours ago, Pasolini said:

and i don't get how a country with 2 of the 5 best athletes in the world can't get a reasonable team. 

 

10 hours ago, intoronto said:

This is the question I have too.

Maybe @Makedonascan explain

Our top two fencers are in the top 5 but our third girl is ranked 147 and then after that our next girl is 227. We are not a big fencing country, so it's actually a miracle that we have two girls somehow in the top 5. We have Kontochristopoulou in the women's foil ranked 86. No one else in any weapon or gender is top 100 (special shout out though to 18 yo Garyfallou who is ranked 102 in the women's foil ).

 

The sport has grown since 2004 slowly I guess. I mean, I don't personally know anyone who has ever competed in fencing even at an amateur/recreational level unlike other sports, so I can't speak much about it, but since 2004 we had Vougiouka, Gkountoura, and Georgiadou all very successful, so the federation must be doing something right because for decades we won no medals and rarely qualified any fencers to the Olympics.

 

As @phelps said, it is very hard to qualify as a European team.

 

Our team made a serious effort the last few years and are ranked 12th which is much better than they were before this Olympic cycle but still they are very far from the top 5/6, and let's not forget this is without Russia who won gold at in Tokyo in the team event!

 

Georgiadou seems like she will stay on until Los Angeles at least, she will be 37 yo. Gkountoura will be 31 so it's not a problem for her. The issue is finding a third fencer, though 15 yo Kourousi and 21 yo Mavrikaki have had some promising results (especially Kourousi for her age) so hopefully we can get a "decent" third sabre fencer and make a push to qualify for Los Angeles.

 

I was saying for the past few years we should try to bring Vougiouka out of retirement, she was top 5 or so for some years and retired after Rio at 30 yo which is not that old in fencing, but it obviously never happened for Tokyo or Paris so I can't see it happening for Los Angeles, the more that time passes the less likely a comeback will be...

[Makedonas 1,678]

11 hours ago, Jur said:

I'm sad for her but the post is giving sore loser. And she knew about the qualification process years in advanced, nothing is new.

I don't think she was ever claiming the process is new or that she didn't expect it, because she was clearly familiar with this format as the number one Greek always qualified via ranking whether it was Vougiouka in 2016 or Gkountoura in 2020 and 2024. She wasn't ranked as high in those other ones but for 2020 she would've been one of the favourites at the continental qualification event but wasn't eligible to compete as Greece already had one quota via ranking.

 

Gkountoura also gave an interview recently and said it is unlucky for Georgiadou.

 

But for example can someone tell me in what other sport does someone who wins medals at World Championships in both 2022 and 2023 not qualify for Paris 2024?

[Makedonas 1,678]

11 hours ago, Pasolini said:

Sad for her, but I don't get the whole idea of "let's change the system because of one specific case".

 

The Olympics is also about have more nations represented. Having said that, I would like to see a bigger fencing draw, like 48? And then we could have a rule of "if you are in top10 you can have 2 individual athletes qualified", like in Badminton for instance or tennis doubles

Or what about letting her compete in the European qualification tournament? It could be like shooting where you can't get more than one quota per qualification event (at least I think that is the rule in shooting, I'm sure @phelps knows better than me).

[Makedonas 1,678]

https://www.instagram.com/p/C5BL6CxMczW/?img_index=1

 

So many famous fencers commenting on this post, it's nice to see how they support each other! Poor Despina 

[Makedonas 1,678]

21 minutes ago, Cobi said:

I just did the maths and I think Gkountoura already secured the Greek spot, even if she loses in the round of 64 and Gkountoura takes the gold medal. Currently Georgiadou has 148 points instead of 154 and Gkountoura 174.

Georgiadou really deserves to go to the Olympics, she was incredible during this Olympic cycle, winning medals at both World Championships that took place as well as other big events. So, so sad 

[Makedonas 1,678]

Georgiadou fell in the quarterfinals, Gkountoura in the round of 16. So if my calculations are correct, Georgiadou (154) is 23 points behind Gkountoura (177).

 

The last chance will be in two weeks in Belgium. Here is what Georgiadou needs in order to qualify for the Olympics:

 

-Win at least silver and have Gkountoura lose in the round of 64

-Win gold and have Gkountoura lose in the round of 16 or round of 32

 

It's very unlikely...

[Makedonas 1,678]

I guess mathematically there is still a chance for Georgiadou to overtake Gkountoura for Greece's quota spot in the women's sabre. However, Gkountoura can clinch her spot in Paris this weekend...

[Makedonas 1,678]

6 hours ago, phelps said:

Women's Individual Sabre ( Lima)

 

Gold:  Olga Kharlan

Silver:  Sugar Katinka Battai

Bronze:  Zaynab Dayibekova &  Elizabeth Tartakovsky

 

Semifinals

Kharlan b. Tartakovsky 15-12

Battai b. Dayibekova 15-12

 

Final

Kharlan b. Battai 15-6

 

Full Ranking & Results

https://fie.org/competitions/2024/470?tab=results

Georgiadou was leading Battai 9-6 the moment Gkountoura lost in the quarterfinals. It's like she noticed what was happening on the other piste because she immediately went from 9-6 to 10-13, eventually losing 14-15. This was really a great opportunity for her to close the gap in the ranking, now it really seems like she will miss yet another Olympics. Hopefully she'll be able to keep going until Los Angeles 2028, where she can finally make her Olympic debut at age 37...

[Makedonas 1,678]

1 hour ago, phelps said:

Women's Individual Sabre Grand Prix ( Tunis)

 

Gold:  Lucia Martin-Portugues

Silver:  Nisanur Erbil

Bronze:  Choi Sebin &  Chiara Mormile

 

Semifinals

Martin-Portugues b. Mormile 15-6

Erbil b. Choi 15-14

 

Final

Martin-Portugues b. Erbil 15-5

 

Full Ranking & Results

https://fie.org/competitions/2024/1431?tab=results

Georgiadou 6th, Gkountoura 33rd. Georgiadou probably needed to take advantage of Gkountoura's result and do a little better than 6th to really close the gap between her and Gkountoura for the Greek quota spot.

 

It must be so awkward for them to be competing against each other for this quota, especially because they are good friends...