OlympicsFan

Do you even follow swimming? Please look up the results of the last world championships. When did Italy last go faster than the Chinese time from this year? China, South Korea and Australia should normally fight for bronze. Don’t see how Italy is relevant in this discussion.

Yeah, but Australia should be at least 0.6 seconds faster on the freestyle leg.

I still don’t see China seriously threatening the U.S. or Australia. China should be about 1.5 seconds behind after the first leg and all the waves will make it very difficult to catch up. I think China is a rather clear favorite for bronze, but probably not more than that. I actually think that China could medal in all 7 relays. The men’s 800 free relay should be the closest call, followed by the men’s 400 free relay. There is a chance that only 4 different nations will win relay medals. Especially the women’s relays look super „shallow“, only the U.S., Australia, China and maybe Canada look like realistic medal contenders. No European nation has a realistic medal chance.

I don’t think that the record on the women’s side is a supersuited one (if that is what you meant). Almost all records are in danger. Only men’s 200/800 free, men’s 100 breast, men’s 200 back, women’s 200 fly and possibly men’s 200 fly seem safe.

1) It clashes with the 200 free at the Olympics. 2) She already put down a time. Don’t see anyone who could realistically get close. 3) Don’t see how it would make sense to put McKeown on the breast leg. You would probably lose one second on the back and free leg (combined). McKeown would have to be 1.5 seconds faster than your second best breastroker to justify putting her there. Even if Strauch doesn’t improve till trials, McKeown would have to be 1:05 mid, which doesn’t seem realistic. In addition to that it wouldn’t help your athletes to swim against the American wave (considering that Smith most likely would open up a considerable gap for the U.S.).

Same as in basketball and football.

Not sure I would call the UK highly developed … More likely politicians like to use sports to masquerade all the other (real) problems (NHS, education system, housing problem, stagnating wages).

Obviously that is nonsense. Everyone at the top dopes (at least in somewhat relevant sports), Eastern Europeans just doped more ruthlessly. Whenever there is money involved, there is cheating. Makes no sense to assume that someone who isn’t doping can win gold, when the huge majority of people live in countries where doping pays off most of the time. Why should someone in Africa/Russia/China/India not dope, when they can become „rich“ by doing it and don’t really face much consequences even if they get caught? In order to outperform the most talented, doped athletes from those nations, you have to dope as well. There is nothing to suggest that people from rich nations are genetically superior and therefore don’t have to dope to beat the doped athletes from all those other nations (that represent at least 80 % of the global population/talent pool). Anyone who disagrees has to defend one of the following two lines of reasoning and in my opinion both don’t really make sense: a) People in rich nations are somehow special and therefore don’t have to dope to dominate the most talented, doped up athletes from the rest of the world (that makes up at least 80 % of the talent pool) b) There is no widespread doping in poorer nations (despite the evidence from countries like Ethiopia, Kenya, Russia or China saying otherwise)

Did she say that she will swim it at trials? Absolutely don’t see her swimming it at the Olympics.

1) What starting date did you use? Do you only look at 2024 results or all results since the beginning of the qualifying period? 2) Many nations haven’t had their trials yet, so we will probably see some changes. I would be shocked if Australia would have less athletes with the A standard than Japan.

It is the same when you look at the results of the International Mathematical Olympiad. Based on the names you wouldn’t be able to tell whether a team is from the U.S., Canada or China.

Don’t see how Hungary wouldn’t be huge underdogs against Sweden. Croatia, Spain and Germany should also be clearly favored over them. Early predictions for quarterfinals: Sweden - Egypt Croatia - Norway Spain - Denmark Germany - France

I said that Australia and the U.S. are a lock for gold and silver (not in that order). USA is the favorite for gold. 1) Australia is clearly faster than Canada (combined almost 2 seconds) on backstroke and freestyle, about equal on butterfly and at most a second behind on breaststroke. 2) Please look up the Chinese breaststroke leg … China is about equal on butterfly, clearly faster on breaststroke, about equal on freestyle and maybe (half) a second slower on backstroke. Right now there is absolutely no basis to say that the breaststroke leg is close. At the moment it looks like a coin toss. Canada is definitely much closer to China than to Australia.

How does that make it any better? Why not throw from the top of the Himalaya or in a wind canal?

Realistically you have to subtract 5 or 6 meters. He is still one of the favorites for the Olympics, but nothing more.

It is much easier to qualify in handball, but I feel that concentrating on qualifying in basketball would be a much more „natural“ choice for GB. Basketball should be a much better match.

Germany has to hope to get Hungary and Slovenia. If everything works out perfectly, Germany might be able to finish 4th.

10 medals in swimming? Masse: She isn’t a medal favorite (behind Smith, McKeown and the 2nd American), but we will see. Women‘s 400 free relay: They aren’t a medal favorite (behind Australia, USA and China), but we will see. Kharun: I see at least Milak, Marchand and Honda ahead of him, but he might end up on the podium. Liendo: He could win gold or end up without a medal. Dressel, Milak, Ponti, Grousset and Temple are all at least as likely as him to win a medal. Women‘s medley relay: Australia and the U.S. are pretty much a lock for gold and silver. Canada should battle with China for bronze. 4 medals (Women‘s 400 free, women’s 100/200 fly and women’s 400 IM) should be the minimum. 7 or 8 medals seem like a realistic goal.

1) Depends on how you sort the medal table. 2) Depends on what you mean with „close“.

2 medals for Corbeau seems borderline insane. I think 2 medals in the 4 breaststroke events seems realistic. The only medal favorite is Schouten in the 200 breast and even she could very well end up without a medal (Chikunova (if she competes after all), Schoenmaker, Douglass).

1) You wrote men‘s 100/400 m hurdles when it should be women‘s 100/400 m hurdles. 2) What happened with the women’s 1500 m prediction? 3) I think that Hassan will win more than one medal. 4) Not sure about Omanyala/Hughes/Samukonga/Eid Naser/Samba-Mayela winning a medal.

Would be interesting to have a ranking of nations with the most athletes under the A standard. I was quite surprised to see that Japan has clearly more athletes under the A standard than GB.

Obviously lightweight categories are completely retarded. 1) Height is an advantage in many sports. Should we also have lightweight basketball? 2) „Smaller nations“ have advantages in other sports (gymnastics, table tennis, diving, figure skating), should we also introduce heavyweight categories there? 3) There are way too many events in rowing anyways. If IOC wants to reduce the number of participants, they should have 3 events at most per gender. Rowing is very unpopular and barely anyone cares to watch, so it make the most sense to save costs by reducing the number of athletes in super fringe sports. In general: More nations are able to win medals -> Bigger viewership => How do you (as federation/IOC) make the sport more accessible and how do you make the races less predictable?

Where did he say that Netanyahu and the Hamas grandpa are the same? Your source is obviously completely irrelevant to this discussion. In addition to that I despise senile Biden and I am certainly not a fan of the U.S. (completely degenerated neo-capitalistic shithole).

To call it a genocide is your opinion, but obviously a very uneducated opinion. The Palestinian population size has exploded over the last couple of decades, but somehow that all happened during a genocide … Israel could easily kill most of the Palestinians in Gaza if they wanted to.