TeamGB

14 minutes ago, Epic Failure said:

2022 was a non-Olympic Euros, so you can't really compare the two.

 

But even with a stronger team in Munich, at the same point in 2022 we only had 2 bronze medals.

I think heading into the championships looking at the entry lists it was expected for the total medals to be down. Looking at the general picture I don't think is unfair to say that the team is in a better position than 2 years ago.

Let's hope the home crowd in Birmingham combined with it not being an olympic year in 2026 will produce some more silverware.

Louie Hinchcliffe was very impressive but again it is about double peaking. The way he finished that 100m, makes me think he would be a better 200m runner, and that event probably has worse depth than the 200m both in the UK and internationally.

1 hour ago, RussB said:

 

in terms of medal prospects for Paris I have more confidence in Molly and Kerr (keely the best chance) than I do in MHS but that’s just a personal feeling.

 

I think Keely has to be our best chance of a medal, and then I would say Molly over Josh (just on the nature of their events), The 400m is just so difficult to predict as even a MHS who runs sub 44 may still miss out on the podium. As much as I would love a full strength mixed 4x400m of MHS, Dobson, Anning, and one other. I think it is too much of a risk to jeopardise medal contenders for individual given 3/4 would have to run in heat as well.

Reform all qualification systems to be less focused on continental representation, or expand the number of quotas in certain events.

Allow a maximum of 3 entrants in each swimming event, 2 for other sports such as judo or boxing.

Introduce a points based scoring table like the one seen in athletics, (alongside the medal table), which may encourage some nations to send all qualified athletes, not just medal contenders.

1 hour ago, NearPup said:

Going to mostly limit this to the Olympics.

 

• Expand the Summer Olympics to three weeks to allow for more athletes / sports / events without balloning costs.
• Specifically, have a rotation of which athletes are there. I like the idea of having one week tentpolled by swimming, one week tentpolled by Gymnastics and one week tentpolled by Athletics.
• Eliminate Modern Pentathlon from the Olympics
• Expand the athlete quota for the Winter Olympics to around 3,500, reverse athlete quota cuts and add some new non-traditional sports (especially ice climbing, cross country running, cyclocross and snow volleyball) to add appeal for more non-traditional winter sports countries.
• Obviously, lets also expand the program for the Winter Olympics to include things like freeride, rail jam and a team moguls event :D

 

And the big one:

• Create a "mind and skill sport" Olympic games, name still a work in progress. Would be a home for stuff like e-sports, chess, go, bowling, cue sports, perhaps even motorsports.

I agree with having it 3 weeks, but I’m not sure that I would like having each week split apart to dedicated sports. I quite like having the ability to flip between different sports as it makes it feel more like a singular event compared to back to back championships.

Scrap semifinals in swimming, at least for the 200s

Reform the European Games into an event like the Asian or Panamerican games. Encourage the best athletes to attend with proper TV broadcasting.

Scrap the club world cup and revert the champions league to original format.

Less events in F1 or at least plan them so the travel schedule is not ridiculous.

Revert the changes to modern pentathlon, and reintroduce lightweight classes into rowing.

Remove umpires call in cricket.

Banish breaking to the shadow realm.

35 minutes ago, Jur said:

A "high profile" journalist in Spain is proclaiming that Doha  is already decided as the host of the 2036 olympics

 

 

I hope not, although it did always feel inevitable. If you ignore all of the sports washing arguments it still seems like a stupid idea. When would it be held?, hosting it in the winter would completely mess up the global sporting calendar. There have been quite a few major sporting events held there (excluding the world cup), recently, many which have been pretty flawed.

2019 athletics worlds - Held in October with almost empty crowds, many big names skipped due to timings. The marathon was held at midnight, and was just 7 laps of a track which involved running up and down a singular crowd with no athletes in sight.

2016 road cycling worlds - The mens race was 250km, of which 150km was in the desert, not exactly gripping viewing. In my opinion, a cycle course needs to be created to allow the riders to initiate an exciting race, which is obviously hard to do in a desert.

2 hours ago, Dragon said:

OK, that's interesting. Not been picked for the individual event so far

Surely she will swim based on that trajectory. I went to watch the session yesterday and she was impressive PBing in the 200m so I expected it slightly, but not a 0.7 drop which would take her into finals contention. Surely she wouldn’t be tapered so that looks really exciting. 

3 hours ago, Epic Failure said:

Most of the teams have not yet been announced because of the Q deadline and with the proximity to the Olympics impacting which athletes are interested in the Euros.

 

The team is due to be announced on Tuesday I believe.

Lots of athletes have stated they are going, and there are plenty of articles on the European athletics website. Off the top of my head I remember articles about Hughes and Hodgkinson.

15 hours ago, rajiv said:

This topic makes me realise that reducing the national  umbers in swimming events from three to two reduces the number of medals that USA and Australia would win.

I think Australia has only had sweeps in swimming but this can  no longer happen (say in the W 100m free )

 

I see that some sports can have 4 entrants from a country. Indeed this is the norm (?)in the Winter Games.

The cynic in me says that this is just so countries of the Global North can have more medals ie more entrants =more medal chances

 

More entrants are needed in the winter games as the global depth is way weaker, in the same way that 3 athletes per nation are allowed in Paralympic swimming

For GB my best guess would be womens triathlon or equestrian eventing. In athletics we could certainly sweep a few events at European level but there aren’t really any at a world level, maybe men’s 1500m but thats a highly unlikely..

@Nish

2 minutes ago, Josh said:

I don’t think so. They said “Clareburt 2 and 1x Fairweather each”

Who's right?

1 minute ago, Josh said:

They said Clareburt 2, so I’m assuming they’re projecting two medals for him..

 

That’s fine, hopefully you’ll be proven wrong though 

I think it's 2 total, 1 Fairweather and 1 Clareburt.

2 minutes ago, intoronto said:

Mcintosh was not tapered for trials

Well she broke the 400m IM WR so she must have tapered somewhat, and she was definitely tapered for Fukuoka.

5 minutes ago, Josh said:

It’s not impossible, but Fairweather likely won’t be on the podium in the women’s 400m freestyle with Ledecky, McIntosh and Titmus. Same for Clareburt in the men’s 200m individual medley, with two Brits, Marchand, Shun, whoever qualifies for United States, and Knox all favored over him.
 

McCartney in women’s pole vault also seems unlikely, she lacks the consistency to be one of the favourites. Caudery, Moon, Morris, Sutej, Kennedy, Murto, and maybe Newman are all over her. 

I would assume the medal for Clareburt would be 400m IM not 200m IM. 

I'm going to gamble here and say McIntosh doesn't medal in the 400m free (sorry), and so Fairweather would be the likely beneficiary. The past two "taper meets" Fukuoka and the trials, she hasn't really performed that well, whereas she has improved in all of the others.

When are the semifinals?

God those American commentators are infuriating. If this is what watching sports in the US is like all the time I don't think I could cope.

9 minutes ago, Rafa Maciel said:

Any significance in the colour coding?

Changes since Tokyo

4 minutes ago, LDOG said:

This is incredibly optimistic. Like, basically everyone performing to their best 

I tried hard not be be but I guess its difficult not to, just out of interest, where would you say I’m being too hopeful?

I'll give a GB prediction a go, although I'm sure there will be some subconscious bias in there.

Artistic Swimming - 1 medal - Kate Shortman and Izzy Thorpe have really impressed me this year, and I think they could win a medal in the duet. Obviously artistic swimming isn't really my specialist subject, and it's difficult to compare due to the changing scoring systems, but I think they could earn bronze or maybe even silver.

Diving - 1 gold, 5 medals - I think GB can medal in all 4 of the synchros (W 3m most unlikely), and there are a few individual medal chances. We always manage to sneak a gold and I'm hopeful, but not confident, it could happen again.

Swimming - 3 Gold, 9 Medals - This is an event will plenty of medal chances but few nailed on golds. I think both mens Freestyle relays can win and I think another Gold can come from. Men's 100m Breast,50m Free, 200m Free and 200m IM. Other medal chances include Men's Medley, 100m Back, 400m IM, Women's 400m IM and 4x200m Free.

Archery - 1 medal - The women's recurve team have been unlucky so far in terms of qualification, but I think they are up there for a medal if both Bryony or Penny are on form.

Athletics - 2 Golds, 10 medals - This sport is in a similar situation to swimming, where we could potentially medal in all track events from 100m - 1500m for both genders, as well as all 5 relays, but similarly come away with a Tokyo sized haul. The contending field events include high jump, pole vault and heptathlon.

Boxing - 2 Golds, 4 medals - Again, not really my expertise but I think we may perform slightly worse than Tokyo.

Canoe Slalom - 3 Golds, 5 medals - The squad is extremely strong but things can very quickly go wrong in this sport. After missing Tokyo I think Joe Clarke will have the fire in his belly to get 2 golds in Kayak, and I think Kimberly can win the extreme event.

BMX freestyle - 2 medals - I think the battle for Gold in the mens event will be between Reilly and Martin. Worthington has not really impressed me in this Olympic cycle, but she may pull something Tokyo-esque out of the bag.

BMX racing - 1 Gold, 2 medals -  doing the test event double does give my confidence and I think the team will replicate the Tokyo results.

Mountain Biking - 1 Gold, 2 medals - Pidcock has to be up there in the Men's event and I think Evie Richards can translate her short track form into a medal.

Road Cycling - 1 medal - Josh Tarling in the time trial, and potentially even more in an unpredictable road race.

Track Cycling - 5 Golds, 6 medals - The growth of the women's sprint squad had been offset by the decline of the men's but I think we will still see more success than Tokyo.

Equestrian - 3 golds, 6 medals - Not really my expertise but I think 3 golds is possible. 

Field Hockey - 2 medals - Both teams should be up there, but I give stronger chances to the men.

Gymnastics - 3 golds, 5 medals - The men's team has grown but the women's is in tatters. I predict GB golds in Men's PH, Vault and Women's Trampoline

Judo - 1 medal - Chelsie Giles should medal, but Lucy Renshall is just too inconsistent to be a medal contender.

Modern Pentathlon - 1 Gold, 2 medals - Joe can defend his title and Bryson should be in the conversation for the women's

Rowing - 6 golds, 7 medals - Reborn after the disaster of Tokyo, British rowing have strong chances to retain all 2023 world titles and add the mens Pair.

Sailing - 3 Golds, 5 Medals - Again very difficult to predict but having qualified all 10 boats again, I think we can match Tokyo

Shooting - 2 golds, 4 medals - It all really depends on wether Llewellyn qualifies, but I think we are contenders in all 5 shotgun events, and 2 women's rifle events.

Skateboarding - 1 Gold, 1 Medal - Sky focusing just on one sport should be enough to win olympic gold.

Sport Climbing - 1 Medal - Toby Roberts is definitely a gold contender in the Combined.

Taekwondo - 2 Gold, 4 medals - All 4 athletes should contend for gold and I would hope at least 2 of them get there.

Triathlon - 2 Gold , 3 medals - The women's team is insanely strong, and I think Yee can go one step further than Tokyo. The mixed relay worries me as we don't have a strong 2nd male athlete.

Weightlifting - 1 medal -  Emily Campbell is up there for 2nd behind the Chinese athlete.

Just counted them up and that makes 40 golds and 90 medals, so maybe my subconscious bias was pretty strong.

Nonetheless, I would expect an improvement on Tokyo to 30ish golds and 70 medals.

1 hour ago, dantm said:

The Womens 50m Free evens out with the Mens 50m Free

Both Sjostrom and McEvoy will need to be well below their best to. lose

The Medley Relay is countered by the Womens 4 x200M Free relay

and ZSC evens out with Sam Short in both the 400m/800m especially without the Tunisian.

I wouldnt write off the Womens medley anyway.

The key is Breastroke and we only need one of our main swimmers to be sub 1.06 

Hodges and Strauch have been there and there are other options including Kaylee especially if MOC swims a Sub 58 back.

Disagree with the McEvoy point, he could easily drop 0.1-0.2 off his best and he may very well not win, and I don’t think you can argue that’s well off his best.

11 minutes ago, Epic Failure said:

Surprised that nobody has mentioned it yet but the performance of the weekend (so far) from a GB runner has come over in the sunny climes of....Belfast.

 

At the Belfast Irish Milers Meet, Phoebe Gill ran the 800m in 1:57.86.

 

Phoebe only turned 17 last month.

 

Assuming the clock etc are accurate, it's hard to overstate how amazing that performance is. To put it in context, it's the second fastest U18 ever, behind only a very suspect Chinese athlete from the 90s. It's the second fastest European U20, behind only Keely. And Phoebe has several years more eligibility in that category. It's quicker than Mary Moraa won the Doha DL yesterday.

 

Obviously, goes without saying that it is an Olympic Q time.

 

Phoebe has been on the radar for potentially being one of the future stars of GB athletics for a while, but I don't think anyone expected her to achieve a time like this quite so quickly. I was hoping that she could drop below 2m this year. That would have been a perfectly good improvement!

 

Race is at the 4h 06m mark:

 

-

Astonishing.

Very impressive and certainly one for the future, potentially even Paris, who knows.

Here's an AW article : https://athleticsweekly.com/athletics-news/phoebe-gill-sets-stunning-european-u18-800m-record-1039985776/

Noticed there is no women's team for the European qualifiers starting soon. Hoping it's a mistake but does seem strange.

21 minutes ago, Rafa Maciel said:

Halfway through the comp and the Brits have had clean routines. 41.566 for uneven bars - including a 14.500 for Beckie Downie. That's a full point more than their 2022 World's score and just under 2 points more than they scored in Antwerp. 

 

Currently the team are sitting on 83.432 and are running about 3 points higher than their score from last year but about 1.2 points less than they scored in Liverpool. 

Crisis, what crisis 😅