Rafa Maciel

You are absolutely right - has major issues with team sports. A lot of that is historical and down to the home nations structure and the funding mentality that if you're not winning on the international stage then there is no reason to support the sport. I think UK Sport have begun to realise that there a funding problem so they announced and additional 2.4mln in funding for 8 team sports and we are perhaps beginning to see the green shoots off the back of that funding. Handball - Given how popular this was at London 2012 in the Copper Box arena, it was surprising that the federation wasn't able to capitalise more. As it is, we at least seem to have the structures in place to support the sport with age-group squads in place and the senior men are in the fight to take part in the 2026 European Championships. Beach Volleyball - The Bello brothers are a class team and can cut it on the international stage. The problem with them is that they lack consistency and haven't been able to make the breakthrough on to the main circuit. They are still in with a chance of qualifying for Paris but it would be through the continental championship pathway. Volleyball - Not sure we actually even have a team at this stage. This is a sport where the home nations are still maintaining their independence so this may be impacting the development of the sport. Basketball - Is actually in a pretty good place all things considered. It is beyond frustrating that the women threw away a great chance to qualify for Paris - I just hope that it doesn't lead to reduced financial support. By not taking up the place in the OQT the federation aren't exactly showing a great amount of respect or confidence in the men's squad. 3x3 Basketball - Absolutely agree this should be an area of focus. You would think there would be a fairly deep talent pool available if only they went looking for it. Water Polo - They seem to have made good use of their additional funding - particularly on the women's side where they have qualified for European Champs for the first time in 10 years. If they can continue to make solid progress it is not beyond possibility that we could see them at an Olympics in near future. If I was going to single out a sport that is screaming out for development it would probably be sprint canoe - we're world leaders in the Paralympic events but can't replicate that success in the Olympic events. One of the things that we don't seem to be doing as well now is promoting talent identification programmes. In the run up to London, the various GB federations seemed to make coordinated and well publicised efforts to find new blood for their sports but schemes like "Sporting Giants" seem to have fallen by the wayside.

Not impossible but unlikely - a 400 point swing at this stage of the season is difficult to see, but if it is going to happen then the journey starts today: Coppa Bernocchi - Rafal Majka takes on Henok Mulubrhan and Natnael Tesfatzion. As a ProSeries event, there are 200 points available for the win but at a minimum, Majka needs a top 8 finish and has to finish ahead of both Eritreans. That would net him 50 points. 3-Oct: Tre Valli Varesine - Rafal Majka is again scheduled to take part and at least on the preliminary entry list, there are no riders from or . Again, it is a ProSeries event so 200 for the win so Majka needs top 8 finish. 3-Oct: Binche-Chimay-Binche- No ranking riders from taking part so it will be down to the performance of Biniam Girmay to determine the impact. As a Class 1 event, there are 125 points available for the win. If Girmay gets a top 4 finish and Majka hasn't scored in his 2 races, it becomes very difficult for Poland to overtake. Ultimately, the race is going to come down to the level of activity from the ranking riders and at the moment, there doesn't seem to be a huge amount scheduled for although the start lists for some of the events are incomplete. So their best chance of moving up the ranking comes at Il Lombardia - a top 5 finish from Kwiatowski and suddenly things look a lot brighter for Poland.

finish qualification with a score of 166.130. That is just over 1.5 points higher than they achieved in Liverpool and 1.7 points higher than they managed at this year's Europeans. Pretty much all of the gains can be traced to improved scores on Balance Beam. In terms of the individual athletes, Jessica Gadirova is currently sitting in 3rd place in the All-Around with 56.932. That is over 2 points higher than she scored last year and is higher than the score she achieved when crowned European Champion earlier this year. Again, she posted a big gain on balance beam but she scored higher across all 4 apparatus. She is pretty much nailed on to qualify for individual all-around final with good chance she will be in the final group. Her 14.400 on Floor should see her into the apparatus final as should her 14.416 on vault. With a 14.000 on balance beam she should also have a chance there but it is worth saying that the scores this year seem to be running higher than Liverpool. I am not expecting any of the other gymnasts to qualify for individual finals although Alice Kinsella should be in the individual all-around despite having a fall on beam. She may also have outside chance of making the floor final - her score of 13.633 would have been enough last year - but I think she is likely to come up just short this time. Ondine Achampong and Georgia-Mae Fenton were both solid enough whilst Ruby Evans will probably be a bit disappointed with how things went - she was solid enough on floor, but had a fall on vault. Overall, I think the team will be happy with how things went - there were no major mistakes and they will be very much in contention for a medal on Wednesday but it is difficult to see how they can catch USA unless something goes seriously wrong.

The end of the season is fast approaching: Men's Events CRO Race 1.) Orluis Alberto Aular Sanabria 2.) Alexander Kristoff 3.) Ethan Hayter Tour of Istanbul 1.) Gustav Wang 2.) Gianni Marchand 3.) Nicolas Vinokurov Tour de Langkawi 1.) Simon Carr 2.) Jefferson Cepeda Ortiz 3.) Pablo Castrillo Zapater Giro dell'Emilia 1.) Primoz Roglic 2.) Tadej Pogacar 3.) Simon Yates will net 165 points from the performances of the Yates brothers - and this, coupled with results elsewhere leads me to think there is a good chance that GB will overtake in the next UCI rankings release but it is likely to be close. Coppa Agostoni - Giro Delle Brianze 1.) Davide Formolo 2.) Marc Hirschi 3.) Victor Lafay Circuit Franco-Belge 1.) Arnaud De Lie 2.) Rasmus Tiller 3.) Corbin Strong Tour de Vendee 1.) Arnaud Demare 2.) Paul Penhoet 3.) Sandy Dujardin Lotto Famenne Ardenne Classic 1.) Arnaud De Lie 2.) Kaden Groves 3.) Florian Senechal Women's Events Giro dell'Emilia Internazionale Donne Elite 1.) Cecilie Ludwig 2.) Marta Cavalli 3.) Juliette Labous There are a handful of races over the next couple of weeks for the men's tour with the last big race of the season being Il Lombardia next weekend. I think this event may have been upgraded this year as the ranking points have increased compared to last year - there are now 800 ranking points for the winner so it could have significant impact on the final rankings. On the other hand, the women's tour is pretty much done and dusted with just 3 1-day races to go and the Tour of Guangxi so I am not expecting any dramatic shifts in the rankings as France would need to net 500 points to overtake GB.

Snowshoe World Cup Men's Olympic Cross Country 1.) Jordan Sarrou 2.) Nino Schurter 3.) Marcel Guerrini Women's Olympic Cross Country 1.) Laura Stigger 2.) Loana Lecomte 3.) Marta Berta

I don't make any judgement on Russian athletes primarily because I don't have benchmarks for their performance this year - I've collated the 2023 results for over 500 gymnasts but none of them were Russian

I'm not sure that they are going to need to score that highly - most of the big scoring vaulters are already qualified through the team event or as All-Around so it may only need high 13s to get the spot. Looking at this year's World Cup/World Challenge Cup results then the following names would be in the frame: Shek Wai Hung - Made the final in 3 out of 4 World Cup events and won 2 bronze medals. Mahdi Olfati - Made the final in 3 World Cup events and secured silver in Cottbus. Dominick Cunningham - Made the final in Cairo but can be a little hit-and-miss. Generally pretty consistently in upper 13s which may be enough to qualify. Andrey Medvedev - 2 finals in World Cup events and generally hitting low 14s. Tseng Wesi-Sheng - 2 finals at world cup this year and consistently around 14. There's a further group who could be wildcards based on their 2023 performances but they haven't competed as often at WC events: Ondrej Kalny Auriel Benovic Audrys Nin Reyes and Jabiel Polanco Trinh Hai Khang Abdulaziz Mirvaliev

Individual Finals: Floor: Harry Hepworth Pommel: Max Whitlock Rings: Harry Hepworth (Courtney Tulloch is 1st reserve) Vault: Harry Hepworth & Jake Jarman Marginal improvement on last year when we had 4 individual finalists. I wonder if Hepworth may be encouraged to not take part in the rings final and give his space to Tulloch.

yeah - keep getting distracted by Ryder Cup

I think Yulo's quota will be allocated through Floor because it is schedule to be completed on the Saturday whereas the P-Bars final isn't until the Sunday. If that is the case, Muntean can't get P-Bar quota as he has an All-Around quota already (You have last quota going to whereas I think it goes to ), so I think that would mean the quota would go to Belgium's Kauvita.

My initial take on the state of quotas after the completion of qualifying. Criteria 1 Qualifiers: Criteria 2 Qualifiers: Criteria 3 Qualifiers: (1 Individual All-Around) Criteria 4 Qualifiers: (Named Quotas) Milad Karimi Artem Dolgopyat Artur Davtyan Krisztofer Meszaros Lee Junho Diogo Soares Luka Van Den Keybus Andrei Vasile Muntean Criteria 5 Qualifiers: (Named Quotas) Floor: Edriel Carlos Yulo Pommel Horse: Rhys McClenaghan OR Ahmad Abu Al Soud OR Lee Chiah Kai OR Harutyun Merdinyan Rings: Eleftherios Petrounias OR Nikita Simonov OR Vincenz Hoeck OR Artur Avetisyan OR Vahagn Davtyan Vault: Kevin Penev P-Bars: Noah Kauvita Horizontal Bar: Tin Srbic OR Arthur Mariano

round out the team quotas after came up short on the floor.

Third rotation done for France - their hopes took a bit of knock as Saladino gave off the P-Bars so his score was down 1.5 points. Overall they move to 123.698 so they are 2 points down on Euros. It's not going to be easy to make up the difference.

Vault was up on previous scores. Currently running 0.7 behind 2023 Euros. So they will need to find about 3.5-4 points across their remaining apparatus.

Yes - my post is poorly worded. Those are the athletes in qualifying position, but the quotas go to the NOC rather than the specific athlete.

not got the best rotation schedule. They are going to finish on pommel which unless you're Max Whitlock, nobody really enjoys They're safely through rings but they may be a bit disappointed by their score of 39.533 - down about 0.6 on last year and down 1 point on their European score. The team get good result on vault with 42.599 outscoring their European result by just under 0.3 After 2 rotations they are running around 0.7 behind their European score. The important rotations are going to be horizontal bar and pommel.

Current Individual All-Around Quotas under Criteria 4 of qualification pathway: Artur Davtyan Casimir Schmidt Ilia Liubimov - Not 100% sure about this one as ISR in line to qualify under criteria 3 but that does not seem to be excluded in the document. Diogo Soares Luka Van Den Keybus Andrei Vasile Muntean Khabibullo Ergashev Ivan Tikhonov

3 individual all-around quotas should be known today - from the best teams that didn't secure team quota. On checking - the quotas under criteria 4 will also be known today - 8 men and 14 women for individual all around based on their qualifying scores.

As we move into the final subdivision, are currently in the hot seat from Olympic quota perspective so their score of 245.295 becomes the benchmark to secure the 9th quota. Competing in SD6 are and Personally, I would be very surprised if don't qualify with room to spare - in fact would be surprised if they failed to make the team final. Assuming they do then the new benchmark would become on 245.461. scored 244.093 points in qualifying in 2022 so it could go either way for them but they should be able to do it. I am rooting for to qualify - if only because I have been working on assumption that they are already qualified as host . To do that they are going to need a score north of 246.028. That is 6 points higher than they scored in 2022 World Champs but only 3 points higher than they scored at this year's Europeans so it is definitely achievable. If that was the case, then I think that Milad Karimi, Artem Dolgopyat and Illia Kovtun would currently qualify as the individual all around athletes under Criteria 3 of qualification pathway.

After Sub-Division 5, there's no change in the top 3 - , & best result from the teams competing this morning - taking 4th place with score of 249.26. That's about 7 points higher than their 2022 score and 8 points higher than their 2022 Commonwealth Games score. This books their place in the team final and gives them a team quota for Paris. started well but had relatively poor pommel and rings scores. They are currently in 6th place with score of 248.192. That's enough to take them to the Olympics and will probably be enough to get the to the team final. and acquitted themselves well but ultimately couldn't keep up with the pace of the other teams.

not qualified yet - finished ahead of them and are qualified for final.

and joins in securing quotas for Paris

Cycling Policy Document: Paris_2024_Olympic_Games_Selection_Policy.pdf (britishcycling.org.uk) Key Points: Athletes who are interested in being on the squad need to submit expression of interest. Decisions will be made by selection panel taking into account recommendations of coaches and relevant international performances. Panel can take into account riders "commitment to the team" and co-operation "with planned team training sessions." Panel can give preference to those riders who will be able to double up. The policy is pretty light on detail and objective performance metrics. Instead, it seems to give a lot of power to coaches and a closed-door selection panel. I'd like to assume that more information has been shared with the athletes. That being said, I don't think the selection for cycling squad is going to prove controversial - there will be interesting discussion about the road team but there are a strong group of riders who will likely be selected. The most challenging selection decisions likely to be around the 2nd line riders for men's and women's mountain biking and men's BMX racing where there are at least a couple of contenders.

Apologies - yes there are 8 more to come. I keep forgetting that France don't get automatic host quota.

and secure quotas for Paris 2024.