Dennis

Oh oh. Disaster result for Van Zundert. Dutch NOC is probably already cancelling her visa.

Kimberley Bos is now the European Champion and the winner of the World Cup 2021-2022. Did not see that one coming before the start of the season 

Removing the best event in the winter Olympics (the men’s and women’s relays in short track) should not even be discussed :P
 
Ski jumping and nordic combined can probably be cut to four by country, but that’s a bit of a cut on paper only since big countries will still bring an alternate anyway.
 
Edit: we can fix all the gender equality issues (including doing things like adding four women in bobsleigh and having 12 women hockey teams w/ 25 players) while slightly increasing the athlete quota in sports like speed skating and figure skating while keeping the athlete quota under 3200. The IOC's insistence on keeping it to 2900 is sort of an issue at this point.

I should mention for full disclosure that the list on Wikipedia is of my doing :P

No, nobody seems to understand. The lists we posted here and what was posted on Wikipedia was all in line with each other. Yet, the ISU interpreted the rules in such a way that nobody but the ISU understands how the list was compiled.

Kind of wild that the three Americans who have a real chance at winning an individual gold medal in Beijing (Jackson, Bowe and Mantia) all come from Ocala, Florida, population 60k.

US Speed Skating Olympic Team
 
Men:
Ethan Cepuran Casey Dawson Austin Kleba Emery Lehman Joey Mantia Jordan Stolz Ian Quinn  
Women:
Giorgia Birkeland Brittany Bowe Kimi Goetz Erin Jackson Mia Manganello-Kilburg  
Breakdown by home state (for fun):
4 skaters: Florida
3 skaters: Illinois
1 skater: Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey, Utah, Wisconsin

So this just happened..
 
 

Rather boring European Championships this weekend held in  Heerenveen. The last international test for most European athletes before the Games.
 
A lot of Russians were in quarantine leading up to the tournament as the their team manager, sprint coach, and Olga Fatkulina (reigning European Champion 500m) were all tested positive soon after arrival in the Netherlands at the start of this week. Therefore the whole Russian team had to stay in their hotel rooms for 5 days, and even missed the first day of the event. Other Russians, including most elite male sprinters had decided last week to stay in Russia. 
 
 Nils van der Poel had already decided not to compete.
 
Medals:
 
Event Gold Silver Bronze Men's 500m  Piotr Michalski (34.60)  Merijn Scheperkamp (34.61)  Dai Dai N'tab (34.76) Men's 1.000m  Thomas Krol (1:07.77)  Kjeld Nuis (1:07.86)
 Kai Verbij (1:07.94) Men's 1.500m  Kjeld Nuis (1:43.60)  Thomas Krol (1:43.91)  Allan Dahl Johansson (1:44.16) Men's 5.000m  Patrick Roest (6:11.54)  Jorrit Bergsma (6:13.47)  Hallgeir Engebråten (6:13.67) Men's Team Pursuit  Bosker, Kramer & Roest (3:37.97)  Engebråten, Johansson & Pedersen (3:38.92)  Ghiotto, Giovannini & Malfatti (3:43.41) Men's Team Sprint  Scheperkamp, Snel & Verbij (1:19.71)  Lorentzen, Magnussen & Rukke (1:19.83)  Kania, Michalski & Zurek (1:20.54) Men's Mass Start  Bart Swings  Livio Wenger  Ruslan Zakharov Women's 500m  Femke Kok (37.32)  Angelina Golikova (37.43)  Daria Kachanova (37.58) Women's 1.000m  Jutta Leerdam (1:13.60)  Femke Kok (1:14.80)  Daria Kachanova (1:14.94) Women's 1.500m  Antoinette de Jong (1:53.81)  Ireen Wüst (1:54.08)  Francesca Lollobrigida (1:54.50) Women's 3.000m  Irene Schouten (3:56.62)  Antoinette de Jong (3:59.79)  Francesca Lollobrigida (4:00.61) Women's Team Pursuit  De Jong, Schouten & Wüst (2:54.12)  Bøhm, Haugen & Wiklund (2:58.54)  Golubeva, Lalenkova & Voronina (2:59.32) Women''s Team Sprint  Bosiek, Wójcik & Ziomek (1:27.26)  Nifantava, Sloeva & Varabyova (1:31.18)  Farstad, Ripsrud & Samsonsen (1:31.43) Women's Mass Start  Irene Schouten  Marijke Groenewoud  Elizaveta Golubeva Only 8 countries won a medal, a record low.

Liensberger and Goggia out of 2nd round
 
In other hand Jelinková very likely in !

World number 1 in the women's 500m Erin Jackson is OUT of the Olympics after finishing third at US Olympic trials!
 
Same top two as in the 1000m, Brittany Bowe first and Kimi Goetz second.

Olympic Trials, day 2 (1000m)
 
Both track records were broken today.
 
On the men's side, 17 year old Jordan Stolz destroyed the field with a 1:07.62, which is a top 10 low land time this season. He is officially qualified for the Olympics. Joey Mantia skated 1:09.00 for second place and a likely spot at the Olympics.
 
On the women's side, Brittany Bowe skated 1:13.63 to guarantee herself a spot on the Olympic team. Kimi Goetz, who was a favourite to make the 2018 short track team before suffering an injury, finished second and will likely make the team.

Holy smokes, Stolz. The kid is utterly insane
 
Didn't they accidentally let him skate in SLC?

Kramer and Bosker in. Ntab and Snel out.
 
Bosker will skate the team pursuit and 1.500m. Kramer will skate the team pursuit, mass start (!) and 5k. Krol will replace Ntab and will therefore skate the 500, 1.000 and 1.500m. 

Kramer and Bosker in. Ntab and Snel out.
 
Bosker will skate the team pursuit and 1.500m. Kramer will skate the team pursuit, mass start (!) and 5k. Krol will replace Ntab and will therefore skate the 500, 1.000 and 1.500m. 

Team  
 
Men:
 
500m: Tatsuya Shinhama, Wataru Morishige, Yuma Murakami 1.000m: Tatsuya Shinmaha, Wataru Morishige, Ryota Kojima 1.500m: Seitaro Ichinohe, Takura Oda, Ryota Kojima* 5.000m: Seitaro Ichinohe** 10.000m: Ryosuke Tsuchiya Mass Start: Seitaro Ichinohe (Ryosuke Tsuchiya is a reserve)  
* got disqualified during the trials, but made it over Taro Kondo as Japan only has 7 quota on the men's side.
** Japan has two quota on the men's 5.000m. Unsure who will be the second skater or if they're going to give back the quota
 
Yamato Matsui is the #7 in the World Cup standings over 500m, but he misses out, because Japan has selected #2 (Morishige), #3 (Shinhama) and #4 (Murakami) based on the results in the Japanese trials. The best Japanese skater in the 1.000m World Cup standings (#8), Masaya Yamada, finished in 5th place, and therefore misses out on a spot in team Japan. Most notable skaters missing out include Taro Kondo, Takuya Morimoto, Shane Williamson and Masahito Obayashi.
 
Women:
 
500m: Nao Kodaira*, Miho Takagi, Arisa Go 1.000m: Nao Kodaira, Miho Takagi 1.500m: Miho Tagaki, Nana Takagi, Ayano Sato** 3.000m: Miho Takagi, Ayano Sato 5.000m: Misaki Oshigiri, Momoka Horikawa*** Mass Start: Nana Takagi, Rin Kosaka Team Pursuit: Miho Takagi, Ayano Sato, Nana Takagi, Misaki Oshigiri  
* did not compete in the 500m at the trials, was probably pre-qualified
** Nao Kodaira finished in third place in the trials, 0.62 in front of Sato, but Sato got selected.
*** 18-year old, still a junior this season and next season
 
All the top athletes are there, with Horikawa being the biggest "surprise". Miho Takagi skates 5 distances. She also won Japan a quota on the 5.000m, but decided not to enter the trials on this distance. 
 
Source: https://www.skatingjapan.or.jp/common/img/info/2022OWGDelegation211231.pdf

Condolences to the Czech Biathlon Community.

(Preliminary) Team
 
Men:
 
Peder Kongshaug Håvard Holmefjord Lorentzen Bjørn Magnussen Sverre Lunde Pedersen Kristian Gamme Ulekleiv Allan Dahl Johansson Hallgeir Engebråten  
Women:
 
Marit Fjellanger Bøhm Sofie Karoline Haugen  Ragne Wiklund  
Still 5 (!) quota places on the women's side which have not been used yet. Norway has won 2 quota on the women's 500m, but this list does not include any 500m skaters. I'm not sure if they'll use the quota as both Samsonsen and Ripsrud only barely qualified based on their season's best time and probably won't make top 20 in Beijing, whereas on the men's side all skaters selected have top 10 potential. Bøhm competed during the World Cups but did not even get close to a quota, so she's probably selected for the team pursuit. Not sure if she'll compete in an individual distance.  
Source: https://www.teamnor.no/nyheter/2021/47-utovere-tatt-ut-i-forste-uttak-til-ol-i-beijing/

Team  
 
Men:
 
500m: Tatsuya Shinhama, Wataru Morishige, Yuma Murakami 1.000m: Tatsuya Shinmaha, Wataru Morishige, Ryota Kojima 1.500m: Seitaro Ichinohe, Takura Oda, Ryota Kojima* 5.000m: Seitaro Ichinohe** 10.000m: Ryosuke Tsuchiya Mass Start: Seitaro Ichinohe (Ryosuke Tsuchiya is a reserve)  
* got disqualified during the trials, but made it over Taro Kondo as Japan only has 7 quota on the men's side.
** Japan has two quota on the men's 5.000m. Unsure who will be the second skater or if they're going to give back the quota
 
Yamato Matsui is the #7 in the World Cup standings over 500m, but he misses out, because Japan has selected #2 (Morishige), #3 (Shinhama) and #4 (Murakami) based on the results in the Japanese trials. The best Japanese skater in the 1.000m World Cup standings (#8), Masaya Yamada, finished in 5th place, and therefore misses out on a spot in team Japan. Most notable skaters missing out include Taro Kondo, Takuya Morimoto, Shane Williamson and Masahito Obayashi.
 
Women:
 
500m: Nao Kodaira*, Miho Takagi, Arisa Go 1.000m: Nao Kodaira, Miho Takagi 1.500m: Miho Tagaki, Nana Takagi, Ayano Sato** 3.000m: Miho Takagi, Ayano Sato 5.000m: Misaki Oshigiri, Momoka Horikawa*** Mass Start: Nana Takagi, Rin Kosaka Team Pursuit: Miho Takagi, Ayano Sato, Nana Takagi, Misaki Oshigiri  
* did not compete in the 500m at the trials, was probably pre-qualified
** Nao Kodaira finished in third place in the trials, 0.62 in front of Sato, but Sato got selected.
*** 18-year old, still a junior this season and next season
 
All the top athletes are there, with Horikawa being the biggest "surprise". Miho Takagi skates 5 distances. She also won Japan a quota on the 5.000m, but decided not to enter the trials on this distance. 
 
Source: https://www.skatingjapan.or.jp/common/img/info/2022OWGDelegation211231.pdf

"Last pair of the day. Ten kilometers. You're the only one left who can qualify for the Olympics. Half the field has withdrawn and the stadium has emptied. You've got to go faster than 13:06.71 (national federation criteria). The fastest time ever posted by a Japanese skater in Japan is 13:14 minutes. Ryosuke Tsuchiya: 13:06.17!"
 
Just, wow  
 
Phenomenal ride.
 
 

There is nothing more exciting in speed skating than what happened in pair 5: a drag race to the line to win the pair, along with a close race with the clock. One of the best speed skating race I’ve seen.

Would be a surprise as the short track relay final will be on the same day, with the relay final being right before the 500m.