NearPup

Not really news, been public for more than a month at this point. Personally I am deeply uninpressed by the event package. A six team tournament for baseball/softball is ridiculous, and it still annoy me that they are including a sport where the men's and women's events are fundamentally different sport. Plus no MLB players should continue to he a dealbreaker for baseball. For Karate I find that Kumite is very viewer unfriendly and boring. Kata is at least different but the judging is... old fashioned. Rife for accusations of favouratism. Skateboarding might normally be a good addition but the IOC is dealing with three conpeting IFs with little legitimacy and who don't appear to be willing to cooperate. The combined format for climbing isn't the traditional format. Surfing is hard to hold in many places and, frankly, not that TV friendly.

You got to admite the commitment to cheating.

Really sad Australia didn't win, it was the standout song for me.

The whole thing is so silly. T&T can either send Dick or nobody. By the time it became a big scandal it was too late to change anything.

Those seem like insane selection criteria o.o

Believe it or not something similar happened at the 2012 Olympics. Li Xueying, winner of the women's 58kg, lifted 246kg while Maiya Maneza, winner of the women's 63kg, lifted 245kg. The 63kg class in London was fairly weak in general.

They don't take team sports into account when deciding if a country is eligible for tripartite spots. If they did Honduras wouldn't be eligible for them since they qualified in Football the last three Olympics.

She is ranked around the top 500 right now. I believe she's trying to recover from injury problems. At her age (28) it's hard to see her back in the top 50 unfortunately.

Gabriela Dabrowski? Her father is from Poland and she speaks Polish (along with English and French) but she was born and raised in Canada.

Quite a few Canadian athletes have dual citizenship or where born abroad and presumably could compete for another country, for example Cynthia Meyer, Santo Condoreli, Michel Li, Ashton Baumann, Shawn Barber and Michelle Williams could all conceivably compete for another country. Of the current Olympians on Canada's team only one was potentially naturalized early (Eugene Wang), ahead of the London games. But outside of pairs skating (where it is sometimes necessary to change country in order to find a good partner) there's little example of people that don't already have Canadian citizenship (like Ted-Jan Bloemen) moving to Canada specifically to compete. Usually when athletes from abroad move to Canada it's for personal reasons. There is also the fun country-example of Taylor Ruck, who has barely lived in Canada and could trivially become a naturalized American but has chosen not to do so.

I don't really buy that less nations will take part in Freestyle Skiing. Not all quotas where allocated in Sochi (there where eight quotas nobody wanted / could accept) and only three countries hit the 26 athletes limit. Hopefully by increasing the limit to 30 all quotas will actually be distributed. Plus, honestly, it created some really silly situations in countries like Canada where ski cross athletes would compete against aerials athletes for the same quota. That problem won't go away (both Canada and the US where over 30 in Sochi) but it will relieve a bit of pressure. The other big change in Ski Jumping is that the maximum size of a men's team is now 4, down from 5. So there is no longer any way to bring someone just for the normal hill or the big hill competition. Edit: I love how the solution to the Netherlands sweeping the 10k was "oh, lets just allow two athletes by NOC!"

If he makes it to the top 200 he should get an ITF place for the Olympics (assuming there aren't four Argentine qualified already).

Such a shame she doesn't get to have her swan song at the Olympics thanks to that stupid team event rotation rule.

No. The FIG Executive Board can chose to invite the best athlete from each non-qualified continent.

Romania only has one spot in the women's event. They also have two male gymnasts, one slot reserved to Marian Drăgulescu and one slot they can allocate to anybody.

Looks like "Belorussian" Kylie Dickson qualified for Rio. Kind of baffling that Belarus wouldn't have preferred to send one of their own gymnast.

Arguably men's Curling would be as bad if top Canadian teams started going abroad (nearly happened too - Jason Gunnlaugson, Justin Richter and Tyler Forrest had originally planed on competing for Russia at the Sochi games and I'm interested in knowing where Qatar got it's curling team). The Canadian Olympic trials are by some margin the most competitive event in that sport.

This is by far the best women's team I've ever seen Canada put together. I have really high hopes for this summer and 2020. The 50 free the same day is probably going to be their focus. Beside, Canada isn't going to make a splash on the medley relay. The focus on the men's side relay wise has to be the 4x100 free.

Not a bad day for the Canadian team, only one quota left on the table. Our relay team is extremely young, with everyone between the ages of 18 and 22. Lacroix is the oldest team member at 32. With the exception of Lacroix, Cochran and Weinberger every swimmer Canada has qualified is under the age of 25.

Veteran Audrey Lacroix booked her ticket for her third Olympics with a win in the women's 200m butterfly. Sydney Pickrem won the women's 200m IM and will be joined in Rio by first time qualifier Erika Seltenreich-Hodgson. Finally, Canada's 4x100m free relay will consist of Santo Condorelli, Yuri Kisil, Markus Thormeyer and Evan Van Moerkerke, with Condorelli and Kisil swimming the event individually.

Big surprised to see Ashton Baumann make the team. He wasn't on form over the last two years. If his sister also makes the team CBC is going to have a field day being all nostalgic over Alex Baumann.

The Netherlands being second makes absolutely no sense. Bleh. Not happy about finishing second only to have to playoff against Spain...

Canadian trials, day 1 Women's 400m free: Brittany MacLean Women's 100m butterfly: Penelope Oleksiak and Noemie Thomas No athlete qualified: men's 400m IM, men's 200m free, men's 100m breaststroke

Ya, it's pretty impressive. They both have a very good shot at making the finals in Rio (and maybe contend for a medal) with that kind of time. Edit: Nobody qualified in the men's 200m free. Bleh.

Not great results so far at the Swimming Olympics trials. Nobody qualified in the men's 400m IM or the men's 100m breaststroke (winner was 0.02s off). Brittany MacLean did win the 400m with a new Canadian standard and, three races is, in the only Canadian to qualify. Taylor Ruck, 15, was less than a second off the qualification time. Edit 1: In an upset Penelope Oleksiak wins the women's 100m butterfly with a new Canadian record. Noemie Thomas beats out Katerine Savard, beating the old Canadian record, to also qualify for the Olympics.