Grassmarket

El Bakkali gets the win, but not his usual monster time.

Just a shame he opted for over Latveria.

Fine here

Everybody laughs at Fat Boy Kim because he travels everywhere by train. Not so dumb now, eh?

Coaches frantically searching for heptathlon meets in the next two weeks.

These are live on Eurovision sport - Finals this afternoon.

The Gotzis meet has an English commentary also. Eurovision Sport

Just a Polish one Lekkoatletyka, Orlen Memoriał Janusza Kusocińskiego, Chorzów [transmisja na żywo, online, live stream] (18.05.2024) | TVP SPORT

DSQ, don’t know if that is better than fourth or not.

And the nations competing for the two places Considering that a victory in Huatulco will mean four tickets secured for Paris, Hungary is lining up the A team to try to secure the last spot that they need. Csongor Lehmann and Bence Bicsak flew directly from Yokohama to Mexico, while Zsanett Kuttor-Bragmayer decided to skip Yokohama to save some fresh legs for the Mexican heat. They will be joined by one of the rising stars of the country, Karolina Helga Horváth, who despite being only 22 years old, she help the Hungarian team to get the 5th place at the Junior/U23 Mixed Relay World Championships last year. Team Norway knows that the only chance that their second female athlete, Lotte Miller, can make it to the start line in Paris is by finishing top-two this Friday in Huatulco. Miller, who has been through a series of injuries in the last two years, has dropped significantly on the rankings, but she proved only a few months ago that she is a reliable asset when it comes to a relay, as she helped the Norwegian Team to claim the gold medal at the 2023 European Games in Krakow. Norway will repeat the team that shined under the rain in Krakow: Vetle Bergsvik Thorn, Solveig Løvseth, Casper Stornes and Lotte Miller, and they seem to be on great form. The long run out of the water and the uphill on the bike course can be an asset for them, known all for their bike power and skills. South Africa is also bringing their best athletes to Mexico, hoping to secure one of the first two places that will give a second female a ticket to the Olympics, as well as the opportunity for the South African team to redeem themselves of the bad luck that they had in Tokyo 2020, on the debut of the Mixed Relay at the Olympics, when Team South Africa was not able to take the start after Henri Schoeman crashed during the individual race and was unable to race. The Rio 2016 bronze medallist Henri Schoeman will be leading the team in Huatulco, along with the young rising star, Jamie Riddle, who showed with his silver medal at the Wollongong World Cup that he is in great shape. On the women’s side, South Africa is bringing their top three ranked females -Vicky Van Der Merwe, Bridget Theunissen and Amber Schlebusch- and will decide which two are doing the relay 24 hours before the start. Both Schoeman and Riddle are excellent swimmers and experts on beach starts like the one in Huatulco, and have proven to be really powerful under heat and humid conditions like the ones expected during the weekend. The Dutch Team also needs desperately a top-two position at the end of the race, to secure the second spot for the men, and Richard Murray, Rachel Klamer, Barbara de Koning and Mitch Kolkman are ready to give it a try. They all seem to like the weather conditions in Mexico, and are always a team that rises to the occasion when it matters. Canada has brought Brock Hoel, Sophia Howell, Mathis Beaulieu and Desirae Ridenour to try to fight for the second female spot for their team. All of them great swimmers, it will be hard to follow them in the water, especially with these choppy and shallow waters on the Pacific Ocean. Genis Grau, Sara Guerrero Manso, Pelayo Gonzalez Turrez and Maria Casals Mojica will be lining up for Team Spain. Despite being a young team with not a lot of experience, all of them have experience in sprint and super-sprint courses and get along really well with these weather conditions. Especially Grau, who is one of the favourites for the individual race on Sunday after finishing on the podium here in Huatulco in the previous two world cups. Despite hosting the Mixed Relay Qualification Event, Mexico knows that they have secured two men and two women through the individual rankings, and therefore have decided to bring to this race a young team to give them more experience on the international field. Yael Vladimir González Melendez, Mercedes Romero Orozco, Nicolas Probert Vargas and Luisa Daniela Baca Vargas will be representing their country this Friday, with nothing to lose and much to learn. Team Ecuador will be lining up Juan Jose Andrade Figueroa, three-times Olympian Elizabeth Bravo, Gabriel Terán Carvajal and Paula Jara, while representing Team Austria will be Tjebbe Kaindl, Julia Hauser, Alois Knabl and Lisa Perterer. For the Austrian team, they have currently two men and two women on the provisional start list for Paris, but they are all sitting in the last places of the qualified athletes, so they need to secure good performances either on the Mixed Relay or on the individual races during the weekend, to secure their spots.

Just a reminder With host country France; World Champions in 2022 and 2023, Great Britain and Germany, and New Zealand, Australia, USA, Switzerland, Italy and Portugal already qualified through the Mixed Relay rankings, each of the nine teams lining up in Mexico will know that, in the unpredictable world of the super-sprint relay, a top-two finish and that Olympic qualification of two men and two women is surely within reach. And that means a lot to some of them.

Oh yeah, that's one of those street games type event, I think. Where the city high school athletes meet the Olympians,

.....and then a triple bill of Gold Level meetings on the World Athletics Website Race Walking from La Coruna World's best feature in stacked race walk fields for La Coruna | PREVIEWS | World Athletics Track and field from Los Angeles McLaughlin-Levrone, Hassan and Cheptegei among stars in Los Angeles | PREVIEWS | World Athletics Track and field from Tokyo (Can't find full details on this) timetable.pdf (goldengrandprix-japan.com) World Athletics Home Page | World Athletics

....followed on Saturday morning by the biggest non-Championships multi-events meet of the year from Gotzis, Athletes in action Entry list | Hypomeeting Götzis (meeting-goetzis.at) Timetable Time schedule | Hypomeeting Götzis (meeting-goetzis.at) And streaming is usually not geoblocked on Austrian TV Leichtathletik: 49. Hypomeeting Götzis live - tv.ORF.at

Huge big weekend of athletics coming up! I think from early Saturday morning there are pretty much a solid thirty-six hours of continuous athletics to watch free to air. First up, your aperitif, live European Athletics meets on YT from Friday afternoon and over the weekend. European Athletics - YouTube

Preview for the Night of the 10k PBs on Saturday / aka British Paris Trials. Live on YT - whole event from mid afternoon - and the BBC - the two Senior races. Night of 10,000m PBs: British athletes eye Olympic qualification - BBC Sport

Don’t think we *disliked* Froome - we just didn’t know him very well since his life in Britain was minimal. Unlike Wiggins, Thomas, the Yates Brothers etc who are definitely from particular towns, grew up in Olympic teams etc etc. Anyway, big to Julian Alaphilippe who got his first major Grand Tour win in ages today, after having a couple of near misses already.

And yet when the Left takes power they suddenly become even more nationalistic than anyone else! Communist states are always the first to charge that all opposition politicians are traitors, disloyal, Zionists (ie Jews), in the pay of the Americans, the British etc etc

Any attack on political freedoms is a political attack.

Oh really? I think the Islamist/Leftist connection is pretty clear by now.

Maybe, but in it was leftists who killed Pim Fortuijn and Theo van Gogh. And Geert Wilders is not having to life his life in extreme security because of the menace of Nigel Farage supporters.

His secret is using only the finest -grown pineapple on his Pizza Hawaii. A humble west London restaurant has been named the as the home to the best pizza in Europe outside of Italy. Napoli on the Road, in the desirable west London neighbourhood of Chiswick, took home the gong at World 50 Top Pizza Awards 2024, on Monday. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/food/article-13421115/The-best-pizza-Europe-west-London-Chiswick-restaurant-beats-hundreds-competitors-Michelin-guide-Italian-restaurants-thanks-Naples-born-chef.html

Good news - absolutely dozens of good European meets going to be streamed FTA on the European Athletics YT Channel in the run-up to the Olympics. Here's the full list, starting off with some meets in the next day or two. European Athletics to offer extensive World Athletics Continental Tour streaming in 2024 | European Athletics (european-athletics.com)

Full programme and participants list for Rabat on Sunday. Programme 2021 (diamondleague.com)

There are always a few invitation places available, but I'm sure he doesn't want to count on that.