JoshMartini007

Russian Swimming Trials - Day 6 Men's 100m Freestyle - Vladimir Morozov, Andrey Grechin Men's 200m Breaststroke - Anton Chupkov, Ilya Khomenko Nobody qualified to the women's 200m Butterfly

Angola - A Brief Olympic History Angola is a nation located in southern Africa. It gained its independence from Portuguese rule on November 11th 1975. The Angolan Olympic Committee was established on February 17th 1979 and was recognized by the International Olympic Committee in the following year. Angola made its Olympic debut during the 1980 Summer Olympic Games. It participated in the Soviet led boycott during the 1984 games, but has since then participated at every Summer Olympic Games. Angola has yet to make its debut to the Winter Olympic Games. Currently the nation has yet to win an Olympic medal. Despite the lack of medals Angola has had a long history in participating in team sports, most notably men’s basketball and women’s handball. The men’s basketball team made its first Olympic appearance in 1992 and has been one of the dominant forces within the continent. They appeared in every Olympic tournament until missing out in 2012 however, Angola had representation as the women’s basketball team qualified that year. 2016 may be the first time since their debut in the sport that Angola will be absent from basketball as the men’s team will have to qualify through a secondary path after the team lost to Nigeria in the final of AfroBasket 2015. The women’s handball team first qualified at the 1996 Olympics and has participated ever since, including already being qualified to the 2016 Olympics. The team is a powerhouse in Africa where they have medaled at each African championship since 1989. Internationally they also do well, finishing in the top 16 at every world championship since 2005, including two quarter-final appearances. Looking outside of team sports Angola has participated in athletics and swimming at every Olympics. Typically the athletes never make it past the heat round. Angola’s most accomplished Olympian was Joao N’Tyamba whom competed for his nation in athletics for six Olympics from 1988-2008. His early Olympics had him running the 800m before he expanded to the 1500m before settling on the marathon where he finished 17th in 2000. He was the flag bearer for his nation twice, at his first and last Olympics. Swimmer Nadia Cruz was also a well accomplished athlete as she participated in four Olympics from 1988-2000 where she competed in the breaststroke. During the early Olympics Angola was often seen participating in boxing and to an extent judo. With stricter qualification rules the number of combat athletes for the nation has dropped considerably though the nation has competed in judo with Antonia Moreira in 2004 and 2012. Moreira will also be looking to qualify again in 2016. Other sports Angola has competed in its history include beach volleyball, canoeing, sailing and shooting.

Also the host quota gets reallocated meaning Paraguay and Bahamas qualify in the men and women events respectively.

For my first choice I will do Angola

Yes, I (or someone else can) will open a thread once the first wild card places have been released. We should be getting our first ones within the next few weeks, if not at the end of May.

Thanks the wording of the document made it sound like they needed to get a certain score. I guess Monaco and Panama would be the favourites provided that they applied.

Does anyone know what the minimum technical standard for artistic gymnastics are? I want to know the chances of a tripartite being awarded.

Russian Trails - Day 4 Women's 200m Freestyle - Veronika Popova, Viktoriia Andreeva Women's 200m IM - Viktoriia Andreeva Nobody qualified in the men's 200m butterfly. Very impressive that Andreeva qualified in two events on the same day.

I'm planning to do something similar with my blog once teams start to become finalized. I've always had a soft spot for Pacific nations, though I like to keep up with all small nations. Are we allowed to do multiple nations (assuming we do one at a time)?

Ireland will be making its Olympic debut in field hockey as an independent nation. Technically an all Irish team competed under the Great Britain and Ireland flag in 1908.

Russian Trials - Day 3 Men's 200m Freestyle - Aleksandr Krasnykh Men's 100m Backstroke - Evgeny Rylov, Grigory Tarasevich Women's 100m Backstroke - Daria Ustinova, Anastasia Fesikova No one reached the women's 100m breaststroke standard, but with the "uncontrollable circumstances" rule Yuliya Efimova essentially has the spot waiting for her should she not get suspended.

Great Britain is set to announce its swimming team on April 22nd

According to IJF the final decision will be made on May 30th. It’s possible that some early decisions have been made, but we probably won’t get an official release until the end of next month

Entry List for the Asia/Oceania Regatta have been posted This will be the first time Oceania nations (minus Australia and New Zealand) are allowed to compete in this regatta. IIRC Vanuatu have applied for a tripartite spot so getting a good time here will be important. The top 7 single sculls and top 3 lightweight double sculls with a maximum of one boat per gender will qualify to the Olympics. China (for the men), Hong Kong and Japan have essentially already decided that they will want to compete in the lightweight double sculls and have thus not sent any athletes to compete in the single sculls events.

Russian Trials - Day 2 Men's 100m Breaststroke - Vsevolod Zanko, Kirill Prigoda Women's 100m Butterfly - Svetlana Chimrova Like I said before technically someone could take Prigoda's spot due to "uncontrollable circumstances," but it's doubtful.

Rugby sevens, where you can finish last one month and win the entire thing in the next.

Liberia's Emmanuel Matadi ran the standard in the men's 200m in Norwalk, this will be his second event (first was 100m)

Ireland isn't a tripartite nation, but it could potentially get a reallocation spot. Based on 2012 reallocations Ireland would have a borderline to okay shot.

Yes there's always weird choices, most likely due to the lack of applicants. One thing I've noticed about taekwondo is that they like to hand out quotas to different continents (3, or 4 if Europe gets one). Asia's quota could be interesting should they not be given the -68kg quota since only Nepal and Pakistan competed and they aren't particularly good and may not have even applied (now that I think about taekwondo is popular in Nepal so maybe they have applied).

Anyone want to give predictions on which nations will win the four tripartite events? They are the men's -68kg, men's -80, women's -67kg and women's +67kg. Here's a list of eligible nations which competed at one of the qualifying events and have not qualified in taekwondo in a different event (note this is not a requirement, but it is likely the spots will go to one of these nations). Men's -68kg - Men's -80kg - Women's -67kg - Women's +67kg - Unsurprisingly the men's -68kg has the most competition including decent athletes from Afghanistan, Andorra and Central African Republic and you can add Suriname for a representative from the Americas too. Macedonia will probably be the favourite for the women's -67kg assuming they applied for a spot. The other events don't have a clear favourite. Using the Olympic rankings the highest ranked nations are Central African Republic (-68kg), Honduras (-80kg), Macedonia (-67kg) and Honduras (+67kg). Obviously Honduras won't get two spots (more likely to get the women's spot). With that said my predictions are Afghanistan/Central African Republic, Chad/Pakistan, Macedonia and Honduras respectively

Update (Remove) Women's +67kg (Taekwondo)

Russian Trials - Day 1 Men's 400m Freestyle - Aleksandr Krasnykh Russia has changed their qualification format. First place automatically qualifies (provided they have beaten the standard) while an athlete which missed the trials can apply for a consideration provided that they were faster than the second place swimmer and have also swam faster than the standard (I call this the Efimova rule).

Great Britain Trials - Day 5 Women's 400m Freestyle - Jazmin Carlin Women's 200m IM - Siobhan-Marie O’Connor

South Africa Trials - Day 7 Men's 1500m Freestyle - Matthew Meyers Miles Brown also swam under the standard during the lead-off of the 200m freestyle relay. In total 11 men and 0 women have qualified (we must wait for the final team to be announced)

If all those bans turn into Olympic bans then France and Czech Republic will automatically qualify to the Olympics while Latvia, Belgium, Georgia, Finland and Germany will qualify to the qualifying tournament. The next two will depend on the hosts, if European then Estonia and the Netherlands will compete. Dominican Republic will take Turkey's place for being the highest ranked non-qualified nation. It probably won't come to this, but it's funny to think about it.