OlympicsFan

Foreign born athletes who might represent Germany in Rio: Athletics: Aleixo Platini Menga (born in Angola, mens 4 x 100 m) Peter Emelieze (born in Nigeria, mens 4 x 100 m) Homiyu Tesfaye (born in Ethiopia, mens 1500 m) Fate Tola (born in Ethiopia, womens marathon) Sosthene Moguenara (born in Tchad, womens long jump) Alexandra Wester (born in Gambia, womens long jump) Marie-Laurence Jungfleisch (born in France, womens high jump) Lisa Ryzih (born in Russia, womens pole vault) Lilli Schwarzkopf (born in Kyrgyzstan, womens heptathlon) Boxing: David Graf (born in Armenia, mens -91kg) Artem Harutyunyan (born in Armenia, mens -64kg) Arajik Marutjan (born in Armenia, mens -69kg) Track cycling: Kristina Vogel (born in Kyrgyzstan, womens keirin/sprint/team sprint) Equestrian: Meredith Michaels-Beerbaum (born in USA, jumping) Fencing: Matyas Szabo (born in Romania, mens sabre) Field hockey: Kristina Hillmann (born in Switzerland, womens hockey) (I dont know if she always had the german citizenship) Football: Mahmoud Dahoud (born in Syria, mens football) Kathrin Hendrich (born in Belgium, womens football) Dzsenifer Maroszan (born in Hungary, womens football) Rhythmic gymnastics: Jana Berezko-Marggrander (born in Russia, individual) Anastasija Khmelnytska (born in Czech Republic, group) Handball: Evgeni Pevnov (born in Russia, mens handball) Judo: Martyna Trajdos (born in Poland, womens -63kg) Table tennis: Dimitrij Ovtcharov (born in Ukraine, mens table tennis) Han Ying (born in China, womens table tennis) Shan Xiaona (born in China, womens table tennis) Weightlifting: Almir Velagic (born in Bosnia, mens +105kg) Graf, Harutyunyan, Vogel, Szabo, Berezko-Marggrander, Ovtcharov, Ying and Velagic are already qualified. Maybe i forgot someone, i didnt check all athletes in rowing and rhythmic gymnastics ... Overall 20 different nationalities.

The "different competition" is not selected by the german swimming federation. Athletes have to select one of the following two meets within one week after the end of the german nationals: Mare Nostrum Tour or German Open (beginning of July in Berlin) If they dont swim the required times there as well, then they dont qualify. International times at the german nationals: Mens 1500 free: 15:01.18 for Felix Auböck Womens 800 free: 8:40.51 for Julia Hassler Womens 400 IM: 4:46.01 for Martina van Berkel I dont know if those times are good enough to qualify ... ?

Hassler was injured/ill and thats why he didnt compete at the previous events. I am very happy that he seems to be fit again and hopefully he will qualify. I think ist really weird that a naion can compete with 2 different athletes here but not at the olympic games. What happens if two athletes of the same nation reach the final/win a quota place? I hope that Thiele (mens freestyle 97kg), Kudla (mens greco-roman 85kg), Hassler (mens greco-roman 98kg), Schellin (womens 48kg) and Eisele (mens greco-roman 75kg) can qualify, what are their chances in your opinion?

I am surprised that all those times count. I know that Amusan's time in womens 100 m hurdles doesnt count as junior world record, because there were no doping tests. I think its a bit weird that you can qualify for Rio in a competition without doping tests ...

I wouldnt really call his status "doubtful" ... He planned to make his first competition on May 15th and now he will make his first competition at the beginning of June (Diamond League in Rome), from there on he has 2 more months until Rio to get in top shape. Overally Germany is having a lot of bad luck this year in athletics, Harting, Schwanitz and Storl are all injured. Franz and Schrader are out of Rio.

Philipp Buhl (mens laser) Heil/Plößel (mens 49er) Jurczok/Lorenz (womens 49er) Toni Wilhelm (mens RS:X) Gerz/Szymanski (mens 470) Bochmann/Steinherr (womens 470) Maybe: One team in mixed nacra

I think we might give back our quota place in mixed nacra. One of our boats needs to finish among the top 10 nations at the world cup in Hyeres, otherwise we will probably give back our quota place.

I dont think that Otto will come back, but he "planned" to qualify for Rio and didnt retire until now. I found some older articles from the end of last year, for example this one: https://www.leichtathletik.de/news/news/detail/bjoern-otto-zwischen-gelassenheit-und-angriffslust/ He wrote on his homepage that he flew to South Africa for a training camp at the end of last year with many other german track and field athletes to prepare for this season.

Thats true and its nice that german federation supports her, they also couldve said no, considering that she doesnt finance herself. In the end she will probably be less successful, but she will have more fun and will probably get more attention, in addition to that she can still compete in cross-country skiing if she wont make our biathlon team for 2016 olympic games. Edit: I forgot the 2 most obvious cases: 1) Evi Sachenbacher-Stehle switched to biathlon at the age of 31. In her last season in cross-country world cup she finished 60th in overall world cup. Her best individual result was a 4th place in the mass start at 2014 olympic games. 2) Celia Aymonier switched to biathlon at the age of 24. In her last season in cross-country world cup she finished 37th in overall world cup. Her best result (so far) were two 11th places in Presque Isle this season in sprint/pursuit. Denise Herrmann is now 27 years old and in her last season in cross-country world cup she finished 23th in overall world cup.

http://www.iaaf.org/records/toplists/racewalks/5000-metres-race-walk/indoor/men/senior/2016 We improved in mens race walking recently, but sadly we are dead in womens race walking. In mens 50km race walking we are also pretty bad, i hope that Linke will finish top 10 in mens 20 km race walking in Rio.

Slamom canoeing: Tasiadis and Aigner are qualified. Track cycling: Förstemann is 99,999% out. Levy has something like a 60% chance to qualify in my opinion. Germany is allowed to send 3 athletes in mens team sprint and those athletes will be allowed to compete in Keirin/Sprint. Levy wasnt part of our mens team sprint squad at the last world championships, so he has to "do something special" to become part of the team, in my opinion he will do it. Enders and Eilers should be safe, but Niederlag was very disappointing at the world championships and Levy reached the final in mens keirin. Levy will qualify 100% if our team sprint squad will be faster with him, otherwise the question will be: Do we want to give away a medal chance in mens team sprint (by including Levy) for getting a medal chance in mens keirin, in my opinion the answer in this case should be no. Equestrian: Langehanenberg is out, because she sold her best horse and now she isnt competitive anymore. Other german medal winners who might/will miss Rio: Kurt Kuschela (gold in mens C2 1000 m) is 100% out, he ended his career, the same is true for Brink/Reckermann (gold in mens beach volleyball), Ole Bischof (silver in mens -81kg judo), Judith Arndt (silver in womens road cycling time trial), Thomas Lurz (silver in mens open water swimming), Katrin Wagner-Augustin/Carolin Leonhardt (silver in womens K4 500 m), Andreas Tölzer (bronze in mens +100kg judo), Hollstein/Ihle (mens K2 1000m), Helena Fromm (womens -67kg taekwondo). Britta Heidemann (silver in womens epee) is 100% out, she missed qualification. Kerstin Thiele (silver in womens -70 kg judo) is 100% out. She got pregnant last year and therefore couldnt collect enough points to qualify. She competed in womens -78kg weight category recently and probably wouldnt have qualified anyway, because Luise Malzahn is much better (7th in world ranking) in the same weight category. Lilli Schwarzkopf (silver in womens heptathlon) also might miss Rio. I think Rath and Schäfer are clearly better than her, she probably has to fight with Öser for the last spot, the same might be true for Christina Obergföll/Linda Stahl. Stahl, Obergföll, Molitor and Hussong are all pretty much at the same level, but there are only 3 spots. Björn Otto (silver in mens pole vault) didnt officially retire until now, but i think he wouldnt have a chance to qualify anyway. Dimitri Peters (bronze in mens -100kg judo) probably will miss Rio. He is 6th in world ranking, but Frey is 3rd in the same weight category and more than 200 points ahead of Peters. There will also be some medallists in mens hockey, rowing and mens foil fencing who will miss Rio. I think you didnt want to include retired/team athletes into your list, but you could add Thiele (100% out), Schwarzkopf/Obergföll/Stahl (if they miss qualification), and Otto/Peters (who are very likely to miss Rio). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germany_at_the_2012_Summer_Olympics (All german medallists from 2012 olympic games)

I dont think its that fast. Two german guys were clearly faster this year (18:44 for Linke and 18:46 for Brembach) and a 3rd german guy had pretty much the same time (18:54.32 for Pohle vs. 18:54.18 for Bosworth).

There are at least 3 ways to look at the decision of Denise Herrmann: 1) German cross-country skiing: Its a pretty big loss, because she was one of our best athletes. She was our 4th best athlete in distance world cup and our 2nd best athlete in sprint world cup. The question is: Does this hurt our medal chances in any event? In my opinion the answer is: Not really. Ringwald and Kolb are already on the same level in sprint and both are at least 2 years younger, so she probably wouldnt have been part of our womens team sprint team in 2018 and she also wouldnt have had a realistic chance to win an individual medal in any discipline. In my opinion its a bigger hit for our womens relay, they might have (had) a small chance for bronze in 2018 and Böhler/Fessel are both pretty old, so this might really hurt us in the future. On the other hand we have tons of talented women who could (easily) replace her in the next couple of years, for example Carl, Belger, Gimmler, Fräbel or Hennig. The only reason why i am a bit sad about this decision is that she was the "face" of german cross-country skiing, so cross-country skiing might become even less popular in the future in Germany. 2) German biathlon: We dont really need her, we have a very young team and Dahlmeier/Preuß/Hinz/Hammerschmidt/Hildebrand are all clearly better than she (in my opinion) will ever be, i doubt that she has a realistic chance to qualify for 2018 olympic games. Even someone like Gössner has a better chance in my opinion. On the other hand german biathlon cant really lose anything. At worst she wont help us and at best she could become an important part of our relay. I think she will be among the fastest athletes right away, so she "only" needs to learn shooting. Its hard to tell how likely it is that she will learn shooting, but in my opinion its not very likely considering her age. Gössner didnt learn shooting until now and she started with the shooting training much earlier than Herrmann. On the other hand Hinz also switched to biathlon pretty recently and she has become at least decent in shooting, but she isnt among the fastest athletes in biathlon anymore, so she might have lost a bit of "speed". 3) Denise Herrmann: I can absolutely understand her decision, although she lowered her chances to qualify for 2018 olympic games with this move. There are various good reasons for this decision: a) She can train/compete with her best friend Maren Hammerschmidt. b) She never wouldve won an individual medal in cross-country skiing, considering the norwegian dominance and she already won an olympic medal in relay, so why not try something new? c) Biathlon is far more popular than cross-country skiing in Germany. I think every team member in german biathlon (top 6) gets more attention than any cross-country athlete in Germany, unless someone wins the overall world cup in cross-country skiing. I think a top 10 finish in biathlon gets far more attention than a top 3 finish in cross-country skiing. d) In an interview she said that she had this idea in her mind for a pretty long time already. Before the start of the last season german womens team in cross-country skiing got a new coach, i think she talked with him about this idea back then and he said something like "At least try my training for one season and if you dont have fun/become better, then you can switch to biathlon". I think she wasnt really motivated for cross-country skiing anymore, considering the norwegian dominance, so in my opinion it was a decision between biathlon and retirement and not between biathlon and cross-country skiing. German skiing federation of course wanted her to continue her career, so they "allowed" this move. In the past Gössner competed in both biathlon and cross-country skiing and i think Herrmann might do the same. For me her situation is a bit like that of Roleder (athletics) who decided to train for heptathlon and then won a silver medal in womens 100 m hurdles at the last world championships. The main reason for that was that she wanted to have more fun in training and Herrmann might have the same reason for switching to biathlon. After all biathlon training and cross-country skiing training are not that different, so she might even become faster by training biathlon.

Its not a surprise that Russia wont be banned. I think they wouldve been allowed to play even if all of their players wouldve been caught doping. The explanation i read sounded very weird nevertheless, its obvious that Markin had a pretty big impact in at least one match. I think no one here thinks that he decided to use Meldonium on his own, its obvious that this was more of a "team decision", so its pretty disappointing that a whole team can get away with something like that. In the end we have to ask: When exactly did he stop to take Meldonium? In my opinion you cant just say "He didnt take it in 2016, so he didnt dope". I think the athletes knew a couple of months before the end of 2015 that Meldonium would be illegal in 2016, so they shouldve stopped to take it right away and not wait until the end of 2015. By taking it until the end of 2015, they "planned" to also profit from it in 2016, so you cant say that it didnt improve their performances in 2016. In my opinion all these athletes shouldnt have been allowed to compete in 2016 until all Meldonium left their body.

Great wins for Zverev (against Goffin) and Kyrgios (against Coric)! Zverev vs. Thiem could be an interesting match. Zverev has a good chance to reach top 30 by the end of the year. Its pretty sad that some top players dont plan to play at the olympics, for example Thiem or Isner.

Its always very sad when something like that happens, but in this case its even more "shocking". Two of our best athletes will have one chance less to qualify, in my opinion thats not fair at all. Marutjan at least will have another chance, but Harutyunyan basically had only one chance to qualify for the olympics and he had to fight against number one seed from France in the second round ... For him it was basically: Either you beat the number one seed or you are out of the olympics.

Why is 18:54.14 a crazy time for you? Only for british standards?

So probably no Griffin, Davis, Bryant, Simmons (Australia) in Rio ...

I dont really like the draw ... We have a good chance to win the group and then we probably will have to play against Denmark or Qatar, two teams we clearly beat recently, so we have a big chance for the semifinal. Our goal has to be to not finish 4th in group/not to play against France in quartefinal. I am optimistic that we will reach the final if we can avoid France and play with our best team (Dissinger, Pekeler, Groetzki, Gensheimer, Weinhold, Wiencek, Drux, Wolff, Dahmke, Kühn, Lemke, Lichtlein, Reichmann, Wiede, Fäth/Glandorf!). I hope for the following quarterfinals/semifinals/finals: Men: Germany-Qatar Poland-Denmark Sweden-Croatia Slovenia-France Germany-Croatia France-Denmark Germany-France Women: Brazil-Netherlands Montenegro-Russia Romania-France Norway-Sweden Norway-Russia Netherlands-Romania Norway-Netherlands

German outfits have been presented and for the first time in many years i really like them. Finally they were produced by a big german brand (Adidas), although i wouldve preferred BOSS. This time they arent very colourful, but mostly black, grey, white and red. In my opinion they look way more elegant than the uniforms we had at the last couple of olympic games.

Source: http://worldarchery.org/news/139158/korean-team-rio-2016-olympic-games-announced Of those 6 only Ki Bo Bae competed in London 4 years ago, she will try to defend her olympic titles.

Are you sure that she will compete for Belgium in Rio? If its true, than it would be really disgusting, this never should have been allowed! Basically Belgium had two athletes in the same weight category at the european qualification! Belgian athlete qualified -> She goes to Rio Refugee athlete qualified -> She gets naturalized and competes for Belgium in Rio

No, +2.0 is the limit, he will have many more chances to qualify.

I hope for 4 more qualified athletes on the mens side: As you said Öhler, Eisele (2016 european champion) and Azizsir already should have qualified. We might use Hassler (2nd at 2014 world championships) instead of Öhler for the last tournament, but i dont know if he is fit. I also hope that Denis Kudla will somehow qualify. On the womens side i hope that Schellin will qualify. 10 qualified athletes would be really amazing for us. We already have more qualified athletes (5) than in 2012 (4). I am optimistic that we will have at least as many qualified athletes as in 2008 (7). In 2004 we had 9 qualified athletes and in 2000 we had 10 qualified athletes, so we have a realistic chance to reach our best result in more than a decade.

What do you think, who will qualify at the last tournament (how many quota places for Germany)?