OlympicsFan

Eckhoff and Wierer might follow. Should be difficult for Germany/Norway to challenge France/Sweden in the near future. I think France and Sweden will be tier 1, while Norway, Germany, Italy and the Czech Republic will be tier 2.

They won 6 medals at the world championships this year, twice as many as the second best nation (Germany) and as many as Germany, Norway and France combined. They were also the only nation with more than one individual medalist and they did that all with their (potentially) best athlete (Elvira Öberg) barely contributing anything. Not sure if they were/are the best nation in the world cup, but they were lightyears ahead of every other nation at this season's most important competition. Something else that can't be missed when looking at past results: The "absence" of Russia/Austria on the men's side and Russia/Ukraine on the women's side is clearly hurting the depth/competitiveness.

I believe that Germany set an all-time record by winning 9 gold medals, no nation ever won more than 8 golds at a single edition. The surprising thing is that it could/should have been even more golds for Germany. All of their golds, except for that of Menz in men’s junior individual, were pretty much uncontested + they could/should have won 4 more golds in men’s youth relay/men’s junior relay/mixed youth relay and women’s junior individual (given Grotian‘s overall dominance). 12 golds absolutely would have been achievable. Nevertheless great results for Germany, although the men still seem to be lightyears behind Norway (in terms of skiing speed).

You don’t have a Point. Your „criticism“ has two dimensions and both don’t really have anything to do with what I said. 1) I don’t put any pressure on Tanglander. At this point her never amounting to anything is still the most likely outcome. Whatever I write here will have zero influence on her career. 2) Objectively her skiing performances here have been the most impressive if you take age into consideration. Usually you don’t See junior level athletes having elite cross-country times when they are 3 years younger than their competitors, especially not at youth level (usually age gets less relevant the older you get). Tanglander was already close to Tannheimer in terms of skiing speed and Tannheimer already has IBU Cup level skiing speed. About Repinc: 1) As you Said she had some injury setbacks. 2) I didn’t take into calculation that Slovenia doesn’t really have the track record/infrastructure to develop world class biathletes. Sweden on the other hand already has multiple world class athletes. I am optimistic that Tanglander will have a better career than Repinc and I wouldn’t be surprised if she would make the 2026 Olympics, but all of that doesn’t mean that I am not aware that there are still a ton of things that could prevent her from fulfilling my predictions.

List of athletes (possibly i am missing some names) who would have been young enough to compete but decided against it: Men: Perrot, Marecek, Zeni Women: Kirkeeide, Passler, Auchentaller Italy shouldn't worry, despite "only" winning 3 medals so far. In my opinion Sweden has been the biggest disappointment in terms of medals (only 1 medal), but of course they don't have much pressure (given the amount of talent they already have + 15 year old Elsa Tanglander might be the biggest talent on the women's side).

I think the plan is that she and Spark will compete next week, but i guess first they want to see how she feels after the end of the junior world championships. I don't think that she is on the same talent level as Neuner, but so far her junior career has been more impressive than Dahlmeier's junior career. Dahlmeier first won gold at junior world championships when she was 1 year older than Grotian is now. Just as a reminder: Neuner won junior world championship gold in 2004 as a 16 year old, 40 seconds ahead of 2nd place despite missing 2 shots. This was probably one of the most impressive performances in junior world championships history, although not quite on the same level as Gössner's performances in 2009 (missing gold in the sprint by only 8 seconds despite missing 5 shots + winning gold in the pursuit despite missing 8 shots). Also Neuner, Dahlmeier, Gössner and Grotian all had the same coach!

I found results from 1997 onwards, but i think this was only the second time we ever had a podium at men's junior level without Norway/France/Russia/Germany/Italy/Sweden, first time was in 2003. I think this was also the first ever medal for both Poland and New Zealand at men's junior level. The most surprising thing for me is that this wasn't a fluke result. All 3 guys had very good skiing times, Campbell had the fastest time, Gunka had the 6th fastest time and Germain had the 7th fastest time. Tomorrow in the pursuit Campbell will start 52 seconds before Hedegart who was 4th today, so him not winning another medal would be rather disappointing. It will be interesting to see how those 3 will develope. In the past we had many great talents from "exotic" nations that never did anything at senior level. I remember that i was very high on Repinc for example and now she looks completely lost. I guess talent doesn't matter much when you don't have the infrastructure to build on it. Not sure if any of those guys could train with bigger nations, i imagine that it would be close to impossible for Wright/Germain to do that.

Grotian with the most expected gold of the competition in women's junior sprint, 52 seconds ahead of second place. I think since 2000 there were only 3 women who won by a bigger margin, Wierer won by 61 seconds in 2011, Neuner won by 62 seconds in 2005 and Dahlmeier won by 108 seconds in 2013.

Another (expected) gold + silver (Tannheimer + Kink) for Germany in women's youth sprint. Tannheimer and Kink are clearly superior at this age level. If Grotian would have competed, then Germany very likely would have swept the podium and probably would have won the relay by 3+ minutes. Surprisingly Tannheimer (who is a great talent) doesn't look like the best talent in this age group. Tanglander from Sweden (born in 2007, 2 years younger than Tannheimer) looks like an even bigger talent + russian/french women are missing. (Somewhat) Bold prediction: Tanglander will make the 2026 olympics (as an 18 year old). Sweden doesn't have to worry about the future thanks to 2 x Öberg + Tanglander.

Crazy that Germany has to feel dissatisfied with the results so far despite winning 5 golds already. They threw away 3 golds in mixed youth relay, men’s youth relay and men’s junior relay. With those 3 golds they already would have been at 8 golds and I am not sure if there ever was a nation that won more than 8 golds at youth/junior world championships. With 8 races to go they might still get there. Unless Grotian wins gold and another medal in her two remaining races, this competition will be seen as a disappointment for her (given how far ahead she is of all her competitors). Tannheimer and Kink should also combine for at least 1 gold + 2 more medals in their remaining 2 races and Engelmann should also aim at winning at least 1 gold. In the remaining two junior competitions on the men’s side I don’t expect anything from the German guys, Norway seems to have multiple guys who could all win gold in the two remaining races.

His father is german. Too bad we aren't Italy, otherwise we would have bought him and Germany would be a speed skating powerhouse again. We might have a similar case in swimming in the near future: Kaii Winkler's father is from Germany as well and Kaii might become really good in the 100 free.

German dominance continues. 7 races so far, Germany won 4 golds already. Of course it has to be mentioned that France doesn’t compete at youth level and Russia doesn’t compete at all. Still the gap between Germany and Italy (finished 2nd) in today’s youth women’s relay was insane. Almost 2 minutes despite the fact that only 3 athletes compete in youth relays. Not sure if we ever had such a huge gap before. Really nice to see that Germany finally reached skiing speed superiority, i always thought that this was the key. Tannheimer (Women’s youth individual), Engelmann (Mens youth individual) and Grotian (Women’s junior individual) all had the fastest skiing time + Menz (Men’s junior individual) had the 2nd fastest skiing time.

Not sure if the 200 fly gold will really be more difficult for her to win (than the 400 IM gold). I think 2021 was the only year where Zhang Yufei went sub 2:05 + she is 8 years older than McIntosh. Also like i said before: I think McIntosh has the potential to break Phelps' records (number of medals at a single olympics + overall medals at the olympics) + Paris might very well be her peak (when you look at the trajectory of other teen phenoms in the past). I don't know what her goals are, but if she wants to become the greatest swimmer of all times, it would be wise to go for as many medals as possible in Paris. Unlike Phelps she won't win 3 safe relay medals at every olympics (thanks to canadian women not being on the same level as american men), so a lot will depend on the quality of her teammates going forward. I hope that Canada will a) find an elite breaststroker (for their chances in the medley relays) and b) use her in all 3 of their relays on the women's side.

It is interesting to see that often the countries that are good in one endurance sport are good in many/all endurance sports. Norway: Biathlon, speed skating, cross-country skiing, running, cycling Netherlands: Speed skating, cycling, rowing, running Italy: Rowing, cycling, swimming, running/speed skating to some degree GB: Rowing, cycling, swimming, running, triathlon Also there have been many athletes who were good in multiple of those sports (mainly 2 out of speed skating/cross-country/cycling/rowing/running).

My guess: Day 1: 400 free prelim 400 free final 4 x 100 free final Day 2: 200 free prelim 200 free semifinal Day 3: 400 IM prelim 400 IM final 200 free final Day 4: - Day 5: 200 fly prelim 200 fly semifinal Day 6: 200 fly final 4 x 200 free final Day 7: 200 IM heat 200 IM semifinal Day 8: Maybe 4 x 100 medley relay prelim 200 IM final It (almost) looks as if the schedule was designed for her. I think whenever there are multiple of her "favorite" events in the same final session, the one where she has better medal chances is first, so competing in both isn't much of a risk. The only "problem" for her is that the 800 free and the 200 IM overlap and it seems impossible to do both. If the organizers would have split those two events up, she could have gone for 6 individual medals. I think the older athletes get, the longer they usually need to recover, so this might be her best chance (unless more nonsensical events will be added in the future) to go for the all-time record of medals won at a single olympics. Anything between 3 medals (400 IM, 200 fly, 400 free) and 7 medals (200 IM, 200 free, 4 x 200 free, 4 x 100 free) seems possible. If Canada would use her in the medley relay prelim, she could mabye go for 8 medals to tie Michael Phelps' record.

The last couple of days have been disappointing for Germany. Men's ski jumping large hill, men's nordic combined large hill, women's cross-country skiing 30 km classic, women's snowboard big air, women's freestyle skiing big air and snowboard cross mixed team all had disappointing results.

Obviously GB officials listened to me ... Overall insane winter sport results for GB this season. I think they might have won more medals than Finland for example?

Interesting result, the swedish women are dominating the sprint, but 5 km already seems like too much for some of them. Finland and the US don't have four good athletes. Germany has a good chance to win more relay medals in the next half 5-10 years. The finish/american women don't look too promising, but of course Russia could spoil the party.

British officials apparently have drawn the right conclusions from their failure at the last olympics. Much better performances in snowboarding, freestlye skiing, bob and skeleton. Those + curling those are their "traditional" winter sports. I think they could also do much better in short-track and speed skating (+ maybe luge, snowboard slalom and ski cross) if they would focus on it. Maybe they will win one or two more medals this week, Brookes could certainly win one in the big air event (given that the american women + Sadowski won't compete).

Is there any information why some people aren't allowed to change their "nation setting" in this forum, while others are allowed to do so?

We are talking about snowboard slopestyle, not athletics or swimming. Doesn't have much to do with genetics.

The Serena Williams of ski cross. Physically just too dominant.

Both „neutral“ countries. There are many countries that would be happy to be mistaken for Switzerland.

Yes, but not sure how that relates. The issue is whether World Athletics itself should (demand organizers of competitions sanctioned by them to) reward Mondo‘s performances with far more money than the performances of Rojas for example. I am not sure by how much those two have improved the world record in their disciplines (percentually). Triple jump certainly doesn’t allow Rojas to „control“ the world record the same way as Mondo does in pole vault. I don’t think that the Prize Money Rojas received adequately represents the impressiveness of her performances compared to those of Mondo.