Triplecast

1.  Athletics, all events, but especially M and W 200m M and W Pole Vault,  W Softball, and W 3x3 Basketball.

2.  Other nations       

3.  Gosh, I could probably name 3000 favorite Olympians, but I'll go back into the past and name 5 special ones to me:  Jesse Owens, Emil Zatopek, Harrison Dillard, Lindy Remigino, and  Shelley Mann, and a 6th for good mention, Billy Mills.  

16 hours ago, Fly_like_a_don said:

Australia will become the first nation to reach Japan for Olympic Preparation . Their softball team reaches Tokyo tomorrow  and will stay in Ota. 

And now the women have arrived.

Aussie softball team first to arrive in Japan for Olympics (yahoo.com)

My few cents, from wire services:  Mr. Richard Pound says: "Before the end of June, you really need to know, yes or no,"  "There will be no further postponement"  "They go ahead, or they cancel."

So, US swimming and athletics trials run 6/13 to 6/27, so we would get an adverse decision right in the middle.

and 

Ms. Kaori Yamugchui, a member of the JOC, says "organizers are cornered"  "We are starting to reach a point where we cant even cancel anymore." 

1 hour ago, phelps said:

if they were honest with themselves, they would see how the increase of covid cases has started when their Baseball season started...

 

they should stop allowing spectators to go to the baseball games, rather than saying all those bullshit on the Olympics as a super-spreading event, when also the kids and the goats know that the athletes would be closed into a bubble without any sort of interaction with the local people and almost all of them would be vaccinated before travelling to Japan... 

This story, described as a fair and balanced look, talks about the same thing you mention, the 

Village may be one of the safest places in Japan.

https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Tokyo-2020-Olympics/Pros-and-cons-of-holding-the-Tokyo-Olympics-during-a-pandemic

1 hour ago, rafalgorka said:

https://olympics.nbcsports.com/2021/05/19/lee-evans-dies-track-and-field-400/

 

Lee Evans, 1968 Olympic 400m champion, dies at 74

One of the best.  He might have repeated in 1972, but for one bad race in the US trials.

3 hours ago, Orangehair43 said:

 

That poll supposedly said 43% cancel, 40% postpone.  So, I see two things here, 53% are in favor of the Games being held, but most just don't want them this year.  But second, these polls should stop asking do you want the Games postponed, as I think most of us here believe IOC, TOCOG, and JPN Gov when they say further postponement is not an option.  That said, I know other polls, when the question is its just a straight cancel or hold show 60% cancel.  But this poll suits the media's McGaffrey's need when they can just scream 83% of Japanese don't want to hold the Olympics, without his bothering to break down the numbers. 

21 hours ago, intoronto said:

Here is my team size predictions for Canada:

 

 

 

TBD:

Men's basketball (12 athletes)

Men's baseball (24 athletes)

Men's 3x3 (4 athletes)

Good luck for Basketball, hoping that home court works in your favor.  As for baseball, it's a shame that at most 2 can qualify between USA, CUB and CAN.

4 hours ago, Orangehair43 said:

https://www.insidethegames.biz/articles/1107862/rakuten-chief-tokyo-2020-suicide-mission And more high profile people in Japan are calling for the Games to be cancelled. 

And it's noted here about said Rakuten chief that Rakuten is one of the few prominent Japanese businesses not sponsoring the Games. 

https://www.cbc.ca/sports/olympics/tokyo-olympics-japanese-athletes-drawn-into-battle-over-tokyo-olympics-1.6029584

3 hours ago, Maxim Fastovsky said:

They are aided by the nolympic communities that are using this as a way to show their "comrades" that the Olympics are bad and destroy everything on their way.   Just go to the nolympicsla Twitter.    Or the nimrod that got through to the ioc press conference few days ago 

1 hour ago, Quaker2001 said:

Oh, well familiar with those douchebags. 

And don't forget @nojpoparis2024 

I prefer to call them anarchists myself.  And I think for them their Covid "concerns" are really just a means to an end.

1.  

2.

3.

But I could add quite a few more.

Men’s 1500

Yared Nugusi   3:34.68  The fourth American now.

39 minutes ago, Orangehair43 said:

Japan really have been awful in getting vaccines. Their one of the richest nations in the world with a very high elderly population and lots of circulating cases( unlike Australia and New Zealand.)

Opinion | Why is Japan failing so badly on vaccinations? - The Washington Post

2 hours ago, Vektor said:

IOC member, Olympic champion swimmer Dániel Gyurta said in a new interview that there's no question about that the Olympic Games will be held this year. 

IOC's Dick Pound says Tokyo Olympics to move ahead despite pandemic concerns | CBC Sports

Echoed by by Richard Pound

29 minutes ago, intoronto said:

Well they are limiting how long you can be at the village for, so its not likely to hit close to 10k at a time.

The suggested guidelines I saw are arrive 5 days before, depart no more than 2 days after completion of your event.

1 hour ago, opruh said:

There's more coverage on the death of Obama's dog over the ongoing violence in Colombia and Jerusalem. I guess there's no need for performative human rights activism since Colombia and Jerusalem is not in China. 

Which news' source are you seeing this?     

1 hour ago, rybak said:

79 days and 12 hours left.

I'm giving the time from the US perspective, in just a few minutes at 2000 Eastern US time, and if you look at the preliminary events, its now 77 days exactly until the first pitch of the  -    women's softball game.  And we are going to have quite the 77 days, I'm afraid.

15 hours ago, Jan Linha said:

Thanks a lot for the explanation. It helped a lot. Seems like a new rule to me. Also would like to point out as quite unfair as the strong countries are able to earn even more quota and the weaker countries are unfortunately have to stay without any. It is a pity. For me, I don't quite get why to change the OG qualification system in the way to support the strong countries ...... 

Sure, to add, this whole idea of going from 5 to 4 was the late Mr. Grandi's idea, I've read, so that it would give smaller nations (e.g., Italy) a better chance in the team event against the likes of  USA, ROC and CHN.  Well, a few weeks after Mr. Grandi passed away, what happens but that Italy wins the bronze in the 2019 World Championships (and that's with a 5 person team, no less).  Anyway, the 4 person teams are for this Olympics only, and we will be back to 5 person teams in 2024.       

8 minutes ago, Jan Linha said:

Can anybody please explain to me how is it possible that Russia has earned additional spots for individial all-around if they already qualified a team? Because of this, the only who could have qualified stayed first under the line who is not qualified (reserve). Thanks

Happy to give it a try. 

First, this is the FIG rules for OG qualification.  Its quite complex and does not take into account that the Artistic all-around World Cup series was cancelled.  

memo (gymnastics.sport)

Each of the 12 countries that qualified a team at 2018 and 19 WC  is allowed to qualify 1 or 2 additional gymnasts who will only compete individually, not in the team event. Its based on results from World Cup series and Continental championships.  Countries without a team (e.g., Romania) can qualify 1 or 2 individuals.  The field is limited to 98 per gender.  One of the ways to qualify was being in the top 2 countries  at Euros that  either had a full team but had only qualified 1 individual   or  countries without a team but had only qualified 1 individual (not 2).  That's why ROC and ROM won the 2 available OG berths at Euros.  

Hope this helps (a little).

.       

On 14/02/2021 at 10:41, Orangehair43 said:

Australia discussing if to ban their citizens from travelling abroad for work so I can see them withdrawing within the next two months.

What happened to this prediction made some 9+ weeks ago?

6 minutes ago, Dragon said:

This is scary news about one of the best known coaches of the last 50 years

 

 

But not very surprising.

5 hours ago, intoronto said:

I chose someone else, because this sport is very unpredictable at times. However, wouldn't shock me if some of the top names win either lol

Right, no one would have picked the US to win in 2000 and 2016.

5 minutes ago, OlympicsFan said:

I don’t know anything about the Dutch medal chances in new sports, but only looking at old sports, I could predict 61 medals for the Netherlands:

(Open water) Swimming: 6

 

6?  From whom?

11 minutes ago, intoronto said:

@phelpsI think you forgot about the 200m back in swimming

I'm counting on Regan Smith being in her 2019 form.  

4 hours ago, Triplecast said:

http://bit.ly/kyodopoll

 

Still very troubling numbers here for Japanese Government and organizers.  Poll released April 11

 

Want Games cancelled    39.2% 

Want Games Postponed  32.8%

Games should go on         24.5%

Doesn't say about the other 3.5%

 

 

1 hour ago, rybak said:

Those 39.2% people should cancelled themselves...

 

We are almost 100 days away from the Opening Ceremony and Olympics aren't an domestic event that could be cancelled or even postponed in such short time.

I hear you and agree, like everyone here, I want the Games to happen.  But I'm a little less optimistic today, than I was yesterday that it will happen.  Besides this poll you have the WHO report today that COVID is growing exponentially, and then the Guardian editorialized that Japan and the IOC have to ask themselves if the event can be justified.  But they did stop short of calling for a cancellation and instead said if they go ahead, the IOC and Japan must ensure  that rules are enforced, not just communicated.  

http://bit.ly/kyodopoll

Still very troubling numbers here for Japanese Government and organizers.  Poll released April 11

Want Games cancelled    39.2% 

Want Games Postponed  32.8%

Games should go on         24.5%

Doesn't say about the other 3.5%