phelps

well, next year I think he's going to focus on the 100m Free and Back, then he already said some time ago that he will start to explore the 200m back and he hopes (if his knee and hip stay healthy) to take the 200m IM seriously imho, he should focus on the 100 & 200m free and back only, the IM races will be Marchand's territory for quite some time, I fear

however, I also have some good news... I thought this championship was going to be an epic fail in terms of people's participation because the tickets are quite expensive and because scheduling the finals' sessions at 4 p.m. in Italy, and especially in July/August in Milan, it's just crazy but I'm happy to say I was completely wrong...OK, the arena is very small, but all the tickets have already been sold, we're gonna have a full sellout crowd all week long (there were more than 2000 people hanging around already on Saturday and Sunday for the preliminary stages -in the less comfortable dedicated hall )

noooooo and this also fucks my prediction contest off

well, technically it's possible to qualify in all cycling disciplines among the women, it's quite normal to find girls who are very strong in more than 1 discipline...the best example is Pauline Ferrand Prevot, who was world champion on the road, in mtb xco and cyclo-cross between 2014 and 2015, when she used to switch between the various events like we change our socks the Paris schedule I think leaves enough space between mtb xco and road race to start in both events, if someone is so brave and strong to make that effort

are on fire in group C Yesterday they won 4-2 vs (and it was easier than the score might suggest) Today, they first destroyed by a score of 9-0 and then, a few minutes ago, they beat 6-1 (3rd win vs the North Americans in this Millenium, but 2nd in a row after last week's at the Canada Cup)

first disappointing outing for Gabriele Cimini couldn't even make the Main Draw of 64...that's not promising at all in perspective for the Team Event (where we desperately need a big score -at least making the gold medal match- to get back in contention for an Olympic spot)

it would have been undeserved... I mean, all the guys did their best given the situation (especially Zazzeri, just coming off a long pause for a severe anaphylactic shock that could have cost him his life), but now we know that are by far the best now (and I fear they won't do anything stupid like Today in Paris) for us this silver medal is already a really big achievement, but we need to improve a lot in the next 12 months if we want to try and get another Olympic medal in this kind of relay on the other hand, the rest of the team is just a disaster...a series of epic fails...nobody getting even close to their best clockings it's gonna be a really painful championship for us

it's the Olympics! they're coming in 12 months...

Today also the Group C goes underway in North-East other than the usual GameTime paid service, all the games of the Italian team and the whole Final Day of competition will be broadcasted (and streamed) live for free by an obscure Italian Network their website: www.mschannel.tv they also have an app for connected devices, it's named MS Plus and it's available on both App Store (iOS) and Play Store (Android) on the App, the games will be available also ondemand I have no idea if a VPN is needed outside the Italian borders

here in Italy, you have to say always Montecarlo in any case...if you say Monaco, all the people will think of Munich (which in Italian is Monaco)

[hide] Event & Date Athletes Gold Silver Bronze Women's Epee July 25th 2023 Nathalie Moellhausen Any Chinese Athlete X Nelli Differt Marie-Florence Candassamy X Alexandra Louis Marie Auriane Mallo-Breton Kong Mai Wai Vivian X Anna Kun Rossella Fiamingo Mara Navarria Any Other Italian Athlete Song Sera X Any Other South Korean Athlete Any Other Athlete Men's Sabre July 25th 2023 Bolade Apithy Maxime Pianfetti Matyas Szabo Sandro Bazadze X Andras Szatmari Aron Szilagyi X Ali Pakdaman Luigi Samele Any Other Italian Athlete X Iulian Teodosiu Oh Sanguk Any Other South Korean Athlete Any American Athlete X Any Other Athlete Men's Epee July 26th 2023 Nessier Loyola Lan Minghao Alexandre Bardenet X Romaine Cannone Mate Tamas Koch Gergely Siklosi X Davide Di Veroli X Federico Vismara Koki Kano Kazuyasu Minobe Ruslan Kurbanov Igor Reizlin Ruben Limardo Gascon Any Other Athlete X Women's Foil July 26th 2023 Jessica Zi Jia Guo Eleanor Harvey Shi Yue Pauline Ranvier Ysaora Thibus X Leonie Ebert Anne Sauer Martina Batini Martina Faveretto X Francesca Palumbo Alice Volpi Sara Azuma Yuka Ueno Lee Kiefer X Any Other Athlete X Men's Foil July 27th 2023 Alexander Choupenitch Alaaeldin Abouelkassem Mohamed Hamza Enzo Lefort Maxime Pauty Cheung Ka Long Daniel Dosa Alessio Foconi Daniele Garozzo X Filippo Macchi X Tommaso Marini X Alexander Massialas X Gerek Meinhardt Nick Itkin Any Other Athlete Women's Sabre July 27th 2023 Anna Bashta Manon Apithy-Brunet X Sara Balzer X Caroline Queroli Despina Georgiadou Theodora Gkountoura X Anna Marton Martina Criscio Any Other Italian Athlete Misaki Emura Any Spanish Athlete Olga Kharlan X Any American Athlete Any Other Athlete Women's Team Epee July 28th 2023 China Estonia France X Hong Kong Hungary Italy X Poland South Korea X Switzerland Ukraine United States Any Other Nation Men's Team Sabre July 28th 2023 Canada China Egypt France Germany Hungary X Iran Italy X Japan South Korea X Spain United States Any Other Nation Men's Team Epee July 29th 2023 China Czechia France X Hungary X Israel Italy X Japan Kazakhstan South Korea Spain Switzerland Venezuela Any Other Nation Women's Team Foil July 29th 2023 Canada China France X Germany Hungary Italy X Japan Poland South Korea Spain Ukraine United States X Any Other Nation Men's Team Foil July 30th 2023 Canada Egypt France X Germany Great Britain Hong Kong Italy X Japan Poland South Korea Ukraine United States X Any Other Nation Women's Team Sabre July 30th 2023 Azerbaijan Bulgaria France X Germany Greece Hungary X Italy X Japan South Korea Spain Ukraine United States Any Other Nation [/hide]

as a consequence, some great news for the Italian hockey fans (but not for my wallet )...NHL.tv is back with all of its content also for us back in topic... in a few minutes, I'm going to watch the DL meet (athletics) from Montecarlo (a bit time-shifted) meanwhile in the next few days, it's all about Swimming/Waterpolo and Fencing world champs (hopefully, one or two days of fencing action in person at the venue )

and in that case it might well happen to have a lot of Cubans representing different Nations in the top places of the Olympic competition, because the "other" Diaz (Jordan Alejandro Diaz Fortun) is going to represent Spain from next year (June 2024) and of course we have 2/3 Cubans still with their native Nation also capable of jumping very far

It has happened quite a few times in wrestling, with all the people on the podium coming from former USSR first and directly from Russia more recently and it also happened in women's Canoeing, not at the Olympics but at the 2001 world championships, when Josefa Idem, Kathrin Wagner and Kathrin Borchert were on the podium all together (all of them coming from, actually, having also represented earlier in their life , West Germany in Idem's case, to be precise)

a) the men are among the gold medal candidates, but we've never won the Olympic tournament, even when we were the absolute best team in the world, so, there's a chance, but I wouldn't say they're the favorites to win the gold medal I don't trust our girls at all, they're not mentally sound enough the best chance in team sports is always the men's waterpolo team (but again, it would take a miracle to win the Olympic gold...a silver/bronze medal is more likely) b) Iapichino might be a gold medal contender in the women's LJ, I just left her out in the previous post not to make the list too long) Furlani...I think it's too early for him, but who knows? right now, however, he can't be considered a favourite for gold, at least TJ...we don't even know if Diaz would be actually able to start at the Games with our team (there are still controversies on the actual date it should be used to count the 3 years from his last Cuban appearance) and in any case, he could well be a medal contender, but Pichardo is still the main candidate to the gold medal c) ask me after this byear's world champs d) men: it might well be, but right now I think we're not the favourite for the gold medal women: medal, but GBR are on another level, especially if they add Zoe Backstedt

on Raiplay (our public broadcaster's OTT service) all the events are still available they've been shown in full I also think a vpn is needed outside ITA

difficult to say for imho, right now 1. Aziz Mouhiidine (Boxing, men's -92kg) 2.Irma Testa (Boxing, women's -57kg) those 2 are the only really big favourites for Gold (they can only lose because a) a severe injury b) a blatant cheat by the boxing officials/judges), in a honest world, they are 2 of the safest gold medallists in the whole Olympic program, but we live in a gangsta paradise, therefore nothing is safe when human judges are involved 3.Sailing (mixed Nacra17), whether the reigning champions Tita/Banti or the newcomers Ugolini/Giubilei, it doesn't actually matter that much...both crews right now are more than solid gold medal contenders, but it's sailing, so, once again, there's nothing written in stone 4.Fencing (all 4 Foil competitions)...it will be really disappointing another "0 tituli" like in Tokyo 5.we have a lot more teams/athletes that on a given day could win an Olympic Gold, but none of them is an actual favourite to do it right now still, I have high expectations in many disciplines...among them, Taekwondo (Tokyo gold medallist Vito Dell'Aquila, men's -58kg and, above all, Simone Alessio, men's -80kg), Judo (Alice Bellandi, women's -78kg and Manuel Lombardo, men's -73kg), Shotgun Shooting (all events) and Athletics (all Race Walking events) are maybe the most likely to happen

I wouldn't call too much a surprise the Nacra17 duo in Sailing, they're not the favourite, but they still have a reasonable chance

great competition by the Mexican diver he didn't compete in last year's junior worlds (nor in 2021), he would have been a fierce rival for Matteo Santoro (who's born in 2006, however) ps it's true that you just can't compare diving scores like swimming or athletics marks, but Santoro got 550+ pts in his 2022 triumph...and you have to be pretty special to score like that with dives of 3.5 DD or less (it's a 90-pt+ average) but let's keep going with Tocci and Marsaglia...Italy = gerontocracy, in actual life but also in sports

no, it's not and in fact he got rightfully DQed

yeah, in the end Baku saved its championship...and not only, it looks that it will be a record breaking tournament

but if today he puts in play a Landis/Chiappucci style effort, how many people would actually trust him? by the way, yesterday's show by Vingegaard, it's difficult to think of it in terms of traditional physical doping...he did something that no "medicine" can suddenly allow. if there's something wrong (and I sincerely hope there's not), it must be some kind of technical trick, rather (and the fact that he's the only one that didn't change bike through the whole course just feeds the suspect)

yeah, just look at our doping bans thread... p.s. did you read about Tobi Amusan, the last shame of WA? I lost my hope quite some time ago...

clean era? in modern sport? in cycling, above all?

but also if they develop the men's game, it's still a poor man's basketball (that already has that 3*3 shit other than the actual game...and both well established in both genders). not to mention that's played at high level only in a few Commonwealth Countries and it's basically unknown in 98% of the world. there's 0 chance Netball will ever become an Olympic sport. having said that, I'm really sorry for the bad situation of the CWGs, I've always liked them and I've always tried to follow at least some of the sports involved.