phelps

100%...at least one between the Netherlands and Italy (and probably both of them) will be for sure among the 12 super Teams in 2019... next year's World Baseball Classic will tell a lot...it's the tournament that gives away the most points in the ranking and both Italy and the Netherlands will have big squads full of MLB pros...so there's a chance that they're going to do very well like in 2013 (NED was on the podium and ITA was 7th, but losing only by 1 run against DOM - the eventual champion - USA and PUR)... @Near yes, they are...but in Baseball they all play for "the Kingdom of the Netherlands" (that's the official status for WBSC)... and 98% of the Italians are North-American born, by the way (our biggest star at the moment is Anthony Rizzo from the Chicago Cubs)...

well, they're no longer the powerhouse they used to be...and if the MLB stars will enter the qualifying tournament (which is highly unlikey, however), probably they won't even qualify for the Games...

well, this is one of the things that have already been decided... it will be JPN + the best from each Continent among those ones who will make it to Super 12 tournament 2019 (and that tournament will only feature the top 12 nations in the world ranking, with no geographical protection)... if less than 5 continental zones wll make it to super 12 2012, then they will take into account the best team from that tournament, even if they come from an already qualified continent)...

if 2020 was tomorrow... FRA, JPN, EGY and TUR in Karate... AUT, CZE, SLO, CAN and KOR in Sport Climbing (but many things could change from now until 2020)... USA, AUS and BRA in Surf USA in Skateboard USA and JPN in Baseball/Softball just my personal opinion, of course...

Sport climbing (the classic Lead discipline and the newcomer Bouldering) has a very good fan base in many Countries around the Alps (France, Italy, Austria, Slovenia, but also in the Czech Rep. and in Germany)... there are also very good atletes from Belgium, GBR, Canada, US and even some Asian Countries (KOR above all, but also CHN, JPN and IRI)... the Speed discipline, on the other hand, it's almost entirely dominated by RUS, UKR and POL, with very few exceptions... as someone suggested, the international federation has a very good website, where you can find info, stats and videos of their main events throughout the year)... http://www.ifsc-climbing.org/ the only problem is that they won't have the 3 disciplines at the Olympic Games in 2020, but a senseless "combined event", which doesn't even exist in sport climbing until now... so, not the best way to promote this sport, I guess...

just look at page 2 of this same thread... they aim at 3+3 classes with just 10 athletes per class for Kumite and the same amount of players for Kata (which only has 1 male and 1 female class, at least)... with so few competitions, all medals would go to the sport powerhouses (FRA and JPN above all) and the smaller Nation (which could have a shot if there would be enough chances) will be left without any possibility event to qualify...

I think they will say YES to all 5... personally, as I wrote in the past, I'd say YES only to sport climbing (but not under those rules...only if they put the Lead and Speed special disciplines as Olympic events), Baseball/Softball (but only if they have a 12-team tournament with all the MLB, KOR and JPN leagues' stars) and Karate (but only with the full 5+5 weight classes of Kumite and with a decent - definitely not less than 16 per weight - number of competitors, without that boring farce named Kata)...

no, if I remeber well they have to vote YES to at least 2 of those 5...

I really hope it's like you wrote...I wish these Games all the best and I really hope they're going to be a great success... I keep my fingers crossed...

today is just about YES or NO for those sports...all details will be decided later... but we already discussed about the numbers they're targeting... here... http://totallympics.com/index.php?/topic/185-summer-olympic-games-2020-news/&do=findComment&comment=18195 to me, something like that doesn't make any sense...even for the other disciplines, not only Baseball and Softball

today I'm going for some action from SWE-RSA, CAN-AUS and BRA-CHN (but mixin' it up with some male European Champions League qualifiers as well)... and probably tomorrow morning i give a look at USA-NZL and FRA-COL's highlights (or maybe I'm gonna watch at least one of those 2 games in full on demand)... tomorrow night, instead, I'm planning a full immersion in the boys' tournament, trying to watch as much as I can (but once again I'm not gonna stay up all night...late games are on my Friday's schedule only)...

hope you're just jokin'...

very, very disappointed with the attendance at the first game...it reminds me the Athens 2004 experience, where only basketball and athletics had full stadiums... now I see that in Sao Paulo it's better...but we're still far away from what it should look in an event like the OG... I hope that tomorrow the boys would get more attention... meanwhile, I like the graphics...they're definitely better than London and Sochi's (despite using more or less the same font)...

no, in the past they didn't...their Olympic teams were always just university or 2nd tier league teams... of course Japanese pro leagues probably will support the 2020 Games, but just because they could give them a new boost in tv ratings and stadium attendance (which are nowadays suffering a bit of decline because of the many stars going to play in the USA - in fact MLB number of games shown on tv and their ratings are increasing lately in both JPN and KOR, especially in JPN)...

officially confirmed... Viktoria Orsi-Toth (Italy, Beach Volley) tested positive for Clostebol (steroids)... she's been already replaced by the American born Italian Rebecca "Becky" Perry, to make pair with Marta Menegatti... not a bad choice, I guess... http://www.gazzetta.it/Olimpiadi/2016/03-08-2016/ecco-becky-perry-arrivo-rio-160578232294.shtml

htere's not officialconfirmation, but it's almost sure that Viktoria Orsi-Toth (ITA, Beach Volley) was tested positive for Clostebol (steroids, the same substance of sailor Roberta Caputo)... so, even if she could be replaced by another Italian specialist, we don't have a competitive team anymore...maybe it would be better to pull out of the competition...

however, it's not that the paid commercial VPNs are a lot different...maybe they're not just as extreme in their "dark" side as hola, but don't trust them when they promise you that they're "transparent" to their users... by the way, when I need a good VPN, I use "Hyde My Ass" (but in the last year or so, after getting my motorized sat dish, basically I stopped using internet streams, apart for those 2 or 3 events I couldn't watch otherwise on tv - and in any case, I still use a Chromecast to send streams to my tv, when I need it)...

individual events in fencing and judo will also be on aug, 4th...

that's the theory...but practice can be a lot different...just look at what the Russians did in Sochi with their "disappearing positives"... frankly, I don't have any sort of confidence in any Institution (WADA, IOC, International Federations) when there's so much money on the table...

yeah, boxing has always been like a heaven for corrupted judges...some of the worst scandals ever have been recorded in this sport... other fighting sports are not so widely manipulated as boxing (maybe because they are less popular in many parts of the world and don't have the same economical power of boxing - even the relatively modest AIBA sector of boxing)... maybe only Taekwondo has had in the past the same problem as boxing, but now there are less "wrong winners" in all of its bouts (of course some manipulations will always be present, I'm not saying that now it's a completely clean discipline)... fencing...well, fencing is so poor on the economical side (and has very few Countries dominating the action, at least until the last few years) that it's not worth the effort to build a system like the boxing one, so until now there have been just a few occasional real cheats...mainly we have just bad mistakes because of not well prepared refs...

2 - to me, no...and it's the same for all "performance" disciplines (strenght or endurance it doesn't matter)... 3 - they should be tested in the last 6 months of their ban (that's also the minimum period required for "newcomers", I mean athletes registered for the first time by an international federation before they begin to compete in international events)... 4 - I think that in this way international federations would be encouraged even more than today to hide their cheaters, rather than exposing them like IWF is at least partially trying to do...they would never risk to lose the Olympic status and the consequent money they can raise thanks to that...

Italy Gold = 150000€ Silver = 75000€ Bronze = 50000€ this is the individual fee, also in team sports each athlete of the team would get this same amount of money...

maybe they did it on purpose, so to win one more medal... but no...of course, it's a typo...

the good thing about BBC streams is that they are available to everybody in Europe, since they are FTA on satellite @ 28.2 Est (I already put them on top of my channel list, snce they are already active and showing pictures from some events of the London Games - in particular, now they are looping Track Cycling, Men's Keirin + Athletics, Men's 10000m and Diving, Men's Springboard)...