phelps

the discus throw final 2 shots!!! Ceh and Stahl!!!!!

as I wrote, that was the only time it happened...the once in a lifetime that sometimes comes and leaves people with open mouth personally, I expected gold from Stano, Palmisano and a medal (not gold) from Tamberi we won 5 gold medals, instead I'm glad it happened to Italy (and not to any other Country), it was great, it will be always in the memories, but it's not that we repeated that (over)performance...it was just a lucky week that most likely it won't happen anymore and trust me, nobody expects that to happen again

well, Italy has a stricter anti-doping law (even the athletes could theoretically end up in jail...Schwazer had to admit all of his faults in 2012 and pay a very high prize -not only the 4 year ban, he also lost his job in the Carabinieri group and had to pay a high fine to avoid jail) and NADO is really drawing a lot of funds from the general sport account (the problem is that they spend all of them pursuing amateur athletes and being part of some plots related to the internal wars in the Italian sport system) for instead, I can only name a few episodes (all in the last 15 years, so well after the end of the former GDR histeria): Deutsche Telekom, Jan Ullrich and his teammates attending Dr. Fuentes lab Humansplasma clinic in Wien (managed by a German doctor and attended by all the best cross country skiers and biathletes of that age) operation Aderlass and I could add the Leipold case (Sydney 2000) and Sachenbacher when she switched to biathlon and a few more not that I'm blaming more than any other...all the Countries have their skeletons in the closet ( included...we all know who dr. Conconi and dr. Ferrari are and where they come from -just to name a couple, don't worry) I'm only loughing at the idea that the German coaches/officials have a true adversion to certain methods...it's not...they're just as many others (sure, not the worst in the world, we all know that there are some "addicted" to certain methods that go way beyond the average)

no surprise at all...she just can't deliver when it matters she can only jump high in unknown meets with no people in the stands

Fortunato this Spring won the most important race of the season beating all those who beat him yesterday...so, yes, he was a legitimate medal candidate I'm not that disappointed or surprised he didn't medal, but I counted on him before the race, I wouldn't have been shocked if he had won Stano was 3rd in the same race Fortunato won, he's last year's world champion over the 35 kms (with a last 2 kms stint that would have given him also the 20km title)...his only bad race was at the Europeans in Munich (and also that day it was raining hard...is it a coincidence? ) Iapichino won 3 consecutive diamond league meets, she jumped 6.97 indoor (silver medal at the Euroindoor) and 6.95 and 6.93 in those DL meets...despite all you can say, with Mihambo out of contention, she was the absolute favourite before the event...and yes, when you're regularly 3/7 cms short of the 7m mark through the season, you are more than expected to improve at least by 10cm in the top event of the year...the champions normally do that and in any case, it's not even the 5th place the disappointing part, it's just the measure...a growing talent like her can't afford to not get the top result of the year when she's supposed to and come home without being criticized. Arese...the PB are relatively not important in this case...the race was on "his" pace, there were no pacemakers leading to a 3.30 mark, he has the perfect characteristics to perform well in this kind of events rather than the circuit meets as he has good progression over the last lap or so and also a good change in the last 100m...he can really do well in a world semifinal with a 3.33 pace (and Cavalli is the perfect demonstration of this theory...you don't need a super-fast PB when the race is just on "your" pace...you need a great kick and some luck) however, I didn't mark Arese as "disappointing", I only wrote that I expected him to make the final because of the tactical nature of a world semifinal race...he couldn't...no problem, he'll do it next time, I'm sure...it's not his elimination that changes my interpretation of the whole team result

women's Individual 50m 3-Position Rifle Gold: Zhang Qiongyue Silver: Han Jiayu Bronze: Sagen Maddalena Olympic Quota Places (to the NOCs, NOT to the shooters): Full Results https://www.issf-sports.org/competitions/venue/csevent.ashx?cseventid=18366

in the specific case of this championship, in Italy there were no big expectations, but still Stano and/or Fortunato in the men's 20km are at least a missing medal Palmisano instead got an expected medal (despite all of her injuries, she's way better than any other active specialist and she's always asked to win, also when she's not at 100%) on the other hand, Fabbri won an unexpected silver in the men's shot put (but Weir had troubles when he was expected to fight for the medals), meanwhile Iapichino is definitely the biggest disappointment so far...she should have won at least silver (and she was clearly expected way over 7 meters) in the 1500m, we expected Arese to make the men's final (and nothing more, tbh) and he didn't, but we got Cavalli in the women's final, which is probably one of the biggest surprises of the championship so far Osakue and Ihemeje are in their respective final, which was their initial target...we'll see how they go, but a top 8 placing would be already a great achievement up to you to decide if this is beyond expectations, a fair balance or "underperforming"...

I'm not saying "performing badly", but still, I can't hear words like "overperforming" and getting "more medals than expected"... with a couple of notable exceptions, it's not true at all...actually, it's the opposite (which, again, doesn't necessarily mean "underperform badly", it's just "not as good as many thought")

where? when? and please, don't tell me "in Tokyo", as it was just an exception, when we had 3 medal candidates and we came home with 5 gold medals (and only in athletics, because in the other sports we didn't maximize anything also in those "happy days" of 2021)

also here they don't update anything until it's shown by the tv director (if they think that big throws/jumps will be shown in reasonable time), but as I wrote, they did show all of the 80+ meters throws live or slightly delayed (and in order, not messing it up), so they could keep up with the competition pace and hype and not relegating it just to a 2/3-throw summary once it was all over

it happens because the official results table updates the athletes' scores according to their finish in the 800/1500m therefore it might happen that someone having a slow run is added to the final results list only a few seconds after someone who just had a fast run but he/she's behind in the ranking and I agree, it does generate a lot of confusion and false hopes...they shouldn't show the updated scores until they have them all

yes, our TV (sky Italia, I don't know what our public TV did, I never watched them) did show the best throws of that competition (in double screen during the 10kms race, especially after the LJ was over) and the reporters always updated the situation, giving decent attention to the competition

that's what they always do on the Italian TV networks...how do you feel? let's re-watch your race and tell me what's gone wrong/great (depending on the outcome) finally, what are you going to do at tonigh't party (if it's over and you got some remarkable result)/what do you think you have to do to improve next time (if there's another round or if it's over and you haven't got a good result) they never go out of this scheme (in every sport) that's how I really hate those post-races interviews that are only covering the action on the field

or the IOC might cut their requests for "cathedrals in the desert" down... I think Budapest already have a lot of venues more than suitable for the OGs and if only the IOC could accept to host some sports in temporary pavillions in an "Exhibition Complex" in town (which would host any sort of activity as a legacy after the games), then also smaller Countries like (or ) might be able one day to enjoy Home Olympics otherwise it will be more and more difficult for them to find a big city really wanting to spend so much money, except maybe for some Nations under dictatorships in search for propaganda

in the end, it was a very enjoyable afternoon of athletics my highlights, the men's Hammer Throw and above all the KJT vs Anna Hall duel in the 800m of the women's Eptathlon...what a race! what an effort by a likely injured Hall and what an answer by KJT luckily, I didn't watch that on the BBC

yeah, Balaton Lake is perfectly suitable for sailing they already hosted European and World champs of Olympic classes in the past (actually, just Today won the ILCA 6 World Title thanks to Maria Erdi )

remember that I own the copyright for certain things!

mixed Team Skeet Gold: United States 1 (Austen Jewell Simth & Vincent Hancock) Silver: Ukraine 1 (Iryna Malovichko & Mikola Milchev) Bronze: Great Britain 1 (Amber Jo Rutter & Ben Llewellin) Full Results https://www.issf-sports.org/competitions/venue/csevent.ashx?cseventid=18351

these mixed team events are really more than just the addition of a couple of individual performance, there must be some kind of feeling between the 2 shooters, otherwise the disaster is just behind the corner and the mental aspect, being contested the day following the individual finals, also plays a complicated role from an Italian perspective, despite the good performance of the men, we've just been killed by the bad day of our girls

a capital mistake cost the gold medal, with coming back from hell and making up good 8 points from the Swiss girl in the medal race, so to overtake her in the final overall standings the best, closest and most exciting medal race of the championship just at the end, despite the very difficult weather (almost no wind)

women's Dinghy (ILCA 6) Gold: Maria Erdi Silver: Maud Jayet Bronze: Anne-Marie Rindom Full Result https://worlds2023.sapsailing.com/gwt/Home.html#/regatta/leaderboard/:eventId=03b11a50-8446-43e9-878c-6cb60dc75715&regattaId=Worlds 2023 - Women's Dinghy

very weak wind today... it was just painful watching those boats struggling so much to sail at an at least acceptable speed they were just at the limit of the rulebook

men's Dinghy (ILCA 7) Gold: Matt Wearn Silver: Michael Beckett Bronze: George Gautrey Full Result https://worlds2023.sapsailing.com/gwt/Home.html#/regatta/leaderboard/:eventId=03b11a50-8446-43e9-878c-6cb60dc75715&regattaId=Worlds 2023 - Men's Dinghy

1 vs for gold and 1 vs for bronze in the mixed Team Skeet finals starting @ 4.30 p.m. CET