Your Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympics anticipation thread!

aus add their 4th but gb pull it back to 4-3 with 5 mins left. epic.

aus have basically stopped attacking the last 10 mins, barely been out of their half.

aus see it out. great game.

Djokovic lost thank fuck. Shame it was Zverev who inflicted it.

novak (w/ stojanovic) also loses in mixed. will hope to settle for two bronzes

havent seen zverev once this tourney but his stats (v minimal double faults + lotsa winners) look like hes playing amazingly

Lol I was wondering about this but not caring enough till I saw this piece on ROC

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2021/jul/30/roc-olympic-successes-mean-absent-russia-more-present-than-ever-tokyo-olympics

For a paper that goes on about Russia this was p even

badminton mixed doubles final was great.

yeah, loved that

straight up cackled at Djokovic going home without a singles medal for the third Olympics in a row

I'm glad to say I was there on Court no.1 nine years ago when Del Potro beat him for the bronze... and I stayed up until about 4am to watch DP knock him out of Rio too. No mixed medal either - looks like he's pulled out of the 3rd-place match. Excellent (though that sucks for Stojanovic).

First time Novak has lost back-to-back singles matches since... Tour Finals 2019 (Thiem/Federer)?

He'll be back in Paris 2024 though :(

Athing Mu looks phenomenal in the 800m. Won the semi final barely breaking a sweat.

Jamaica 1-2-3 in the women’s 100m. Thompson-Herah just broke Flo Jo’s Olympic record.

they only showed the gbr female and male runs of the bmx freestyle, two runs each. these were heats, actually down as 'seeding' because *everybody* qualified, there were only 10 women and 8 men competing. finals tonight.

(actually one of the Americans may've thrown his two runs so as to keep his final run secret, will be interesting to see)

svitolina over rybakina in the bronze match was p epic, especially the last game. svitolina is scarily intense.

bencic just gave a break back in the deciding set vs vonderosa. both players feeling it now that gold is tantalisingly within sight.

bencic comes out of a medical timeout at 4-3 to play a perfect game to break. serving for gold.

15-40

back to deuce now mp

saved. now bp

bencic does it!!! so happy for her.

Just left the tennis venue at a little over 1 am cursing both women’s matches for dragging this on for way longer than necessary. I also blame my editor who sunnily told me I would be able to go home early since Djokovic withdrew - not a chance. It’s been a crazy, insane week of tennis and I both don’t want it to end and can’t wait for it to be over.

I'm usually a fan of the obscure sports - but I'm skeptical of 3x3 basketball. Anyone a fan of 3x3? Does it have a following?

I hadn't even heard of it before the games, but I find it very enjoyable. It's like condensed greatest hits version of normal basketball.

bbc 6music news has just spoilered the bmx results for me 8(

Bit bummed we only got to see Logan Martin’s safety run.

bbc 6music news has just spoilered the bmx results for me 8(

The guardian spoils pretty much every result for me.

Tried to watch some judo last night. Incomprehensible.

7 man playoff for bronze in golf right now lol.

During the BMX, especially during Nakamura Rim’s round, they kept cutting away to a line of fans on the bridge by the arena. A little bit of pathos, there.

Enoshima is a great location for the sailing. (I really need to go and visit, that area is on Japanese TV a lot)

bbc changed channels halfway through the women's second bmx with the gbr having fallen during first run...

No Jamaican in the men’s 100m final.

love the Kenyan singlets

Yulimar finally smashes the World Record in the triple jump. Beaten after 26 years.

Aw, Bashim and Tamberi were given the option of having a jump-off in the high jump or sharing the gold and they chose to share.

That was terrific.

that Barshim-Tambera moment will be the best gif of these Games

*Tamberi

Wow, Italy gold in 100m too!

History made 😍

Gold medal for both Mutaz Essa Barshim and Gianmarco Tamberi after the two athletes agree on it!#Olympics #athletics #TokyoOlympics2021 pic.twitter.com/zpWXVmsuiw

— George Orfanakis (@G_Orfan) August 1, 2021

Fratus é a personificação do meme do emocionado do pódio 🥉🇧🇷 pic.twitter.com/EfqwUwlf8s

— Vinícius (@vinni_pereira) August 1, 2021

lol badminton women's doubles final one player ran off court mid point leaving her partner to hold on, grabbed a spare racket off the table, ran back and won the point. and the indonesian pair win gold despite being unseeded

!!

This is rather worrying but not unexpected: https://www.reuters.com/lifestyle/sports/exclusive-olympics-belarusian-athlete-says-she-was-taken-airport-go-home-after-2021-08-01/

Looks like Facebook is good for something:

"The 25-year-old Rojas, who has already won two world titles and a silver medal in Rio in 2016, paid credit to her coach, the legendary Cuban long jumper Ivan Pedroso, with whom she linked via Facebook. After its algorithm suggested they be friends, she wrote to Pedroso to say how much she admired him. He replied that he rated her as well and then invited her to train with him in Spain.

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“It was destiny,” she said. “It was meant to happen. I think that meeting Ivan through Facebook was definitely a turning point in my life. I just broke a world record and have an Olympic gold medal. This is priceless. I am making my dreams come true.”

Rojas, who had initially wanted to be a volleyball player only to find there was no team in her local sports centre in Anzoategui, beat Patricia Mamona of Portugal and her training partner, Ana Peleteiro of Spain, into silver and bronze respectively.

“I was looking for the world record, I knew we had that distance in my legs to get it,” she said. “I could hear the ‘wow’ from the crowd and Ana screaming – I didn’t have to look because my head, my heart, my body already knew. My coach was screaming and jumping and cheering. It is incredible!”

When told that she was the first Venezuelan female gold medallist, she said: “I think I am opening doors – and not just for myself. I am also opening doors for people who want to achieve great things and to write great things for my country.”"

Lol bcz it's true

who cares https://t.co/ZsBL4B7loO

— raandy (@randygdub) August 1, 2021

"Can we have two golds?"

Best Olympic moment I’ve ever seen pic.twitter.com/vZP8XNegVq

— Ana Breton (@missbreton) August 2, 2021

That was magic.

Not so magic are TeamGB’s Lotus bikes.

The moment of this Olympics for sure! And all the right people have been triggered by it. I'm curious why anyone would choose to have a jumpoff: "You can either both have the gold now, or potentially lose. It's your choice."

Canada beat US in the women's fitba. A shit match and US had the better of it tbh but would be cracking if Sinclair can end her career with the gold

sweet sweet revenge for 2012

This is rather worrying but not unexpected: https://www.reuters.com/lifestyle/sports/exclusive-olympics-belarusian-athlete-says-she-was-taken-airport-go-home-after-2021-08-01/

She has been offered asylum in Poland. The whole story is crazy.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/02/world/asia/belarus-olympics-kristina-timanovskaya.html?action=click&module=In%20Other%20News&pgtype=Homepage

Oh look, the foundations of women's sport have not in fact been ripped asunder, dashing the dreams of little girls everywhere or whatever the TERFs told us would happen https://t.co/h8TsdnJ0fH

— Stefan Bielik (@prstskrzkrk) August 2, 2021