Games and Rings
  • A Blog for Olympic Sports Fans

News Recap:  Week Ending May 10 2015

5/10/2015

 
Picture
A New Irish Athletics Star?
Congratulations to 400m hurdler Thomas Barr, after being named European Athletics' Athlete of the Month for April. This comes on the heels of setting a European-leading time of 49.08 in late April, which places him to-date at #5 on the year's list. It's a good time for a breakout season, with the World Championships later in the summer and the Olympic qualification push in earnest through next year. Ireland has not enjoyed a particularly high-profile athletic history, but perhaps Barr can help Robert Heffernan set a higher bar and draw some spotlight to the Emerald Isle. On the women's side, veteran Greek pole vaulter Ekaterini Stefanidi won the honor for April.

Thomas Bach and the United Nations
In a meeting during his Asian and Pacific tour, IOC president Thomas Bach reiterated his support for governments to push the United Nations to include sport as an important initiative with their Sustainable Development goals, to reinforce the ways that sport can be used as a unifying force. This complements his efforts from last month in which he joined Choue Chung-won (World Taekwondo Federation President) to support his proposal for a Sport Peace Corps. Although Choue's SPC plan is frustratingly not new, it sure does sound great to me...

This Week's Guanabara Absurdity
André Correa, Rio's environmental secretary, was filmed diving into the much-maligned Guanabara Bay, in an effort to show the cleanliness and safety of the waters despite multiple and consistent claims to the contrary. The stunt - which apparently was staged at the timing of high tide, and near the open mouth of the bay - has done little to stem the, um, tide, of criticism.

Team USA's New Awards Program
The U.S. Olympic Committee announced a revamped awards program, in partnership with corporate sponsor Dow, amongst others, in which monthly recognition will be presented to the top male, female, and team of the month. Which...isn't too different from the previous iteration, the Athletes and Team of the Month, except for the sponsor involvement (congrats to the USOC on finding a way to secure some additional $$ on an old platform) and some fan voting element. The first winners apparently were for March, although the official announcement came timed with the April version this week. (Congrats, Oksana Masters!)

FIFA Still Not Progressive
U.S. star player Abby Wambach, who had been at the forefront of pressuring FIFA to install real grass for the upcoming World Cup, revealed this week that there was a window of opportunity for FIFA to provide real grass - at no cost, but declined. There's probably an element of financial contracts with the artificial turf installer to be sensitive to, but my guess is that it really boils down to Sepp Blatter just not wanting to lose any face. It would have been interesting had more attention had been drawn to the issue - there is absolutely no way that the men would have been asked to play of non-grass. But the women backed down..a shame.

Picture
 A First for Gymnastics
Apparently, this hasn't happened before, but it did this weekend in Varna, Bulgaria -  a World Cup event in artistic gymnastics took place at the same time and place as a World Cup in acrobatics. I've always been curious that acro hasn't been pushed as an Olympic discipline, and this was a great opportunity to the sport in front of a larger crowd, with event finals being alternated on the final two days. Though, my favorite result from the weekend's news does come from the artistic side - Germany's stalwart Oksana Chusovitina winning the title in her specialty event, the vault. She's still going!


Speaking of Gymnastics
The International Gymnastics Federation (FIG) is mulling some changes to the Olympic competition for 2024, possibly reducing the number of allowed team members to enhance a focus on individual event competitors, and offer a greater range of geographic representation in the sport. True, there has been an increase over recent years on event specialists (see Chusovitina, above), and they do in theory get a short shrift in attention with the team-dominant structure currently in place. But how about this...reduce the # of team entrants and replace that athlete allotment with an acro competition??

More Trouble for SportAccord
Tension is increasing between SportAccord, the group representing a wide variety of international sport federations, and the International Olympic Committee. This week, boxing's federation AIBA pulled out of SportAccord, and the organization's World Combat Games as a direct result of SportAccord's president Marius Vizer's stern criticism of the IOC recently, in an obvious sign of 'taking sides' with the IOC. My money is on the IOC winning this battle - and war.

The Fifth Blind Games Open
In Seoul, the 5th edition of the International Blind Sports Association (IBSA) Games opened on Sunday. 60 countries have sent athletes to compete in athletics, chess, football, goalball, judo, powerlifting, showdown (kinda sort table tennis), swimming, and tenpin bowling. Good Luck to all the competitors!

Asian Wrestling Championships End
While the IBSA Games opened in Seoul, the Asian Wrestling Championships ended in Doha. As expected (I assume), Iran won the men's freestyle and greco-roman team titles, with Japan winning the women's. On the strength of the women (eight medals), Japan won the overall medal count with 18, followed by Iran at 13 and then China and Kazakhstan with 12 each. Now, if Iran can get on board with a women's program, they'd really be an all-around power.


Comments are closed.
    Above: Athens' Kallimarmaro, the site of the 1896 Summer Olympics


    About This Blog

    An Olympics fan blog celebrating all things Olympic sport athletes

    Picture
    Read about me.

    Navigate It

    Celebrating Olympic sport athletes with news links, social media peeks, and more, seen through the cheeky lens of this particular, passionate fan.

    ​Check out:
     A Little Roundup
    Get caught up on the athletes of Olympic sports with a collection of links to recent news and feature stories

    Let's Get Social
    Taking a look at what some of your favorite Olympic sport athletes are up to on social media away from competition.

    They are the Champions
    Congratulations to the world champions of Olympic sports!

    Athletes Worth Watching
    Who are some emerging Olympic sport athletes worth keeping an eye on for the future?

    ​Ramblings and Things
    ​
    I have my own comment and opinions sometimes!

    A Quick Review
    Quick thoughts on Olympic sports-related films, art, books, TV, etc. that I've come across .
    p.s. see my Bookshop!

    Picture
    Me at Rio 2016's Barra Olympic Park


    Follow Me

    Twitter
    Instagram
    ​
    Spotify
    Medium
    ​
    Bookshop
    Post.
    Mastodon
    Tumblr

    Favorite Sites

    The IOC
    The Olympic Museum
    Olympic World Library
    ​Intl Olympic Academy
    ​Team USA
    World Athletics
    ​Athletics Integrity Unit
    WADA
    Court of Arbitration
    Around the Rings
    Inside the Games
    GamesBids.com
    The Sports Examiner
    ​AP Olympics
    ​AP Winter Olympics
    NBC Olympic Talk
    NY Times ​Olympics
    USA TODAY Olympics
    Wiki Summer Olympics
    Wiki Winter Olympics
    ​Athlete365
    ​
    Global Athlete
    ​Olympic Historians
    World Olympians Assoc.
    ​Games Architecture​
    Art of the Olympians
    Olympic.org Results
    ​Olympedia
    ​Olympstats
    ​
    Olympian Database
    ​On This Day in Sports
    ​Coubertin Speaks
    ​Olympic City Project
    ​
    Keep the Flame Alive
    Off The Podium
    The Games Odyssey
    ​Totallympics
    ​Qualifying to the Games
    ​Lost Olympians
    ​
    Olympians 1964 to 2020
    All Sports Books Reviews
    Outsports
    ​
    Queerstory Files
    ​Paris 2024
    ​Milan Cortina 2026
    Los Angeles 2028


    Categories

    All
    A Little Roundup
    Alpine Skiing
    Amsterdam 1928
    Ancient Olympics
    Aquatics
    Archery
    Artistic Swimming
    Athens 1896
    Athens 2004
    Athlete Spotlight
    Athlete Worth Watching
    Atlanta 1996
    Badminton
    Baseball
    Basketball
    Basketball 3x3
    Beach Volleyball
    Beijing 2008
    Beijing 2022
    Berlin 1936
    Biathlon
    Bobsled
    Boxing
    Breaking
    Canoe/Kayak
    Cross Country Skiing
    Curling
    Cycling
    Cycling BMX
    Cycling Mountain Bike
    Cycling Road
    Cycling Track
    Demonstration Sports
    Diving
    Equestrian
    Fencing
    Field Hockey
    Figure Skating
    Freestyle Skiing
    Golf
    Gymnastics
    Handball
    Helsinki 1952
    Ice Hockey
    Innsbruck 1976
    IOC
    Judo
    Karate
    Let's Get Social
    London 1908
    London 1948
    London 2012
    Los Angeles 1932
    Los Angeles 1984
    Los Angeles 2028
    Luge
    Melbourne 1956
    Mexico City 1968
    Milano Cortina 2026
    Modern Pentathlon
    Montreal 1976
    Moscow 1980
    Munich 1972
    Non-Olympic Sports
    Nordic Combined
    Olympics
    Olympic Sports Media
    On This Date
    Other
    Paralympics
    Paris 2024
    Pyeongchang 2018
    Rhythmic Gymnastics
    Rio 2016
    Rome 1960
    Rowing
    Rugby Sevens
    Sailing
    Salt Lake City 2002
    Sarajevo 1984
    Seoul 1988
    Shooting
    Short Track Speedskating
    Skateboarding
    Skeleton
    Ski Jumping
    Ski Mountaineering
    Snowboarding
    Soccer (football)
    Sochi 2014
    Softball
    Speed Skating
    Sport Climbing
    Squash
    Stockholm 1912
    Summer Olympics
    Surfing
    Swimming
    Sydney 2000
    Table Tennis
    Taekwondo
    Tennis
    They Are The Champions
    Tokyo 1964
    Tokyo 2020
    Track And Field
    Trampolining
    Triathlon
    Volleyball
    WADA
    Water Polo
    Weightlifting
    Winter Olympics
    Wrestling


    Archives

    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014


    To opt-out of cookies, and to read this site's privacy policy, read the Policy page.

    The following link is listed for Mastodon site verification purposes only:
    Mastodon

    RSS Feed


Proudly powered by Weebly