On Friday, July 26th, the Games Off The XXXIIIrd Olympiad will open in Paris, France. This will be the third time Paris will have hosted the Summer Olympics, having hosted in 1900 and 1924.
One thing about these Olympics Games is these will now be back to full crowds. You may remember the Tokyo Games were delayed by a year and had to be held without spectators. You may also remember the Beijing Winter Olympics were also quite limited in spectators. Now that the pandemic has been mostly tamed down, Paris can be a free-for-all and the crowds are back. Also I got back my ambition to do pre-Olympic blogging. Something I haven’t done since the 2018 Winter Games.
With every Olympics comes many an athlete or team that will be heavy favorites or athletes of curiosity. Here’s my look at fourteen athletes at the Paris Games who you should keep an eye on.
-Noah Lyles/USA – Athletics: The American sprinters have been struggling to get themselves back to the top for almost 20 years. First there was the setback of Usain Bolt and other Jamaicans. Then there was Italy’s Marcell Jacobs winning in Tokyo and the men’s really team failing to qualify for the final. Seeking to put the US back on top is 27 year-old Noah Lyles. Back at the Tokyo Games, promise was noticed as he won a bronze in the 200 metres. At last year’s World Championships, he won the 100m, 200m and was part of the winning American relay team.
This season, Lyles is ranked World #1 in both the 100m and 200m and even recently ran a personal best in the 100m of 9.81. Lyles will have rivals in Paris. In the 100m, he will be up against Jamaica’s Kishane Thompson and Kenya’s Ferdinand Omanyala who have posted faster times this year. Expecting to challenge Lyles in the 200 is Tokyo silver medalist Kenneth Bednarek who finished second to him at the US Olympic trials. Also rivaling him is Botswana’s Letsile Tebogo who finished second to him at the 2023 Worlds in the 100 and third in the 200. If all goes well for Lyles, he could be one of the stars of Paris.
-Sha’Carri Richardson/USA – Athletics: Many will remember before the Tokyo Olympics, there was a lot of news of Richardson being disqualified from the Olympic team for testing positive for marijuana. It was a shock to many. Sha’Carri was undoubtedly disappointed. Unnoticed at the time was the then 21 year-old sprinter was still young and her best years were still to come. At last year’s World Championships, her talent arrived when she won the 100m, finished third in the 200m and was part of the US’s winning relay team.
For most of this year, Sha’Carri has kept it low-key. She hasn’t been to too many competitions and bypassed the Diamond League this year. She did prove herself to be a force in the 100m in Paris after winning the US Olympic trials in 10.71. Her main rival Sherlock’s Jackson of Jamaica is injured but that won’t stop her from having rivals in Paris like Ivory Coast’s Marie-Josee Talou-Smith, St. Lucia’s Julien Alfred and Jamaican legend Shelly-Anne Fraser-Price looking for one last Olympic gold. Paris could be Sha’Carri’s moment and the possible start.of a long legendary career.
-Yaroslava Mahuchikh/Ukraine – Athletics: Back at the Tokyo Olympics, Yaroslava was 19 years old and seen as a rising talent with her bronze medal in the high jump. Then the war started months later. Many Ukrainian athletes had to find new ways to train or even leave Ukraine to seek refuge in another country. Mahuchikh first traveled by car to Belgrade to compete at the World Indoor Championships. Shortly after, she found refuge in Germany to resume training. Since her move, her career skyrocketed with silver at the 2022 World Outdoor Championships and then gold last year. Just last month, Mahuchikh broke the 37 year-old world record in the women’s high jump!
She is a heavy favorite to win the high jump in Paris, but she will have competition. She will face rivalry from Australia’s Nicola Olyslagers who beat her at this year’s World Indoor Championships as well as another Australian: 2022 World Champion Eleanor Patterson. Whatever happens, Mahuchikh’s triumphs are not limited to inside the athletics arena.
-Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone/USA and Karsten Warholm/Norway – Athletics: The biggest action in athletics at the Tokyo Olympics came in both the men’s and the women’s 400m hurdles. In both events, the winner broke the world record by a huge margin, the second-place finisher finished in a time faster than the pre-Olympic world record and the third-place finisher’s time was a small fraction short of that pre-Olympic world record!
It’s interesting to see what has happened since to both men’s winner Karsten Warholm and women’s winner Sydney McLaughlin. Both won their hurdles event at a World Championship since. Walholm has still continued his consistency with major victories, and won the 2023 World championships but finished 7th at the 2022 Worlds. McLaughlin has also won the 2022 Worlds and has even knocked almost a full second off the world record since Tokyo. She missed the 2023 Worlds due to a knee injury. Both runners will face rivalry here in Paris. For Warholm, the two other medalists from Tokyo — US’s Rai Benjamin and Brazil’s Allison dos Santos — will rival him in Paris. McLauglin’s top rivalry will come from 2023 World Champion Femke Bol of the Netherlands and her own teammate Shamier Little. Only time will tell if both repeat as Olympic champion here in Paris, and if they break the world record again.
-Eliud Kipchode/Kenya – Athletics: One thing about social media these past ten years is that there are so many athletes being promoted as GOATs. One of which is Eliud Kipchode who’s commonly seen as the GOAT of marathon running. Personally I still want to think of Abebe Bikila as the GOAT but Kipchode’s feat of eleven major marathon victories, four Olympic medals including two marathon gold’s, and breaking the world record twice, it’s very tempting to call him the GOAT. Even his time-trial marathon run under two hours sparked buzz.
The crazy thing about marathon races, especially at the Olympics, is that it is the hardest to predict. Many favorites have succumbed to the course or the weather conditions and unknowns have often ended up the winners. Despite his illustrious career spanning almost two decades, Kipchode will face rivalries from 2023 World Champion Victor Kiplangat of Uganda and from his own teammate Benson Kipruto who has won the fastest marathon time this year. Whatever the result, Kipchode will add to his greatness here in Paris.
-Simone Biles/USA – Gymnastics: Simone Biles is an athlete loved by many, shunned by others. For many years, she was dominant in gymnastics having won a stack of World Championships and at the 2016 Rio Olympics, she was the queen winning four golds and a bronze. In between Rio and Tokyo was the revelation of the predator doctor Larry Nassar. Biles was one of his former patients who testified against him. Then at the Tokyo Olympics, she had a mental lapse called the ‘twisties’ and needed to bypass most of the competition. She did leave Tokyo with a silver and a bronze, but many people, most of whom don’t understand the dangers of gymnastics, labeled her a quitter or a loser. She would come back at the 2023 Worlds winning four golds and a silver.
Despite being the queen, she will face challenges from Brazil’s Rebecca Andrade and from her own American teammates in Jordan Chiles and defending Olympic all-around champion Sunisa Lee. Whatever happens in Paris, it will add to Simone’s greatness.
-Carlos Alcaraz/Spain – Tennis: One thing about tennis is right while there are a lot of greats, there are also young guns looking to dethrone them. One of which is Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz. Right at a time that seems dominated by Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic, Alcaraz appears poised to dethrone them. The 21 year-old has already won singles titles in Wimbledon, the US Open and most recently his first French Open victory. The latter is an advantage as the Olympic tennis competition will also be in the Roland Garros arena.
One thing about Olympic tennis is that most favorites have not won the gold medal and many times, unknown players have become Olympic champion. In fact, Djokovic’s only Olympic medal is a silver from 2008. Djokovic is one of Alcaraz’s rivals here in Paris. Also in the tournament are challenges from Germany’s Alexander Zverev and Norway’s Casper Ruud. Paris should be another chance for Alcaraz to make a name for himself in the tennis world.
-Julien Alfred/St. Lucia – Athletics: One of the things I like to do each summer Olympics is keep an eye out for any athletes that just might win their nation’s first-ever medal. One with good chances is 23 year-old Julien Alfred from the Caribbean island of St. Lucia. Her talent was first noticed at the 2018 Youth Olympic Games when she won silver.in the 100m. When she enrolled at U of Texas and became part of the Longhorns track team, that’s when things improved. She won a silver medal at the 2022 Commonwealth Games and at last year’s World Championships, she finished fifth in the 100m and fourth in the 200m.
In the 100, her rivals include Sha’Carri, Shelly-Anne Fraser-Price and Marie-Josee Talon-Smith. In the 200, she will face challenges from Jamaica’s Shericka Jackson, the US’s Gabrielle Thomas and the UK’s Daryll Neita. The Olympics are known for upsets and Julien Alfred could prove to be one of the top upsetters in Paris.
-Spain Women’s National Football Team: When it comes to a nation like Spain, you figure they would greatly support their men’s football team but greatly overlook their women’s team. Over the last five years, the RFEF started taking their women more seriously. After the 2019 Women’s World Cup, Spain’s women’s team made huge improvements in the sport and even won the Women’s Works Cup last year. Despite the growing success of the team, the sexism the team has been facing has been greatly exposed. Before the WWC, players boycotted the team because of a lack of a tactical preparation and a controlling environment. After they won the WWC, there was the incident at the trophy ceremony where RFEF president Luis Rubiales kissed player Jenni Hermoso on the lips, unconsentually. The controversy sparked outrage in Spain which led Rubiales to resign and paved the way for better equality with Spain’s women’s team.
One thing about the reigning WWC champion is that they’ve never won the Olympic gold medal. Spain aims to end that bad luck curse. They could face tight rivalry from the WWC fourth-place team Australia and from the US and Germany who hope to improve greatly after their WWC disappointments. Even host-nation France could be a threat. Anything is possible at the 2024 Olympics and Spain’s team could just achieve another victory here.
Four From The Host Nation
France’s athletes have competed in every Summer Olympic games except 1904 and have won a total of 751 medals: 223 of them gold. That medal haul puts them 5th in the all-time total of Summer Olympic medals. The sports where they’ve won their most gold medals are in fencing, cycling (which they have the most total medals), judo, equestrian and sailing. Here in Paris, the French team look to greatly add to their legacy. Here are four athletes representing France to look out for:
-Leon Marchand/France – Swimming: France’s swimmers have won a total of 43 medals. Eight of them gold. So far no French swimmer has won two individual event gold medals. The possibility looks great for Leon Marchand. Back at the Tokyo Olympics, he was 19 at the time and didn’t win a medal. Since then, he has become the fastest all-around swimmer in the world. He has won the World Championships of both 2022 and 2023 in both individual medley events: 200m and 400m. 2023 had added bonuses as he broke Michael Phelps’ world record in the 400 from the 2008 Olympics and he also won a bonus gold in the 200m butterfly.
He will face rivalry here in Paris from the UK’s Duncan Scott and the US’s Carson Foster in the IM races. In the 200 fly, he will face rivalry from defending Olympic champion Krisztok Milak of Hungary and Tokyo silver medalist Tomoru Honda of Japan. If all goes well, Marchand should be able to delight the home-nation crowd.
-Joris Daudet, Sylvain André and Romain Mahieu/France – BMX Cycling: Usually when you think of France and cycling, you think road racing like the Tour De France. Even though France is still big in road racing, it has recently developed as a force in BMX racing! Franch riders have won a medal at every World Championships since 2016 and they’ve won the last two: Romain Mahieu winning last year and veteran Joris Daudet Winning this year. The caliber of talent of France’s BMX racers is so jam-packed, last year’s Worlds silver medalist Arthur Pilard didn’t make the Olympic team. Instead this year’s Worlds bronze medalist Sylvain André will be competing in Paris.
The most interesting thing is all three were finalists at the Tokyo Olympics. Despite the big predictions, it will all boil down to the races. In fact, Daudet has won World Championship medals since 2011 but has never won an Olympic medal. The anticipated sweep of the medals will face a challenge from defending Olympic champion Noel Kimmann and 2022 World Champion Simon Marquardt from Switzerland. Anything can happen in Paris and the French BMXers can deliver a performance for the ages.
And there you have it. There’s my look at foreign athletes to look out for at the upcoming Paris Olympics. My blog of Canadians to look out forl is coming soon.
Jon The Blogcentric 