All posts tagged "2021"

Los Angeles (AFP) - US gymnastics icon Simone Biles said on Monday she should have quit "way before Tokyo" but held onto her Olympic dream even though it took a heavy emotional toll on her well-being. The 24-year-old Biles was expected to dominate at the Tokyo Games but instead caused a sensation by pulling out of the opening event of the women's gymnastics competition after being plagued by an attack of the "twisties". "If you look at everything I have gone through the past seven years," Biles told New York Magazine in an interview released Monday. "I should have never made another Olympic te......

The Tokyo Paralympics ended on Sunday with a spectacular closing ceremony as China finished the Games top of the medals table by a huge distance. The Paralympics has been held without fans and under strict coronavirus protocols, just like the Olympics in the Japanese capital in July and August, China racked up 96 golds and 207 medals in total followed by Britain with 41 golds and 124 medals. The US was third with 37 golds and 104 medals ahead of the Russian Paralympic Committee with 36 and 118. Russia was not allowed to compete as a nation due to doping-related sanctions. China, which next hos......

The German modern pentathlon coach disqualified from the Tokyo Olympic Games for punching a horse has expressed regret for the incident and insisted that animals in the sport are not badly treated. "I am a long way from torturing animals," Kim Raisner told dpa on Sunday. "I love animals, I love horses. We don't beat up our horses." German gold hopeful Annika Schleu saw her Olympic medal dreams end on Friday when horse Saint Boy refused to take the show-jumping course. Entering the middle event of the pentathlon with a substantial lead, Schleu's failure to score on the horse left her out of con......

Japanese siblings Uta and Hifumi Abe made history on Sunday when they claimed double judo gold for the Olympic hosts at the Tokyo Games within one hour on Sunday. Uta Abe, 21, first beat French star Amandine Buchard by ippon in added time in the women's -52kg category at the iconic Budokan venue. The two-time world champion then watched in sheer joy when 23-year-old Hifumi Abe beat Georgia's Vazha Margvelashvili by waza-ari in the men's -66kg event. It is the first time at the Olympics that siblings have won gold on the same day in an individual sport. Japan now have three golds from the Tokyo......

Japanese tennis superstar Naomi Osaka has lit the Olympic cauldron for the Tokyo Games at the opening ceremony. Four-time grand slam champion and former world number one Osaka, 23, completed a 121-day torch relay across the country held rather low-key under coronavirus conditions. Japan-born Osaka has a Japanese mother and Haitian father. They moved to the United States when she was three years old. She is one of the big gold medal hopes for the hosts but has not played in two months since withdrawing from the French Open and then citing mental health problems....

Brisbane was confirmed as host city for the 2032 Olympics on Wednesday as the Games head to Australia for a third time. International Olympic Committee (IOC) members followed the proposal from their executive board by voting 72-5, with three abstentions, at the 138th IOC Session in Tokyo, ahead of the 2020 Games opening Friday following a year delay because of the coronavirus pandemic. The Brisbane Games and Paralympics will be the latest in sports-mad Australia, following Melbourne 1956 and Sydney 2000. The capital of Queensland came second time lucky after losing out against Barcelona for th......