Tokyo 2020 Olympics: the new phenomena ready to become myths

The stars of Usain Bolt and Michael Phelps, the phenomena of the last Olympics in athletics and swimming (eight gold medals for the Jamaican from 2008 to 2016 and 23 for the American from 2004 to 2016) will not shine in the Tokyo sky. Now that they are part of the history of the Games, new heroes are already appearing chasing other records. It is the magic of the Olympics, the highest expression of sport that for 125 years has been producing emotions through the best performers of the various disciplines.

After waiting a year longer than expected, the show finally opens. Until 8 August there is the possibility, for all the Olympians, to dream. And then there are the phenomena, those destined to amaze to make their history and that of the Games even greater.

Teddy Riner in Tokyo fights in the homeland of sport where he is already king to become a legend and equal the three Olympic golds of the Japanese Tadahiro Nomura in the 60 kg (1996, 2000 and 2004). At Nippon Budokan, where judo became an Olympic sport in 1964, the Frenchman aims to confirm his leadership in the over 100 kg category where he has already won two Olympics and ten World Championships. To do this, he underwent a diet that made him return to a healthy weight of 135 kilos, losing 30. In the sports hall where the Beatles also performed, the stands will be desolately empty. Too bad, because Riner in Tokyo is more famous than John Lennon.

Simone Biles in Rio 2016 came close to perfection: four golds (teams, individual, vaulting and free body) and a bronze (beam). In Tokyo she will try to do better to overcome the Czech legend Vera Caslavska, four golds and two silvers in Mexico City 1968. To do so, the American gymnast trained at the World Championship Center in Spring, Texas. Which then is the family gym, a structure open to the public and born thanks to the passion of father Ron and mother Nellie. In 2016, at the inauguration, there was also Marta Karolyi in whose Ranch, seventy miles north of Houston, the national doctor Larry Nassar was stained with repeated abuse of gymnasts. Simone came out destroyed. But it started flying again.

Katie Ledecky did not win at the US Olympic selections. He dominated. Because he left the second at 1 “68 in the 200m freestyle, at 3” 59 in the 400, at 5 “74 in the 800 and 10” 68 in the 1500. He then arrives in Tokyo with the hope of repeating the 2015 World Cup Kazan, when he won all four races. Katie at the last Trials also impressed for her great resilience, winning the 1500 meters only 70 minutes after having played the final of the 200. But she is used to amaze: at 15, in London 2012, she won the Olympic gold in the 800. Discreet out of the water, in the race it transforms. The New York Times wrote that the swimming pool for her has the same effect as the phone booth for Superman.

Sky Brown has already won his Olympics. The qualification for the Games at the age of 13 (she completed them on 12 July) projected her into another dimension. With the board he can fly high and now that he is a worldwide media phenomenon, not only of skateboarding, he is also a little diva. Sky at the Tokyo Olympics will play at home because her mother is Japanese and she was born in Miyazaki. But he competes for Great Britain, the father’s country. Already testimonial of the giant Nike, she could become the youngest female gold medalist at the Games. With silver or bronze he will not beat the record for the earliest on the podium: Luigina Giavotti from Pavia in Amsterdam 1928 was silver in the gymnastics team competition, when she was 11 years and 301 days old.

The United States have been unbeaten at the Olympic Games since Athens 2004, when they lost in the semifinals to Argentina who then took gold in the final against Italy. In Tokyo, Luka Doncic’s Slovenia will try to write a fairytale. At the age of 22, he took on his national team and took it to the Games with an MVP Pre-Olympic, awarded in Kaunas by Arvydas Sabonis. Luka is used to surprising and winning. He did it with Slovenia, gold in the 2017 European Championship, and also at club level with Real Madrid, where at 19 he won the 2018 Euroleague from Mvp. Then he went to the NBA in Dallas. In 2020-21 he averaged 27.7 points, eight rebounds and 8.6 assists. He hasn’t put the ring on his finger yet. But that medal around his neck from 2017 reminds him that you can dream.

Djokovic’s Olympics arrives at the center of a magical path after the Australian Open, Roland Garros and Wimbledon. For the story, the US Open is missing. By winning them, Nole would achieve the Grand Slam, or conquer all four major tournaments in the same season as only Don Budge (1938) and Rod Laver (1962 and 1969) have been able to do. The Serbian has hooked Federer and Nadal in orbit in the ranking of the multiple Slam winners, at an altitude of twenty, and at the Tokyo Games he finds a unique opportunity to hope to even complete the Golden Slam (the four majors plus the Olympic gold) succeeded only to the German Steffi Graf in 1988. Among the males André Agassi and Rafa Nadal have won all the Grand Slams and the Olympic gold in the singles, but not in the same season.

Caeleb Dressel is the swimming phenomenon that comes from the United States. He knows how to express himself to the maximum both in freestyle and in the butterfly, like Mark Spitz (seven golds in Munich 1972), Matt Biondi (five golds, one silver and one bronze in Seoul 1988) and Michael Phelps (eight golds in Beijing 2008). Now he is the serial collector of medals: in Tokyo he is a candidate to become the symbolic athlete of the Olympics, he should do seven races and in six he is the favorite. Always with the blue bandana that Caeleb carries with him. It belonged to his math teacher Claire McCool who wore it during the battle against cancer. That woman is gone, but Claire’s courage inspired Caeleb’s life. Who wins with and for her.

Tomorrow Tadej Pogacar can complete a match that no one has ever achieved: winning the Tour de France and Olympic gold in the line race in the same year. Also because the track will be very tough: 234 kilometers starting from Tokyo’s Musashinonomori Park and arriving at Fuji International Speedway with a total of 4,685 meters of elevation gain. The 22-year-old Slovenian is the new master of stage races but, as he demonstrated at the last Liege-Bastogne-Liege, he can also win big one-day races. A predestined, who as a child left football for cycling following his brother’s passion. As Merckx has won three jerseys in the Tour for two consecutive years (yellow, white – at the time of the Cannibal it was for the “combined” today is for the best young man – and polka dots for the mountains).

For Karsten Warholm, a lap with 10 91.4 cm obstacles seems like a “normal” 400 meters. Because with the world record of 46 ”70 set last July 1st in Oslo – eight hundredths better than the time set by Kevin Young at the 1992 Barcelona Games – he would have finished fifth in the 400 floors at the last Italian championships. The Norwegian, in Tokyo, can bring back to Europe the Olympic gold of the 400 obstacles that is missing from the 1980 Moscow edition. Then, without the Americans, the East German Volker Beck won. To find a European Olympic victory with the Americans present, we must even go back to the success of the Irish Bob Tisdall in Los Angeles 1932. Warholm, at 25, is one step away from the Grand Slam of athletics after the gold at the continental championships (2018 ), world championships (2017 and 2019) and the world record.

Armand Duplantis is used to looking down on everyone. But he doesn’t do it out of arrogance. He is a discreet boy and at the age of 21 he is already the world record holder in pole vaulting (6.15 outdoors and 6.18 indoors). Fly high, that’s his life purpose. The Swede in Tokyo is chasing Olympic gold for himself and for his father Greg (former 5.80 athlete) and mother Helena (former heptathlete) who were excellent athletes but not from the Olympic podium. Greg is the coach, Helena is Armand’s first fan and last year, to allow her son to compete in the Monte Carlo meeting, she drove twenty-five hours from Sweden with the auctions they had not boarded the plane . Armand repaid her by winning the race. As it does (almost) always.