Topic: Tokyo 2020 Olympics

A thread to celebrate the Olympics.

Who of you is going to watch and what?

I'm planning to watch:

• Running (women)
• Soccer (women)
• Skateboarding
• Basketball 3x3
• Cycling (men)
• Swimming (women)
• Archery
• Table tennis (women)

Probably going to watch way more than this, because I'm easily glued to the telly when it concerns sports.

(I don't care at all whether men or women practice a sport, but with some sports I just have a better understanding of the athlethes of a certain gender. I know the female soccer teams, but I don't know the male soccer teams. Same, though the other way around, for cycling.)

@Kidfried I always enjoy the Olympics. Especially the summer games. For me, the highlight is the track events, particularly the men’s sprints, with the 100 m being the pinnacle. “The Fastest Human Alive” battle. It amazes me how world records just keep getting broken, and the human physical capabilities continue to improve. I always wonder where the theoretical max is for how fast we can run, or how high we can jump, or how far we can throw, etc. Surely there’s a ceiling to some of this.

But I can relate on the team events where sometimes I like the women’s and sometimes I like the men’s. Mostly just depends how my home country is doing in the sport. Some of that is tainted by what the TV network chooses to focus on. Usually NBC does a good job at picking out interesting personal stories to highlight and then show those events. That’s the real joy of the Olympics — the fact that the vast majority of these athletes are not professional and are just doing some other day job and devote the rest of their lives to this one little area to compete in. The human backstories are what is fascinating.

I love the Olympics. I usually watch the stuff like Archery, which I won’t watch elsewhere. Absolutely buzzing for the Skateboarding though, incredible to see it on the world stage like this. Nyjah Huston’s probably the favourite for men’s street but the women’s street is a bit wider open.

Surfing at the Olympics this year too! 😎 🏄‍♂️

I absolutely love the Olympics, and have been waiting years for Japan to get one, so needless to say I'm stoked! It's an absolute shame COVID is dampening the festivities though.

My favorite part has always been the elaborate opening ceremony (at least as far back as Beijing 2008, when I really first started paying attention), but I really enjoy watching sports you don't really get to see elsewhere as well.

I like Women's Diving, Women's Beach Volleyball, the Rifle & Archery events, Swimming, BMX, and casually watch this & that as well.

I didn't know they had skateboarding as an olympic sport
How does that work? Freestyle with judges giving it ratings based on number and difficulty of tricks performed?

I also think it's kinda cool that they have some e-sports in there as well.

Usually not too into the Olympics and seeing as the US basketball teams are both looking pretty rickety even less so lol. Honestly just hope it goes relatively smoothly without too many more positive tests.

@Voltan It’s just been added this year. I think it’s the same as the X-Games, difficulty and execution of essentially a routine. Like gymnastics, trampolining or diving in that sense.

@nessisonett Yeah, that makes sense. Pretty cool that they're adding more "modern" stuff. There's probably o ton of people very mad about it

@Voltan Those people better be hardcore discus and Greco-Roman wrestling fans 😂

@Voltan Same as Tony Hawk Just collect the Vicarious Vision logo, the alien plushie and constantly grind in between.

Pretty cool to see Andy Anderson make it into Canada’s Olympic skateboarding team. I’ve been aware of him for a while now and he’s an insane freestyle skater. Some of the stuff he comes up with is way out there.

Starting to get hyped by watching a documentary on iPlayer ( called going for gold or something like that to UK readers) showing how lottery funding helped GB team go from the lows of Atlanta 96 and actually compete on the world stage by becoming professional with some good interview clips from those involved.

As ever, I'll watch whatever's on when I'm around to watch it with especial focus on track, field and swimming events.

And also the opening ceremony. I just love the bit when all the teams walk round the stadiums with flags. They better still be doing this even without fans. I love that big nations like US, GB, Germany etc show up with 300+ people and then Haiti or someone come in and its just one guy and his coach

The London 2012 opening ceremony was bloody brilliant.

@Thrillho The best bit was when Dizzee Rascal turned up and performed for a global audience of over 900 million! It was definitely better than the absolute abomination that was the 2014 Commonwealth Games opening anyway 😂

Opening ceremony on now and apparently this is some of the music;

I... didn't realise the opening ceremony happened haha. Guess I've got to watch it now!

Thought the drones were pretty amazing and enjoyed that pictogram bit. Definitely recognized some of the music but could place which games it was from

I loved watching the cycling today. Was everything I wished it was, except for maybe the winner, hehe.

Oh, and 3x3 is a nice addition to the Olympic sports.

I stayed up for the skateboarding men’s final (yes, I’m shattered) and it definitely didn’t disappoint. Pretty surprising results but a great competition from start to finish, really showing off the sport as a proper Olympic event. Looking forward to the women’s street tomorrow and the park events later on.