Scorching heat, COVID-19 outbreaks, apathy, the Tokyo Olympics will go down as the Olympics nobody wanted
Naomi Osaka of Japan holds the Olympic torch after lighting the cauldron at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics opening ceremony on July 23, 2021.Of the many unintentionally hilarious signs they had posted around Tokyo 2020, the most on point was one they had stuck up at the front of the media buses: “Please tell me if you begin to feel worse.”
Most of the venues were clustered around a stretch of Tokyo’s industrial docklands. Without spectators, that lent the landscape nearby the feel of a moonscape. On the court, Olympic tennis. Just off the court, new condo builds and a truck dealership. The same can-do types scoffed at the heat. Then they played in it. Tennis player Daniil Medvedev captured the mood when he turned to the umpire during a break in play and said, “I can finish the match, but I can die.”
A lot of records fell, which is a great thing for an Olympics. But it wasn’t such a great thing coming after a year and a half of erratic international drug testing. A few competitors on the losing end of unusual results made accusations. Most often what you got was a raised eyebrow and a tilt of the head across the fence in a mixed zone. You were left thinking a few of these accomplishments are not going to ring out for all of history.
Tweens such as Momiji Nishiya and Kokona Hiraki, and new events such as sport climbing, injected some lightness into what sometimes played like an employee adventure weekend put on by an insurance company.On the ground, nothing rose to the level of “Olympic” because, as just one example, Olympic track and field does not work without fans. They have a place where they do track without fans already. It’s called high school.
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