Qualifying events resume as Tokyo Games draw ever closer
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[February 06, 2021]
By Shrivathsa Sridhar and Hardik Vyas
(Reuters) - With Olympics officials
reiterating their commitment to holding the Tokyo Games this year
despite the COVID-19 pandemic, several sports will soon resume
qualifying for athletes with less than six months to go.
The pandemic decimated Olympic qualifying across sporting
disciplines last year, with numerous competitions postponed or
cancelled before the Games itself was pushed back a year.
As things stand, 61% of athlete quota places have already been
allocated to National Olympic Committees for the July 23-Aug. 8
Games, with another 25% to be determined by June 29.
The remaining 14%, in sports including swimming, tennis, badminton
and golf, will be decided according to their respective ranking
systems, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) said last week.
Olympic officials unveiled their first Games guidelines on
Wednesday, including mandatory mask-wearing, a ban on chants during
events and another on the use of public transport.
So far, only five Olympic disciplines have completed
the qualification process for Tokyo -- road and track cycling,
equestrian, hockey, volleyball and climbing.
Track and field athletes have until June 29 to secure qualification
through World Athletics' rankings pathway, which will be based on the
average of an athlete's top five results, with performances weighted
according to the status of the meet.
The top 10 finishers in marathon events at the 2019 Doha world
championships and each of the marathon majors held up to April 5, 2020,
have already qualified for the Games.
Triathlon hopefuls, however, are in limbo because standings have been
frozen since March. The World Triathlon Executive Board said on Friday
that it would not restart qualifying until May 1, and would only take a
final decision next month.
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The logo of Tokyo 2020
Olympic Games that have been postponed to 2021 due to the
coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, is seen through signboards,
at Tokyo Metropolitan Government Office building in Tokyo, Japan
January 22, 2021. REUTERS/Issei Kato
Modern pentathlon has had to contend with political unrest in
Belarus apart from the pandemic, with world championship organisers
forced to move the June 7-13 event to Cairo from Minsk due to safety
concerns.
Wrestling hopes to hold qualifying events in Europe, Asia, and
Africa and Oceania in March and April, as well as a world
qualification tournament in May, while table tennis events will be
held in Europe, Asia and Latin America in March and April.
In handball, the top two teams at tournaments in Norway, France and
Germany from March 12-14 will complete the men's lineup, while the
two best women's teams from events in Spain, Hungary and Montenegro
(March 19-21) will also head to Tokyo.
The two-legged women's soccer qualifying playoff between China and
South Korea - which will determine Asia's last entry - is now set
for April after initially being scheduled for this month, marking
the fourth time the tie has been postponed.
The artistic swimming qualification event due to be held in Tokyo in
March as a test event for the Games has also been pushed to May
because of novel coronavirus restrictions in Japan.
(Additional reporting by Rohith Nair in Bengaluru; Editing by
Christian Radnedge)
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