I was going to do three blogs to the Tokyo Games. It seems since the closing ceremony is tomorrow that I will only be doing one more blog. I haven't been watching as much Olympic competitions as I should. After Simone Biles dropped out of the team competition, all-around, and most of the individual competitions in gymnastics, it was a big bummer for me. This was officially the Olympic year for the most unusual circumstances and memorable for many reasons. It seems the events I watched, well the U.S. wasn't doing so well, but it wasn't for lack of trying. The U.S. will end with the most medals (not that it be the only thing that matters). There were many firsts, upsets, wins, losses as well as records broken and medals won after many years of absence. I should've watched more events so I could report on them. China has the most Gold medals (so far) with 38, U.S. is second with 37, and Japan is third with 27. Accounting for all medals, U.S. has the most with 109, China is second with 87, and ROC is third with 70. Here are some of the major highlights although definitely not all of them.

  1. The U.S. women's gymnastics team won Silver. Members Sunisa Lee won Gold in all-around, Jade Carey won Gold on floor, MyKayla Skinner won Silver on vault, and Simone Biles won Bronze on balance beam.
  2. The men's triathlon had to restart the race due to a boat preventing swimmers from diving into the water for the first leg of the race. Kristian Blummenfelt from Norway won Gold with a time of 1:45:04.
  3. Eliud Kipchoge from Kenya defended his Gold in the men's marathon. He won with a time of 2:08:38.
  4. Ariarne Titmus won Gold in the 200 and 400-meter freestyle. Siobhan Haughey won Silver from Hong Kong and Penny Oleksiak won Bronze in 200. Katie Ledecky won Silver from U.S. and Li Bingjie from China won Bronze in the 400.
  5. U.S. won Gold in men's basketball for the fourth time in a row. France got Silver fourth time in a row as well and Australia got Bronze this Olympic year.
  6. Sajad Ganjzadeh from Iran was knocked out by Tareg Hamedi from Saudia Arabia in karate men's kumite +75. Due to a penalty from a knock out, Hamedi got Silver where Ganjzadeh got Gold. Ugur Aktas from Turkey and Ryutaro Araga from Japan got Bronze.
  7. Jessica Fox from Australia threw up before winning Gold in women's canoe slalom.
  8. The U.S. men's and women's 4x400m teams won Gold. The men''s team consisted of Kaylin Whitney, Wadeline Jonathas, Kendall Ellis, and Lynna Irby and the women's team consisted of Allyson Felix, Sydney McLaughlin, Dalilah Muhammad, and Athing Mu. This also makes Felix the athlete with the most track adn field medals of 11.
  9. Peres Jepchirchir and Brigid Kosgei from Kenya won Gold/Silver in women's marathon. Their times were 2:27:20 and 2:27:36.
  10. China won seven weightlifting Gold's out of 14 weightlifting competitions.
  11. Jessica Springsteen, yes the daughter of Bruce, won Silver in team equestrian for the U.S.
  12. Lydia Jacoby from U.S. won Gold in women's 100-meter breaststroke at the age of 17, beating Lilly King also from the U.S.
  13. Faith Kipyegon from Kenya set an Olympic record and won Gold in the women's 1500m.
  14. Robert Finke from the U.S. won Gold in men's 800-meter freestyle race.
  15. ROC won Gold, China won Silver, and Ukraine won Bronze in both the duet and team free routine in artistic swimming.

And there you have it, the Olympics came and went like the rest of 2021. I would love to say 2022 will be better, but that's what I said about 2021 about 2020. I hope there won't be as many issues or problems as the winter Olympics in China. I'm sure some countries and viewers will protest by not participating or watching in 2022. One thing the athletes won't have to deal with is the humidity and high temperatures. Then again, dealing with chilly temperatures isn't great either. Either way, Japan was robbed in a big way of their opening ceremony and closing as well. They did the best they could and here's to the future Olympics where COVID will be behind us (I hope) and the world is back to not wearing masks.