The Top 3 Moments of Tokyo Olympics 2020
1) US Swimmer Dressel tosses his Gold to teammate Curry
Brooks Curry swam in Dressel’s place during
the team’s qualifying match but sat out in the finals. This allowed Dressel to
remain in spirit for both his individual races as well as the relay final.
Although Curry would win a medal but
wouldn’t be included in the medal ceremony where only the four swimmers would
be on the podium, Dressel took the chance to show his support for his teammate.
Dressel won his gold went over to the
stands where Curry was at, called him to the first row of the benches and
tossed over his gold to Curry directing attention away to Curry whose efforts
led the team to the finals.
Dressel later stated, “I had the easiest
job last night out of everyone here. I got to watch it on TV. So, I felt like
Brooks deserved that a little more than me.”
2) Golds in Men’s High Jump: Qatar and Italy for the win
During one of the events, precisely the Men's
high jump – Athletics, two athletes, Qatar’s Mutaz Essa Barshim, and Italy’s
Gianmarco Tamberi both competing in the finals went against each other only to
be led into a draw between the two. Both Barshim and Tamberi jumped to a
whooping 2.37 meters. As part of the rules, the officials asked for a jump-off
to settle the tie. The two had to make three more jumps each in order to settle
on the sole gold winner. They did so, however none of them could go above their
original mark of 2.73 meters.
As the winner couldn’t be decided after the
3 jumps from either of the athletes, the officials asked them to make one more
jump. However, at this point, athlete Tamberi had dealt a leg injury and
decided to withdraw. Barshim now had the opportunity to make a better jump for
the gold medal for his country.
Tamberi was out but Barshim checked with
officials asking them what would happen if he withdrew from the last jump as
well. The officials then checked the rule book and confirmed that if Barshim
withdrew his name as well, then it would mean a gold medal for both the Qatar
and Italian athlete. To which, Barshim nodded in approval and Tamberi accepted
it as well and jumped to hug the Qatar athlete. Thus, both Tamberi and him
received a gold for the event. Both, Barshim and Tamberi have been good friends
since 2017.
Barshim has previously taken bronze in
London in 2012 and silver in Rio five years ago in 2016 and the gold from this
year’s Olympic is an addition to his success.
“For me, coming here, I know for a fact
that for the performance I did, I deserve that gold,” Barshim said. “He did the
same thing, so I know he deserved that gold. This is beyond sport. This is the
message we deliver to the young generation.” Winning is not everything in a
game and both the athletes have given the message to the rest of the world to
respect your rivals whiling sharing the success with those who deserve it.
3) Noah
Lyles’ Boring Bronze
American professional track and field
athlete Noah Lyles who has been known as the defending 200-meter world champion
and an Olympic favorite called his bronze win ‘Boring’, few minutes after which
he broke down into tears and discussed his guilt and wished his older brother
Josephus was also in Tokyo. Josephus Lyles is also an American sprinter and
younger brother to Noah. Noah continues, “I feel like this wasn’t even my
dream. In 2012, my brother had the dream that he was going to come to the
Olympics. I really just tagged along for the ride.”
Noah discussed all that along with his
struggle with going on and off of anti-depressants and how the discussion on
mental health shouldn’t curb long after the Olympics are over.
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