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Five Olympic debuts

2021-07-16T02:17:05.458Z


Four sports are debuting in Tokyo: surfing, skateboarding, climbing, and karate. Another, softball, returns to the Games. An athlete from each discipline tells us how they prepare to fight for these new medals


Surfing, skateboarding, rock climbing, karate, and softball.

Four sports debuting in Tokyo and one returning to the Games.

We portray some of the athletes who aspire to make history by taking a medal in these categories without Olympic tradition, but with a lot of popular relevance.

Alexis Sablone (USA).

Skateboarding

US National Team Olympic Skater Alexis Sablone pictured at Cooper Park Skatepark in Brooklyn, NY, wearing the official medal podium kit for the Tokyo Olympics. Victor Llorente

  • Born in Connecticut (USA) 34 years ago, Alexis Sablone has been skating since she was 12. She is a skater, an architect and an illustrator.

    A square in Malmoe (Sweden) is decorated with a sculpture that she designed called Lady in the Square.

    Sablone, who has six international medals, is one of the veterans of the circuit and competes in a modality called street.

    Skateboarding debuts in Tokyo.

    40 women and 40 men will compete divided into two modalities: park (park) and street (street).

    The park consists of a circuit with ramps, while the street has curbs, railings and stairs along its route.

  • It is a peculiar sport that is not governed by the same schemes as the rest.

    It is usually learned in the street, without approved facilities.

    Alexis Sablone claims that this has changed.

  • “If when I was younger they had asked me if skateboarding was going to be my obsession, I would have laughed and said, 'No way!' He told Rolling Stone magazine. But now I feel part of it. Something in me is nostalgic for old skateboarding. The one now is very different, but exciting. He has done a lot for women by giving us an equal position. It has had a significant economic impact ”. Compare skateboarding to architecture. “With the table you move through pre-existing spaces and look for a way to give them another use; it's like choreographing something through a space that was designed for another purpose. In architecture you try to create something from empty spaces ”. She is moved by the same obsession as when she draws:the urge to repeat over and over again (the design or the move) until she's happy. "Skateboarding is exactly that, a work in progress."

Damián Quintero (Spain).

Karate.

Damián Quintero, Spanish karate fighter who will participate in the Tokyo 2021 Olympic Games, at the Shubukan Dojo, in Madrid.

In the photo, with the equipment for the opening ceremony of the Games.

Samuel Sanchez

  • Damián Quintero was born in Buenos Aires, but from Buenos Aires he doesn't even have the accent.

    He settled in Spain by chance when he was five years old.

    Their parents' goal was Australia, but they fell in love with Malaga.

    Discard the papers that were already processed to start a new life on the other side of the world.

    An aeronautical engineer, Quintero (36 years old) also has two master's degrees.

    One in Aeronautical Composite Materials and another in Sports Administration and Management.

    When in 2015 he announced at home that he was going to take leave of absence, the mother pulled her hair.

  • Karate was not yet Olympic, but there were rumors that it was going to be, and Quintero opted for it and for dedicating himself exclusively to it. He spent many hours training in solitude in a room at the High Performance Center in Madrid. Finally, the sport that he has practiced at the highest level for 19 years will debut at the Tokyo Games, and Quintero is one of the favorites for the medals. Only the Olympian is missing; It has those of 5 world championships (one gold, two silver and two bronzes) and another 10 of Europeans (six golds and four silvers).

  • Japan is the cradle of karate.

    Kata (Quintero's discipline) is a Japanese word that describes a sequence of movements.

    Each kata has a name, and there are no strikes or opponents.

    It is a fight against an imaginary rival in which a series of established movements are carried out and where strength, speed, power, balance and the ability to transmit are evaluated.

    To work on balance, they do many blindfolded sessions.

    Quintero says that the part of the body that hurts the most after a day on the mat is the neck and the traps.

    "From the jerks we hit," explains the athlete.

Silvana Lima (Brazil).

Surf.

The Olympic surfer of the Brazilian national team, Silvana Lima, photographed in Posto 8 of Ipanema beach, Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), with her country's kit for the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games.Gui Christ

  • She is 36 years old and Brazilian.

    She was declared the best surfer in her country eight times and world runner-up in 2008 and 2009. Now she is making her debut at the Games.

    She and also her sport.

    Lima had very different beginnings than most surfers.

    He grew up in a cabin on the beaches of Paracuru, north of Fortaleza.

    Her parents had a snack stand and she sold them on the beach to bathers.

    He got on a surfboard when he was seven years old and did not separate from it again despite the fact that it has not been easy for him to make a career.

    He says that the feeling of freedom that comes from being in the water is "unique and wonderful."

  • When in 2016, the year of the Games in its Brazilian land, it was not yet official that surfing would be Olympic in Tokyo, Lima denounced that it had no sponsor and that the brands turned their backs on it for not complying with the canons of beauty. However, he made a living to pay for trips around the world circuit: he sold his house, his car and started raising dogs. “The surf brands seek, apart from whether you are an athlete, you are a model or you look great. I am not a model or a barbie, I am a professional surfing. I could go under the knife and implant my chest, hair, make modifications to my face and even wear contact lenses, but it wouldn't be me, "he denounced.

  • This year in Tokyo, on the beach of Tsurigasaki, on the Pacific coast, he is aiming for a medal.

    Surfers will be able to take a maximum of 25 waves and five judges will rate each one based on the degree of difficulty, innovative maneuvers, variety, speed, dominance and style.

Yukiko Ueno (Japan).

Softball

Japan National Softball Team Olympian Yukiko Ueno, pictured at Takasaki's Utsugi Stadium in Japan team competition kit for Tokyo 2021. Matthew Jordan Smith

  • Of the five sports that make their debut or return at the Tokyo Games, baseball is the only team. It appeared for the first time at the 1904 San Luis Olympic Games as an exhibition sport, that is, without awarding medals. From Atlanta 96 to Beijing 2008 he was part of the Olympic program. Then it disappeared. And this year he returns. The countries with the most medals are Cuba (five), the United States (five, but with fewer golds), South Korea (two), Japan (three) and Australia (one). Yukiko Ueno is Japanese, she is 39 years old (she will turn them just the day before the opening ceremony) and she is a veteran. He was part of the Japanese team that achieved gold in Beijing 2008, defeating the almighty United States team, and bronze in Athens 2004. These Games will be his last chance to fight for another Olympic gold, after the 2008 epic.because it has already been announced that softball will not be in the Paris 2024 Games. She says that the dream of getting an Olympic gold has been taken as a mission.

  • Known as the Iron Thrower, she was for many years considered the fastest pitcher in women's softball.

    He had another mission, which he has not yet been able to fulfill.

    “A friend invited me to play when I was 10 years old.

    I really liked it and when it was included in the 1996 Olympics I began to dream of participating in such a competition.

    Now my job is to help this sport have representation once and for all at the Games.

    That's one of the reasons I keep playing, ”he declared in 2018.

Julia Chanourdie (France).

Climbing.

French national team Olympic climber Julia Chanourdie, pictured at the Karma climbing wall in Fontainebleau, France, in official competition gear Ed Alcock

  • "When in doubt, I like to remember that climbing is just a game," says Julia Chanourdie, a 24-year-old Frenchwoman. That game will debut this summer at the Olympics. However, anyone who thinks of climbing, the first thing they visualize are mountains, outdoor walls and nature. Olympic climbing has little to do with that, it is

    indoor

    and mixes three very different specialties: speed, block and difficulty. As a technical manager of the Spanish federation wrote, it is as if in athletics the winner is chosen by taking the average of the results of the javelin throw, 100 meters and marathon.

  • Chanourdie, who was born and lives on the shores of Lake Annecy (France), combines rock with

    indoor

    climbing

    .

    He has a versatile profile and an alpine upbringing. Her father, who is also her coach, took her to the mountains since she was little. She does not have medals in world championships (sixth in 2016 and eighth in 2018), but she is the third woman who has done a 9b of difficulty (within a scale that begins in the fourth grade and ends, for the moment, in 9c).

  • What stands out the most, however, is his biotype: athletic, lean, but strong.

    He measures 1.62 meters and weighs 53 kilos, and not 40, which is what it seemed that he was imposing himself in this sport.

    Several experts have warned of the problem of anorexia in climbing.

    The documentary

    Light

    , by Caroline Treadway, denounces eating disorders in sport climbing through the testimony of Treadway, who wanted to be an elite climber and started by taking a shortcut: stop eating.

Production by Sara Cuesta in collaboration with the International Olympic Committee (IOC), Hannah Burns and Marta Téllez.

Acknowledgments: United States: USOPC.

Spain: COE.

Brazil: COB.

Japan: JOC, WBSC and JSA.

France: CNOSF, FFME and IFSC.

Source: elparis

All news articles on 2021-07-16

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