Tokyo, Olympics 2021, The Games Are Essential

May 21, 2021,

To be or not to be?

That is not only the question, it is the anxiety that Japan faces regarding the 2021 Summer Olympics which should have been the 2020 Summer Olympics.

Covid-19 has the Japan Olympics in a headlock.

The real question is, will it let go?

The 2020 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXXII Olympiad, and also known as Tokyo 2020 is an upcoming international multi-sport event scheduled to be held from 23 July to 8 August 2021 in Tokyo, Japan.

Formerly scheduled to take place from July 24, 2020 to August 9, 2020, the event was postponed in March 2020 as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, and will not allow international spectators.

Well, Mr. Allen Saunders quote still holds true. "Life is what happens to us while we’re making other plans”.

No one could have planned for a global pandemic or remotely see this one coming.

Despite being rescheduled for 2021, the event retains the Tokyo 2020 name for marketing and branding purposes. This is the first time that the Olympic Games have been postponed and rescheduled, rather than cancelled.

The 2020 Games will mark the second time that Japan has hosted the Summer Olympic Games, the first being also in Tokyo in 1964, making this the first city in Asia to host the Summer Games twice.

Overall, these will be the fourth Olympic Games to be held in Japan, which also hosted the Winter Olympics in 1972 (Sapporo) and 1998 (Nagano).

The 2020 Games will also be the second of three consecutive Olympics to be held in East Asia, the first being in Pyeongchang County, South Korea in 2018, and the next in Beijing, China in 2022.

In our book, 10 percent of something good is always better than 100 percent of nothing great.

Our keen interest in this year’s Olympic competition will be the role that Women’s Wrestling plays in the scheduling.

The female sport has been popular in Japan for decades, mostly of the pro wrestling scripted variety.

The team at globalsportmatters.com educates, “Women’s freestyle wrestling has been part of the Olympics only since 2004, but in those 15 years, Japan has dominated the sport at every weight class. Two women, Saori Yoshida and Kaori Icho, have been on the forefront of that dominance.”

Our friends at Femcompetitor Magazine appreciated Ms. Icho’s talents and wrote about her:

https://femcompetitor.com/kaori-icho-continues-to-take-names-and-break-records/

Our super star was undefeated for over 13 years.

The group at femcompetitor.com extends, “Fortunately in the area of women’s wrestling, Japan has been very open-minded and financially supportive of young women participating in the sport. Nippon has a long rich history of women entertaining in the squared circle seeing a huge boom in the 1990s.”

Should the world still be excited about a Summer Olympics during a pandemic?

It depends upon who you ask.

When Tokyo was awarded the global games in Buenos Aires almost eight years ago, members of the Japanese delegation hugged one another and screamed with joy.

“I had thought that Tokyo would be like New York City, but it wasn't. I'd imagined that they'd be similar in their bustle and noise level, but, in fact, Tokyo is a very calm metropolis. The bright lights and hectic night-life images so often found in advertisements and Western media do not reflect every day Japan.”…Min Jin Lee

Many were so elated that they started to cry.

Some are crying a very different type of tears today.

At usatoday.com they share, “As COVID-19 continues to spread both domestically and around the world, recent polls in Japan indicate that between 60% and 80% of residents believe the Tokyo Olympics should not be held as scheduled this summer. A petition calling for the Games to be canceled has generated more than 350,000 signatures.”

Ouch. That is far more painful than a Kaori Icho headlock.

The Japanese government confirmed the country's first case of the disease on January 16, 2020 when a resident of Kanagawa Prefecture who had returned from Wuhan, China was infected.

This was followed by a second outbreak that was introduced by travelers and returnees from Europe and the United States between March 11, 2020 and March 23, 2020.

According to the National Institute of Infectious Diseases, the majority of viruses spreading in Japan derive from the European type, while those of the Wuhan type have been disappearing since March.

Japan's death rate per capita from coronavirus is one of the lowest in the developed world, despite its aging population. Factors suggested to explain this include the government response, a milder strain of the virus, cultural habits such as bowing etiquette and wearing face masks, hand washing with sanitizing equipment, a protective genetic trait, and a relative immunity conferred by the mandatory BCG tuberculosis vaccine.

We still hope that the games happen.

In the global world of tennis, if the 2020 United States Open can happen, the 2021 Australian Open was spectacular, the NFL can have a full season, the NCAA 2020 football season was altered but still occurred, than why not have the Olympics take place with safety measures in mind?

The athletes have worked too hard and too long for it not to happen.

There is much at stake.

The 2020 Games will see the introduction of new competitions including 3x3 basketball, freestyle BMX, and madison cycling, as well as further mixed events.

Under new IOC policies, which allow the host organizing committee to add new sports to the Olympic program to augment the permanent core events, these Games will see karate, sport climbing, surfing, and skateboarding make their Olympic debuts, as well as the return of baseball and softball for the first time since 2008.

In terms of women’s wrestling, there is still much to be excited about.

As reported at japantimes.co.jp, “Three-time Olympic champion Saori Yoshida will double as a coach for the Japanese national women's wrestling team in the lead-up to the 2020 Tokyo Games.”

Their team adds that Ms. Yoshida, who was defeated by the American Helen Maroulis in a shocking women’s freestyle 53-kg final loss, missed the chance to join compatriot Kaori Icho in taking four consecutive Olympic titles in Rio de Janeiro.

She, like ourselves, feel that the 2020 Tokyo Games will be an occasion too big to miss.

We certainly miss Tokyo. Olympics or not, it is one incredible world class city.

The games should go on. They must.

Our minds are made up. Many of the athletes too. We have no need to wrestle with to be or not to be.

~ ~ ~

OPENING PHOTO Femcompetitor.com, grapplingstars.com, fciwomenswrestling.com, FCI Women’s Sports, fcielitecompetitor.com, fciwomenswrestling2.com Istlife-pexels.com-photo-credit

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Summer_Olympics

https://globalsportmatters.com/culture/2019/12/13/japan-showing-world-what-a-womens-wrestling-powerhouse-is/

https://www.usatoday.com/in-depth/sports/olympics/2021/05/19/tokyo-summer-olympics-2021-japan-covid-19-protest/5074273001/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_in_Japan

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/sports/olympics-wrestling/

https://femcompetitor.com/

https://grapplingstars.com/

https://www.fcielitecompetitor.com/

https://fciwomenswrestling.com/

https://www.brainyquote.com/topics/tokyo-quotes