Nina Kennedy rounds off Australia’s golden day at Paris Olympics with pole vault victory | Paris Olympic Games 2024 As pole vault world champion Nina Kennedy took Australia to its 18th gold medal at the Paris Olympics, the nation’s best medal haul at the Games, she soared to new heights. After Kennedy had charged towards the uprights, forcefully planting her pole in the box, the 27-year-old flew upwards, gracefully lifting over the bar, before dropping cleanly to clear 4.90m. Kennedy did not know it at the time, but it would be the jump that won her gold. It felt like an apt metaphor for an extraordinary Wednesday from the Australian Olympic team, the best single day in the team’s history, with a total of four golds and two bronze medals. What more appropriate way for the Australians to fly past history and make Paris 2024 the nation’s best Olympics yet? Kennedy became the first Australian to win pole vault gold since Steven Hooker at the Beijing Olympics in 2008, and the first Australian woman to win gold, bettering Tatiana Grigorieva’s silver medal at the Sydney 2000 Games. The bar started low, with Kennedy easily clearing 4.40m on her first attempt. She was again comfortable at 4.60m, before suffering a minor mishap at 4.70m. But any fears of an early exit — Kennedy bowed out at 4.40m three years ago in Tokyo, as she battled an injury — were quickly allayed as the Australian soared over on the second attempt. From there, while the field slimmed, Kennedy looked flawless. She took a deep breath at 4.80m, waited in contemplation, before clearing on her first attempt. When the bar was raised five centimetres, Kennedy was again untroubled — waiting for the jump clock to hit 20 seconds before charging forward and sailing over the bar. She was the only vaulter to clear 4.85m on the first attempt, and the only remaining competitor to clear 4.90m (again, on the first attempt). Kennedy clears again. Photograph: Andrej Isaković/AFP/Getty Images With just three athletes left, defending champion Katie Moon from the United States and Canada’s Alysha Newman, Kennedy found herself in the gold medal position. Newman failed to clear 4.90m, while after an unsuccessful attempt, Moon elected to pass on to 4.95m. The American and Kennedy both missed their first attempts at the new height, but Moon had one less chance to give. When Moon failed to clear again, Kennedy did not need to try again. “I knew first-attempt clearances at those high bars were going to take the gold,” Kennedy said afterwards. “I put all my focus into that exact second, and that’s how I won.” Kennedy had shared the gold medal with Moon at last year’s world championships, after the pair were level at 4.90m and both failed to clear 4.95m. The Australian has been asked repeatedly in recent months whether she would consider splitting Paris gold. skip past newsletter promotion Sign up to Olympic and Paralympic briefing Our daily email briefing will help you keep up with all the goings on at the Olympics and Paralympics Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. after newsletter promotion “Deep down I knew I wasn’t going to,” she said. “I wanted that outright gold medal. I became really confident in talking to the media, it was really scary, really vulnerable, to lay it all out there and say: ‘I want the fucking outright gold medal, this is what I want.’ That’s really scary — I’m just really happy I got the job done.” https://lottolenghi.me/nina-kennedy-rounds-off-australias-golden-day-at-paris-olympics-with-pole-vault-victory-paris-olympic-games-2024/ #ParisOlympic2024 #Paris2024 #SummerOlympics #OlympicGames #Olympics #LesOttolenghi #NinaKennedy #AustralianOlympic #ParisOlympicGames2024

Why Olympic wrestler Vinesh Phogat was disqualified India’s star Olympic wrestler Vinesh Phogat is out of the competition ahead of a gold medal match, after being disqualified for being over her class’s weight limit. It’s a devastating end to the Paris games for the wrestler who has led the charge against sexual harassment at the highest levels of her sport. Had she been able to compete and won Wednesday’s match, she would have been the first Indian woman to win a gold medal in any Olympic event. Phogat, who often wrestles at a 53-kilogram weight — or about 116 pounds — made the 50-kilogram (about 110 pounds) berth after another wrestler won the 53-kilogram spot on India’s wrestling team. She knew that getting down to competition weight would be difficult, she said in an April interview: “I gain weight easily. It doesn’t matter how fit I am, I still gain weight because I have a lot of muscle mass.” She had been able to maintain the lower weight until Wednesday, when she weighed in at just 100 grams over the weight limit — despite the drastic measures she had taken over the past week to maintain her 50-kilogram weight. Phogat barely ate, spent hours in a sauna and exercised, and even tried cutting her hair to make weight, according to Team India’s chief medical officer. But that 100 grams — around 3.5 ounces — meant she couldn’t compete in Wednesday’s match, and wouldn’t receive a medal at all despite her dominance. She put up a phenomenal performance in Paris, beating out Japanese Olympic gold medalist Yui Susaki in the first round, and dominating thereafter, seemingly guaranteeing India either a gold or silver medal. Her wins — and sudden disqualification — have put her recent crusade against sexual harassment in India’s national wrestling organization back in the spotlight. And though her Olympics are over, there’s now global attention on her activism as much as her athletic prowess. Sexual harassment is a problem in India — and in sports Phogat spent months last year as the face of a campaign to remove Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh as head of the Wrestling Federation of India (WFI), the body governing the sport in India. Phogat and other women wrestlers accused Singh of sexual exploitation, and Phogat in particular alleged that he emotionally and psychologically tormented her following the Tokyo Summer Games, where she just missed out on a medal. After filing a complaint with the Indian Olympic Association, and receiving little response, they mounted a May 2023 protest in New Delhi — where they were reportedly assaulted by police. Sexual harassment is a problem everywhere, and India is no different. A 2024 Centre for Economic Data & Analysis study found workplace sexual harassment to be on the rise in India (though reporting mechanisms have increased, too), and a 2022 World Bank report found harassment on public transportation to be a nearly universal experience in big cities, with 88 percent of those surveyed in New Delhi saying they’d experienced it. Scholars Anil Kumar and Ashutosh Pandey, both professors in the department of sociology at Bayalasi P.G. College, in Jalalpur, India, wrote in a recent study that the “prevalent perception of sexual harassment often portrays it as a joke, where women are deemed both responsible for and deserving of such behavior.” #Paris Olympic2024 #Paris2024 #SummerOlympics #OlympicGames #ParisOlympics #OlympicTorchRelay #ParisPreparations https://lottolenghi.me/why-olympic-wrestler-vinesh-phogat-was-disqualified/

Olympic basketball: D'Tigress overcome adversity to shine at Paris 2024 Nigeria’s historic run in the women’s basketball tournament at Paris 2024 has been underlined by defensive steel, as well as a sprinkling of inspiration from their young coach. The team known as D’Tigress became the first African side - male or female - to reach the quarter-finals of an Olympic Games after beating Canada in their final group game on Sunday. The West Africans registered a win on their Olympic debut in Athens in 2004 but had to wait 20 years for their second victory. The challenge now is to build on their progress. “I'm really proud of them putting Nigeria on the map again after 20 years,” Mfon Udoka, a member of the 2004 squad, told BBC Sport Africa. “I'm just hoping in the near future that it doesn't take another 20 years to see the same success.” However, the squad has had to show plenty of resilience off the court to get to this stage. https://lottolenghi.me/olympic-basketball-dtigress-overcome-adversity-to-shine-at-paris-2024/ #Olympicbasketball #Paris2024 #SummerOlympics #OlympicGames #ParisOlympics #OlympicTorchRelay #ParisPreparations

Paraguay’s Luana Alonso has denied reports that she was removed from the Paris Olympics Village for inappropriate behaviour. Paraguay’s Luana Alonso has denied reports that she was removed from the Paris Olympics Village for inappropriate behaviour. This denial comes after several news outlets ran stories on her expulsion from the athletes’ village. The story was first published by British tabloid The Sun, quoting Larissa Schaerer, head of the Paraguayan Olympic Committee. Paraguay’s Luana Alonso denies reports of her expulsion from the Olympics Village.(Instagram/@luanalonsom) “Her presence is creating an inappropriate atmosphere within Team Paraguay,” Larissa Schaerer said in a statement published by the outlet. “We thank her for proceeding as instructed, as it was of her own free will that she did not spend the night in the Athletes’ Village.” The Sun report suggested that Luana Alonso, 20, sneaked out of the Olympic Village to visit Disneyland Paris instead of cheering for her teammates. A separate report in Daily Mail also said that she was a distraction to her teammates “with her skimpy clothing and socialising with other athletes.” It added that she was seen walking around the Village in her own clothes rather than the official Paraguayan kit provided to all athletes. In an Instagram Story shared yesterday, the 20-year-old swimmer dismissed reports of her expulsion from the Olympic Village. “I just want to clarify that I was never removed or expelled from anywhere,” Luana Alonso wrote in Spanish on Instagram Stories. “Stop spreading false information. I don’t want to give any statement but I am not going to let lies affect me either,” she added. Take a look at her Instagram Story: Luana Alonso addresses reports of her expulsion from Olympic Village Alonso failed to advance into the women’s 100m butterfly semifinals on July 27, missing out of qualifying by a mere 0.24 seconds. She announced her retirement from the sport shortly after the event, but continued to stay on in the Olympics Village. “I have been swimming for so long, 18 years, and I have so many feelings,” she wrote on Instagram while announcing her retirement. “Unfortunately, I made the decision to stop and I am happy that my last race will be at the Olympic Games.” Alonso was just 17 when she participated in the Tokyo Olympics. The Hindustan Times YouTube channel now has 7 million subscribers. We thank our viewers for their support. Follow the channel for exclusive video news on politics, sports, entertainment & more. Click here. See more Get Latest Updates on Trending News Viral News, Video, Photos and Weather Updates of India and around the world News / Trending / Swimmer Luana Alonso breaks silence on her expulsion from Olympic Village: ‘Stop spreading false info’ https://lottolenghi.me/swimmer-luana-alonso-breaks-silence-on-her-expulsion-from-olympic-village-stop-spreading-false-info-trending/ #Paris Olympic2024 #Paris2024 #SummerOlympics #OlympicGames #ParisOlympics #OlympicTorchRelay #ParisPreparations

Simone Biles toasts Olympic glory with racy snaps alongside Team USA gymnast Jordan Chiles Simone Biles celebrated her three gold medals at the 2024 Olympics in Paris by posing for a set of eye-popping snaps with fellow Team USA gymnast Jordan Chiles. Barely 24 hours after the 27-year-old openly complained about reporters constantly asking her about ‘what’s next’ following her new achievements at the Olympics this summer, Biles took to social media to put her close bond with Chiles, 23, on display. ‘red, white, biles&chiles,’ she captioned her post on Instagram. The pair can be seen hanging out on a balcony in what presumably is the Olympic Village, which is located in the northern Paris suburb of Saint-Denis. Both gymnasts wore booty shorts with ‘TEAM USA’ printed on them as they also showed off their back muscles with crop tops Chiles also posted a series of pics with Biles on Instagram. She wrote ‘team usa girlies…’ with a red heart emoji as a caption to her post. After claiming gold in the teams finals, all-around events and women’s vault earlier this week, Biles expressed her frustration with the line of questioning taking place after her performances in Paris. Addressing reporters on X, she posted: ‘you guys really gotta stop asking athletes what’s next after they win a medal at the Olympics.’ Biles then added in another post: ‘let us soak up the moment we’ve worked our whole lives for’. When asked by a fan what does come next for her after winning another gold, she replied: ‘babysitting the medal’. https://lottolenghi.me/simone-biles-toasts-olympic-glory-with-racy-snaps-alongside-team-usa-gymnast-jordan-chiles/ #ParisOlympic2024 #Paris2024 #SummerOlympics #OlympicGames #ParisOlympics #OlympicTorchRelay #ParisPreparations

Today at the Olympics: Monday’s schedule and highlights including Keely Hodgkinson and Noah Lyles Our mission is to deliver unbiased, fact-based reporting that holds power to account and exposes the truth. Whether $5 or $50, every contribution counts. Support us to deliver journalism without an agenda. Monday’s highlights Simone Biles has already won three gold medals in Paris but she has further finals to come on the balance beam and floor exercise on the final day of artistic gymnastics. Biles has the chance to make history in the events – if she wins both she will join American swimmer Katie Ledecky and former Soviet Union gymnast Larisa Latynina on nine Olympic golds, which is the most of all time. The headline star athlete of Monday and perhaps the entire Olympics is Noah Lyles. The Team USA sprinter is back from the thrilling 100m final in a bid to double up and take gold in the men’s 200m first round. Zharnel Hughes, Letsile Tebogo, Andre De Grasse and Erriyon Knighton are among the biggest threats to Lyles. Keely Hodgkinson goes again in the women’s 800m final, with the Team GB star likely to face a challenge from Kenya’s Mary Moraa. https://lottolenghi.me/today-at-the-olympics-mondays-schedule-and-highlights-including-keely-hodgkinson-and-noah-lyles/ #Paris Olympic2024 #Paris2024 #SummerOlympics #OlympicGames #ParisOlympics #OlympicTorchRelay #ParisPreparations

Jodie Sweetin Defends Olympics Opening Ceremony Drag Performance Full House alum Jodie Sweetin is defending the 2024 Olympics Opening Ceremony after conservatives attacked a portion of the show featuring drag queens. During the opening ceremony for the Olympics in Paris, a segment featuring drag queens caught the attention of Christian-identifying viewers. They believed that the performers were “mocking” Leonardo da Vinci’s “Last Supper” painting. However, it turns out that the drag performers were re-creating the feast of Dionysus, which depicts the Greek gods of Olympus, in honor of the Olympics. Sweetin took to social media to call out the backlash the opening ceremony received, as they were not aware of their art history. “Tell me you don’t know about art or history without TELLING me you don’t know about art or history,” Sweetin posted alongside a video mocking people’s outrage. https://lottolenghi.me/jodie-sweetin-defends-olympics-opening-ceremony-drag-performance/ #ParisOlympic2024 #Paris2024 #SummerOlympics #OlympicGames #ParisOlympics #OlympicTorchRelay #ParisPreparations

Countdown to Paris 2024: Torch Relay Kicks Off as Olympic Fever Grips France As of late July 2024, the Paris Summer Olympics, set to commence on July 26, 2024, are generating significant buzz with several key updates and developments capturing global attention. First and foremost, the Olympic torch relay, which began its journey in Greece, is now making its way through various French cities, creating a festive atmosphere nationwide. The relay, which will conclude at the opening ceremony in Paris, has already been marked by vibrant celebrations and enthusiastic crowds, setting an exciting tone for the games. In terms of infrastructure, Paris has made substantial progress in preparing for the Olympics. The city has invested heavily in upgrading existing venues and constructing new facilities, including the stunning Aquatics Centre and the new Olympic Village, designed to be both environmentally sustainable and technologically advanced. The Paris 2024 organizing committee has emphasized eco-friendliness, with many venues utilizing green energy sources and sustainable materials. Athlete preparations are also in full swing, with numerous national teams conducting their final training camps and trials. A particular highlight is the anticipated debut of several new sports, including breakdancing, which will feature prominently for the first time in Olympic history. The inclusion of these sports has sparked considerable interest, especially among younger audiences. https://paris2024.ai/ #Paris Olympic2024 #Paris2024 #SummerOlympics #OlympicGames #ParisOlympics #OlympicTorchRelay #ParisPreparations

Olympics to Hold Its First Esports Games Starting in 2025, Amid Concerns The games industry may be surging, having recently generated more money than movies and North American sports combined, but enthusiasm for esports has ebbed and flowed. Now, though, competitive gaming will get a jolt of recognition: The International Olympic Committee has just formalized the Olympic Esports Games, with the first scheduled for 2025 in Saudi Arabia. Complicating the picture for the IOC: the themes of violence that run through many video games, and a political environment in Saudi Arabia that’s hostile to LGBTQ+ individuals. The IOC hasn’t decided on the exact location and dates or, most importantly, which video game titles the esports athletes will be competing in. In the past, professional esports competitions have mostly been title-specific tournaments, including huge international efforts like the League of Legends World Championship and the Dota International. The last couple of decades have seen esports leagues rise and fall, from the US-specific Major League Gaming (acquired by Activision Blizzard and now owned by Microsoft) to publisher-sponsored organizations like Activision Blizzard’s Overwatch League. Large-scale professional gaming competitions have been pushed mostly by game publishers and esports leagues, but the IOC has been exploring esports since 2017, culminating in the Olympic Esports Week in Singapore in 2023 and a subsequent request to study the creation of a formal Olympic Esports Games. The IOC Esports Commission said in a release Tuesday that it has “devised a project which addresses the interest of the esports community while respecting the Olympic values. This is particularly true with regard to the game titles on the programme, the promotion of gender equality and engagement with the young audience, which is embracing esports.” Esports reviving the Olympics Appealing to younger fans has been a priority for the IOC, leading it to adopt new event categories in recent Olympics. In 2020, the traditional Games added surfing, skateboarding and sport climbing, while breaking (what had been known as breakdancing) is debuting at the 2024 Paris Olympics. The IOC has been looking into esports as traditional sports audiences age — a MarketWatch report in 2017 noted that the average NBA viewers were in their early 40s, while average NFL and MLB viewers were in their 50s. But even as the IOC Esports Commission formed to explore how it might integrate competitive gaming into the Olympics, questions arose about whether that marriage would work. Many of the top esports titles are violent first-person shooters, which goes against Olympic values of peaceful competition — the IOC flatly stated a year ago that games from the Counter-Strike and Call of Duty series would never be included in Olympic Esports, according to The Jakarta Post. While the IOC formalizing the Olympic Esports Games seems to put the debate to bed about whether virtual competition is a sport, siloing esports into their own event, away from the traditional Olympics, does send a complicated message. The most pertinent question is whether gamers will flock to esports if they’re hosted by the Olympics, or if they’ll just continue watching tournaments and leagues that have been built up by the games industry and esports enthusiasts. “Years ago I said, ‘The Olympics needs esports more than esports needs the Olympics,’ and I still stand by that statement,” said Rod Breslau, an esports and gaming consultant. #lesottolenghi #Olympics #OlympicGames #Olympics2024 #parisolympics2024 #olympicsparis2024 #2024summerolympics #parisolympicsschedule https://lottolenghi.me/olympics-to-hold-its-first-esports-games-starting-in-2025-amid-concerns/

‘I’m good to go’: Steph Catley fit for Matildas’ Olympics opener against Germany | Paris Olympic Games 2024 Coach Tony Gustavsson expects to have captain Steph Catley and a full-strength squad available when the Matildas face Germany in the opening match of their Olympic campaign on Thursday. The Matildas have been beset by injury woes in the lead-up to the Paris Games, with Catley nursing a calf niggle, Katrina Gorry returning from an ankle injury, and other worries for attacking threat Caitlin Foord and defender Kaitlyn Torpey. But Gustavsson insisted his team was fit and ready to go following an extended pre-Olympics training camp, as all 22 players – 18 squad members and four reserves – trained on Wednesday in Marseille. “Everyone trained today, which is good,” Gustavsson said. “It’s been a challenging preparation period, to be honest. If you look at the game minutes that these players have had over the last six months, with everything from stress fractures to foot surgeries to soft tissue injuries and all that. And then a break, and then coming in [to camp]. So we’ve had to do a lot of hard work and individual planning. “It’s been a little bit of a challenge to get everyone up to speed, but to then see 100% of the players available for training today was amazing,” Gustavsson added. While the coach said that final decisions on availability would be made following a last medical meeting, he indicated that Arsenal star Catley was expected to start against Germany. “If Steph is available, our captain, that’s a no-brainer,” he said. “I’m fit,” added Catley, set to compete in her third Olympics. “I’m good to go.” The Matildas enter the Games with high expectations after finishing fourth at both the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 and home World Cup in 2023. But on each occasion the Australians fell in the third-place encounter; the team has never won a medal at a major international tournament. “It would be incredible,” Catley said about the prospect of finishing on the podium in Paris. “This team has gone through a lot, been together for many, many years, we’ve come close to having some pretty amazing results. It’s definitely something that we want to achieve. “But so does every single team in this tournament,” continued the 30-year-old. “Every single team in this tournament is incredible – the Olympics is really, really tough. Not to be clichéd but it really is one game at a time for us. We dream big always – every tournament we go into, we go into to win, to achieve the absolute most we can. But it’s risky to start to think like that, we just need to focus on Germany and how we can beat them.” After the encounter with Germany, the Matildas will face Zambia in Nice on Sunday, before concluding the group with a blockbuster clash against long-time rivals the United States in Marseille next week. The Australians need to finish in the top two of group B, or be among the best-ranked third placed teams, to qualify for the quarter-finals. On the eve of their opening match, and with the Paris 2024 opening ceremony only 48 hours away, Catley spoke of her pride at wearing the green and gold on the Olympic stage. Sign up to Olympic and Paralympic briefing Our daily email briefing will help you keep up with all the goings on at the Olympics and Paralympics Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. after newsletter promotion “We know what the Olympics mean to everyone,” said the defender. “We take a lot of pride from the stories we share – meeting Cathy Freeman )ahead of the last World Cup], the connections we have with her, and how many of us grew up watching the Olympics and being so proud to be Australian in those massive moments. “We want to recreate those kinds of moments for young girls watching the TV, up in the middle of the night watching us,” Catley added. “We want to make them proud – we want to give them that Olympic memory we had growing up.” Goalkeeper Mackenzie Arnold, meanwhile, had a simple message for Australian fans ahead of the Germany clash: “Set your alarms.” The Matildas’ Olympic opener will take place on Thursday evening local time (3am AEST). “It’s going to be an early one – set your alarms, get around it,” said Arnold. “It means a lot to us.” #lesottolenghi #Olympics #OlympicGames #Olympics2024 #parisolympics2024 #olympicsparis2024 #2024summerolympics #parisolympicsschedule https://lottolenghi.me/im-good-to-go-steph-catley-fit-for-matildas-olympics-opener-against-germany-paris-olympic-games-2024/