Episode 205: What News Did You Miss?

Surprise! The world did not stop while the Olympics and Paralympics were going on, so there is a ton of news to catch up on!

We’ve got the latest International Olympic Committee dealings with AIBA, the international boxing association (still a testy relationship), as well as the International Paralympic Committee’s latest step toward an updated classification system.

Plus Games news from:

• Rio 2016
• Tokyo 2020
• Beijing 2022
• Paris 2024
• Milan-Cortina 2026
• LA 2028
• Future Games (yeah, there’s a lot of news to catch up on!)

And our news from TKFLASTAN includes updates from:

• Emily Cook
• Tom Scott
• DeAnna Price
• Connor Fields
• Jordan Gray
• Lauren Gibbs
• Josh Williamson
• Erin Jackson
• Clare Egan
• Alex Diebold
• Luuka Jones
• Michelle Carter
• John MacLeod
• Derek Leung – check out his video
• Lou Jones – check out his photography exhibit at the Griffin Museum
• Meagan Duhamel

Thank you to our ongoing contributors at our Patreon campaign! Want to support the show on an ongoing basis? Learn more here.

Thanks so much for listening, and until next time, keep the flame alive!

TRANSCRIPT

Episode 205 – What News Did You Miss?

Jill: [00:00:00] I see what you’re doing there, IOC by not getting citizen buy-in with your formal bidding process. Hello, Olympics and Paralympics fans and lovers of TKFLASTAN and welcome to another episode of “Keep the Flame Alive,” the podcast for fans of the Olympics and Paralympics. I am your host. Jill Jaracz joined as always by , my lovely co-host. Alison Brown, Alison. Hello, how are you?

Alison: Hello! We are all well rested and recovered and ready to figure out what’s been going on in the world since we had been hidden in our Tokyo caves.

Jill: Right. And there’s been a lot too. So today’s show is a follow-up. Everything that’s been going on with the IOC, with the IPC what’s going on with past games and future games. And with our past guests who are our TKFLASTANIS, our Team Keep the Flame Alive. Why don’t we get started with some IOC updates?

Jill: All right. So the IOC Executive Board has met, and this is where the fun begins because the Executive Board has gotten the IOC members, the session as a whole, to allow them to take sports out of the Olympic program if they want without getting session approval, which is one to watch.

Alison: And we know what sports we’re talking about here.

Alison: We’re talking boxing and weightliftingwho have been, in the crosshairs for at least a year or two.

Jill: Yes. So at the most recent Executive Board [00:02:00] meeting where we’re talking about boxing right now, and so we have an update. The organizing committee ran the boxing at Tokyo 2020, and so far, it sounds like things went well there, but we still have problems with the international association called AIBA, and the IOC wrote them a letter and said, Hey, we just wanted to say, we’ve noted you’ve made some changes and how they measure up to what we were hoping we see from you. And it’s not looking good so far.

Alison: Their midterm progress report. Not what we were hoping for.

Jill: Right. So one of the big areas is governance, and the IOC has noted that there is no new leadership team in place to quote “effectively embrace the change of culture in the governance of AIBA,”

Jill: And so the IOC is supposed to get an analysis of the organization’s governance in November, and that comes from outside parties, including Professor McClaren, who is known for doing all of these outside reports, especially on doping. So we’ll get another McLaren report.

Alison: If you get a McLaren report, you are in big trouble.

Alison: Easter egg This is like beyond getting sent to the principal.

Jill: Right? Financial issues are still not cleared up for the IOC. So we’ll keep an eye on that. And then McLaren is delivering another report to the IOC at the end of September on the AIBA’s refereeing and judging. So the IOC Executive Board got complaints about this this category at the Youth World Champs and at the Asian Championships. And this year’s World Championships for boxing does not seem to be incorporating the best practices that the IOC recommended. So they will hear from McLaren about what’s going on there. And you have a look.

Alison: You know, we saw in Tokyo that if you’re not [00:04:00] stupid, you can run boxing cleanly And yet we don’t seem to be able to manage to do this,AIBA.

Jill: It’s a shake your head moment. The IOC would like feedback from AIBA by the end of September. And we will continue to follow the saga. Meanwhile, international weightlifting breathes a collective sigh of relief that the spotlight was off them for a change.

Alison: Okay. So this whole story makes me think of when you have two kids who have done something wrong, but one kid did something way worse. So the other one is just like, oh yeah, mom’s mad at him. So I’m good for now. But you know, mom is going to remember what you did. So wait until tomorrow she’s coming back for you, IWF.

Jill: Oh, yes. So those organizations will be ones to watch.

Jill: And then the other big thing is that North Korea has been suspended through the end of 2022. This is because they did not perform what the IOC calls, the basic duty of a National Olympic Committee, because they did not send a team to Tokyo. And this was not necessarily a boycott. They got the invitation; they just didn’t respond. And they didn’t say, Hey, we are not coming. So because of, I think improper procedure or not following protocol, the IOC said, well, you know, you didn’t come to our party. Therefore you we’re getting suspended. You’re not getting our funding, which I think is the big hurt for North Korea. And they’re not going to be invited to Beijing 2022.

Jill: They did say that if athletes did qualify, they’d look at those cases on an individual basis, which makes me think that if they do have some qualifying athletes, which they might, because they’ve had figure skaters before. They’ve had other athletes in the Winter Olympics. They’ll probably, I would think they’re going to do something like Russia, where they have “athletes from North Korea”– or the DPRK.

Jill: And we take it from there, but it’s kind of a wait and see.

Alison: So [00:06:00] this may seem extreme to someone who’s not familiar with the history of North Korea and the IOC. No, North Korea said that this was all about COVID, but pretty much every Olympics, they pull this where we’re not going to come. We’re only going to come under certain circumstances.

Alison: They threatened a boycott, and I think the IOC finally is just not dealing with them anymore and saying, You can’t keep acting like a spoiled brat. You know, either you’re in or you’re out, make a decision. You’re either going to come to the party or we’re going to stop inviting you. We’re not bending over backwards to keep you happy anymore.

Alison: We’ve all had that friend and the IOC has done playing. You are not invited to margaritas and burritos anymore, North Korea.

Jill: We have a little bit of updates from the International Paralympic Committee. So they are wrapping up their first of three consultation phases about the update to the classification code, which a huge major overhaul. This is a multi year process where they get opinions, sort through everything, and then they revise the classification code that is required for all athletes at the Games.

Jill: So this is the first phase and they were looking for views and feedback on the current code and the international standards. The whole process is going to be up for approval by the IPC General Assembly in December, 2023. And then if it passes, the implementation, won’t be until January 2025 for summer sports and July, 2026 for winter sports. So you won’t see this new code in action until LA 2028 at the Paralympics.

Alison: So athletes will have a very [00:08:00] long run-up, if they’re being reclassified or classified out or any changes that are going to affect athletes, they’re going to have significant lead time. So this is not like, oh, we’re changing it in 2023 and the Paralympics is in 2024 and you’re out. So it’s a very long process with lots of information.

Jill: Right, which is good for the athletes who get affected in one way. And I think on the other side, people who think that athletes are misclassified or are gaming the system probably don’t love the fact that this is a multi-year process, but I think it has to be because a) things and in an organization of the scale take a long, long time, and they take a long time to do right. So we’ll keep following that and see how that goes.

Jill: Got some news from Rio.

Alison: We have no Rio music, because that was before our show started. I realized that just this minute.

Jill: So yes, we have Rio news. Remember when Kenya had that big kerfuffle over, they misappropriated money. I don’t even, I think if I remember correctly, the Kenyans didn’t even get uniforms. They had to scramble to get uniforms at the last minute, because there was no money for them.

Alison: This sounds vaguely familiar. I don’t remember it well, but I’m looking at this going, oh really? Really?

Jill: Right. So the former sports minister of Kenya named Hassan Waro and Kenya’s chef de Mission for 2016, Stephen arap Soi have been ordered to pay fines or they face prison sentences because a court in Nairobi has found them guilty of embezzling funds during the Rio games. This is reported by Inside the Games. They have to pay massive fines, which are in the tens of thousands of dollars or of jail terms of multiple years. They misappropriated money, they embezzled and it’s not good. It wasn’t good for the team. It overshadowed their performance at the Rio Olympics and it’s taken a long time for that to find justice.[00:10:00]

Alison: Yeah! We’re back to Tokyo!

Alison: Yes. Back to Tokyo. But sadly the village is closed, officially closed, and now it will be converted to the apartments that people have lined up to buy and have been waiting for another year or two, actually take possession of. The final report was that in terms of COVID cases, they had 878 cases from July 1st on through the Paralympics.

Jill: And most of those ended up being with Japanese nationals or with contractors that were associated with the Games, not many cases among athletes. The Japan News reported that according to the organizing committee, 32 people were disciplined during the Paralympics for violating playbook rules. 29 were reprimanded for not wearing masks or other offenses. Two were disqualified, and one of those was a Georgian male athlete who injured a hotel guard. Yeah.

Alison: What?

Jill: I had not heard, not heard that. And then one person had their qualification temporarily suspended and the disciplinary cases were totaled at 88 cases.

Alison: To be fair, I think there are more violations at your typical US college football game, probably. So considering the number of people and how complicated this staging was. 88 is not bad. I wonder how that compares, and we’ll have to look into it with other Olympics historically. I mean, obviously the rules here were much stricter, but just in general, you know, who gets into a fight. Australian rugby team. I’m looking at you. You know, who causes trouble just in general. Ryan Lochte, I’m looking at you.

Jill: Good question. Excellent question.

Jill: And then we were talking about heatstroke a lot during the Games. And this is specifically for the Paralympics that The Japan News found that [00:12:00] 32 people developed symptoms of heatstroke, but no one had developed serious conditions, which is good. It’s not great that heatstroke happened, but given the heat issues in Japan during that time that’s not too bad.

Alison: Now do you know if that 32 is just athletes, or would that include officials? Volunteers?

Jill: I think it includes everybody because they just said people.

Alison: That’s not bad.

Jill: No, no. Considering how hot they were and how especially on the Paralympic side, people are more susceptible to heatstroke. Of course with no fans, they didn’t know how any of the other heat measures that they had taken would work. But that’s what they found out with the heatstroke.

Jill: Because the village is closed, they’ve got all the leftover cardboard beds and Inside the Games reported that about 800 of the beds that were used in the village will be going to Osaka for a temporary COVID 19 medical facility. And this facility will be for coronavirus patients who have minor or no symptoms.

Alison: So this is your quarantine facility.

Jill: Yes.

Alison: They, these beds are getting so much attention.

Jill: They worked, I didn’t hear any breaking except for when you put nine members of a baseball team on them

Alison: Or when Lukka kicked it really hard.

Jill: Sadly, Great Britain’s CJ Ujah, his positive drug test has been confirmed with the B sample. And so that means Great Britain will be losing their silver medal in the four by 100 meter relay. Canada moves up to silver, and China will receive the bronze.

Alison: Ooh.

Jill: Yeah, this is tough. They’ve done thousands of tests in Tokyo. And this is the first that we’ve had of a competition that’s [00:14:00] already happened, because a lot of they, they did catch a few people before they were in competition, but this is the first one that’s affecting a result.

Alison: And it’s, it makes me so angry that it’s in a relay. Cause it’s not just you being stupid for yourself. Those three other athletes who did nothing wrong, get stripped of their medal because you’re dumb and selfish.

Jill: I totally agree.

Alison: On a happier doping note.

Jill: Yes. The International Equestrian Federation has confirmed that no horses or riders tested positive for doping in Tokyo. So that’s good news.

Jill: Interestingly enough. Remember our Belorussian situation where one of the athletes had been told to pack up and leave because she had said– upset about some some things that the national committee was going to make her do in Tokyo, regarding her events. And then she feared for her life. So Poland took her in. There is another Belorussian now in Poland on a humanitarian visa. This is Olga Safronova , who did not go to the Tokyo Games because one of her horses was accused of doping and Safronova had criticized state authorities. To me the accusations are, Hmm. Don’t know about that. This is another story from Inside the Games and we will keep an eye on that, but she is now safely in Poland.

Jill: Following up on the Algerian judoka Fethi Nourine, who withdrew from the Olympics because he did not want to face an Israeli opponent. The International Judo Federation has banned him and his coach for 10 years.

Alison: They are not playing. People are not playing right now. They have had enough of this. I am glad they banned the coach as well, because you know this athlete did not make this decision on his own.

Jill: Well. And a 10 year ban is pretty severe. That pretty much could end your [00:16:00] judo career, your athletic career, if you’re an athlete, but the coach can go on for a long time. And so this even prevents the coach from finding more success in judo.

Jill: Let’s end on some happier notes.

Alison: I like happy notes.

Jill: So the three Samoan weightlifters who were not allowed to go to Tokyo 2020, because they could not get out of Samoa due, to COVID-19 travel restrictions. They got their official uniforms and other gifts from the Samoa association of sports and their national committee. So that was nice. I mean, it doesn’t make up for the fact that they couldn’t compete. And one of them was a medal contender, but at least they get the stuff.

Alison: You know, at least they’re being recognized as Olympians and as having qualified and their loss is being recognized to say, yeah, we know you missed out. So we’re going to give you what we can give you. We can’t replace the Olympics, obviously, but we want to treat you the way you should be treated. Gee, treating athletes the way they should be treated. What a novel idea.

Jill: And we have two Golden Slams in wheelchair tennis. This is so exciting because a Golden Slam is extremely hard to get. Novak Djokovich was on his way to hopefully achieving that, but he lost at the Olympics and then he ended up losing at the US Open. So he didn’t even get the Grand Slam. Diede de Groot from the Netherlands. She is a a female wheelchair singles player. She won all four Grand Slam titles, plus the Paralympic gold, and then also Dylan Alcott in the quad division. He won as well at the US Open and completed the Golden Slam.

Alison: These two make the third. Only Steffi Graf has done this before in 1988, but now these are the first two for Paralympic athletes.

Jill: Amazing. Getting the gold was so tough.

Alison: This was no [00:18:00] joke. And I mean, we talked a lot about Dylan Alcott’s match, and he beat Niels Vink again, my adorable little Netherlands boy in the US Open. And I’m like, can you please stop beating up on my favorite little Dutch boy, just let him win something, Dylan, stop it. But then you get a Golden Slam. So it’s okay.

Jill: Right. And also Japan’s Shingo Kunieda, he got a Grand Slam. And he beat Alfie Hewitt from Great Britain to do so and said it was very tough because Tokyo 2020 was just before the U S Open. So they had two big tournaments in a row and they were just all feeling very fatigued. So congratulations to all of them.

Alison: And on opposite the sides of the world.

Jill: Yes.

Alison: I mean, they only had a couple of days, I think, to travel from Tokyo to New York. Amazing. Amazing, amazing, amazing. I love when people are amazing. That’s why we do the show.

Alison: Ah, Beijing 2022.

Jill: We’re going to hear that music a lot over the next several months.

Alison: Are we up to counting days yet? Or we’re still like, yeah, it’s like five months away.

Jill: I can’t count days yet.

Alison: We’re not ready to accept that.

Jill: No, no, no. I know that the media stuff is starting to happen because I did see mention of Erin Jackson, our speed skater, she did the NBC shoot. So we know that all of the NBC promotional stuff is starting to happen and all of those packages are starting to be created.

Jill: Good news for the hockey tournament at Beijing, the National Hockey League has reached an agreement with the players union that will allow players to participate in both Beijing 2022 and Milan Cortina 2026, which is excellent because they were not at PyeongChang 2018.

Jill: I think the players were disappointed. I’m sure [00:20:00] the organizers were all disappointed too, because you lose all the big names, but this is very good news that they’ll be able to get to the Olympics, middle of their season.

Alison: And what’s amazing when you’re talking about the hockey players is because hockey is such, the National Hockey League in the U S and Canada is such a worldwide league that you will have NHL players pretty much on every team in the Olympic tournament.

Alison: And it makes the tournament more interesting for everybody, gets all these different countries involved, and makes the play better. And you really do not know who’s going to come out with that medal when you’ve got the NHL players.

Jill: The Chinese Figure Skating Association has canceled hosting the ISU Four Continents Championships in Tianjin, which was set to take place two weeks before the opening of the Games. They have cited travel restrictions, quarantine requirements, safety concerns, and logistical challenges as the reason for this.

Alison: This is big in ice skating news, but also big in hosting world events news, because why are they canceling this event? Are they canceling this event because they don’t think they can do it safely? Are they canceling this event because China does not want anybody looking too deeply at them before Beijing actually starts? Are they canceling the event because they’re afraid something’s going to happen with a COVID outbreak from the event? And then what does that mean for Beijing two weeks later?

Alison: It’s problematic on so many levels. And now we’ve got no host for the Four Continents, which is a major competition on the figure skating calendar.

Jill: Right. And I imagine that having the championships in China right before the Games was part and parcel to help the athletes [00:22:00] just acclimate to China. They just would probably stay there and practice and get ready for the Games and not have to travel and be at their best for the Olympics. So it’ll be interesting to see what happens and where the championships go. I wonder if ISU will try to keep them kind of in the same time zone area.

Alison: They may do one of two things. They may just postpone Four Continents until after the Olympics. Oftentimes, if countries have multiple teams, they don’t send the same teams to Four Continents as they would to the Olympics. But sometimes they do, depending on how many teams and athletes the country has, but we’ve already had so many cancellations on the figure skating calendar from last year that people don’t know what we’re going into this year.

Alison: So to cancel Four Continents altogether is really problematic for the ISU. So they are having some headaches that they did not need.

Jill: We’re still doing test events for Beijing 2022. Those will start in October and will include a new strict COVID protocol that organizers hope will allow for spectators at the big events.

Jill: BBC reported that their local officials are expecting to have spectators at Beijing 2022. They expect to have full stands, but they don’t know yet how many of those spectators will be from overseas. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was domestic fans only. I — they could potentially fill stadiums and stands with people from the local area. Who knows? So we’ll keep an eye on what that is like. They haven’t really talked about ticket sales yet. They haven’t talked about spectators much yet. BBC also reported there will be no protest parks like there were in Beijing 2008.

Alison: Now I don’t remember the protest parks.

Jill: I remember the protest parks. I also vaguely remember that they were [00:24:00] far away from a lot of stuff. They were one of those, ideas that China said, oh yes, we will show you that we will allow for freedom of speech because everybody was so worried again, remember all of the concern about humanitarian rights and all of that stuff around Beijing 2008.

Jill: Well, that was really kind of China’s bigger coming out party as a nation. And so they said, yes, we will have protest parks . We allow people to speak freely. And that was pretty much for show. They were farther away if I remember correctly and not well used if I also remember that correctly. So they just put the kibosh on that this year.

Alison: Well, the one thing that Beijing does not have to worry about that Tokyo did is you don’t have literally thousands of tickets having already been sold worldwide. They just didn’t sell anything once COVID started cause they didn’t know what was going to happen. So all the tour companies are not involved in any of these decisions.

Jill: Right. So we’ll see. And playbooks will be coming in October. I’m curious if they just do kind of a copy and paste from Tokyo or they make them totally different.

Alison: Some of it is going to have to be different just because the local circumstances are different.

Jill: Very true.

Alison: Wear your mask will definitely be copy and pasted.

Jill: Right. The Olympic and Paralympic flags used in the host handover ceremony are in France and they will be making a tour of the country this fall. The flag tour will cover over 10,000 kilometers and visit more than 30 towns across the country, says Inside the Games.

Alison: So somebody actually gets to see the flags with the little balls on it in person. Please take a very close up picture and send it to me because I am fascinated by the little pompoms on the [00:26:00] flag.

Jill: We do have some Milan 2026 news. We have a new sport added to the sports program. Ski mountaineering is coming to Milan 2026.

Alison: Is coming to a mountain near you!

Jill: So what this is is basically you climb up the mountain and you ski down and you use your skis or carry your skis with you. I believe this was at the at a Youth Winter Olympic Games. It’s apparently very popular in Italy. So that is one of the reasons why it went on the program.

Alison: Oh, it makes sense. This is the free form skiing, like you’re not skiing where there’s a ski trail, that’s like hot dog skiing where you’re doing this on your own. So there’s no lifts. So you climb up and ski down yourself.

Jill: Right. But I’m sure they will have a trail marked out. So that–

Alison: Yes, there’ll be a course, but I’m saying historically where this comes from. Yes. It’s kind of an X Games idea, which is where we get all our new sports from.

Jill: And the hockey arena construction will start next fall. So, about three and a half years before the Games start. So let’s keep an eye on all the construction there. They are very optimistic about it. And also that this will be an arena that will have a legacy aspect, because they’ll be able to have concerts and things there as well.

Alison: I mean, you would think an ice arena would be pretty easy to keep using. You would hope. I mean, when we visited Lake Placid, 40 years later, that ice arena was busy.

Jill: Yeah. Lake Placid has done a great job of keeping that up because there’s hockey tournaments for youth that keep going on and they do have a lot of stuff.

Jill: Little bit of LA 20, 28 news. [00:28:00] The games now have a CEO. Her name is Kathy Carter, and she will report to the Chair. She will lead the planning and execution of the Games.

Alison: And she has a background with Major League Soccer. So she knows big sporting events and how to manage personalities. Shall we say. So good luck, Kathy Carter, cause you’re going to deal with some personalities.

Jill: We also have a lot of news on future Games. Everybody wants to host again, all of a sudden.

Alison: I noticed that! I feel like that Brisbane decision, just– it seemed to irritate a lot of people around the world in the sense of, how dare you pick somebody so far in advance? We wanted our turn.

Jill: Right?

Alison: So now they’re throwing in their hat very early for lots of stuff.

Jill: Yeah. And, and lots of stuff is the key because it’s just like, well, you know, if we don’t have to put together a bid or commit to having a super committee and a formal bid book and all of this process. Oh, sure. We’ll just be, think of us for everything.

Jill: Ukraine wants to host. So they are considering hosting the 2030 Winter Games, even though they don’t have a great winter sports legacy, but it’s a smaller event to put on and they think they can get all the venues and it would provide venues and hopefully interest in winter sports. 2030 also is got interest from Salt Lake City, Barcelona, and Sapporo.

Alison: Barcelona doesn’t even get snow!

Jill: Well, they would go into the mountains. It was a whole regional bid.

Alison: But then it’s not Barcelona.

Jill: I don’t know. But they also think that by that time they would be separate from Spain.

Alison: Oh really?

Jill: Yeah. And I believe that it’s an Inside the Games note that they are still working on independence from Spain. So it could be a [00:30:00] Catalonian bid.

Alison: Yeah. That’s not going to go very far because there’s no way the IOC is getting in the middle of that crack.

Jill: Vancouver, Quebec City and Bashkortostan from Russia had been also mentioned as considering bids for 2030, but Russia can’t be involved in a bid process until their WADA anti-doping sanctions expire. So that’s interesting.

Alison: Quebec City would be lovely.

Jill: Yeah, it would be interesting to see if they could host.

Alison: It’s a small city, so could they, could they pull it off? I mean, they certainly have a good number of facilities there and there’s certainly a long history of winter sports.

Jill: Right. The one thing I assume they would have to build is a sliding center, which is pricey, but North America could probably …it’s a chicken and egg thing. North America could use another sliding facility to make splitting a sliding season between North America and Europe pretty attractive.

Alison: Well, wouldn’t it be interesting if Quebec and Lake Placid did a joint bit? Use the Lake Placid sliding center. It’s only like four hours away, I want to say, maybe five. That sounds certainly closer than Sapporo in Tokyo for your marathon. That might be interesting. you know, Quebec City, give me a call! I speak a little French, like five words, but we’ll try.

Jill: But now that you say that, since we’ve talked about regional bids, this wasn’t a regional bid for Tokyo, but a regional games element did happen.

Jill: And in a sense, because the velodrome was so far away, that was also a regional event. I think the Games are more regional than we consider them because oftentimes there’s other satellite villages and things where some sports are that they’re just [00:32:00] not close enough to Tokyo for like football tournaments are in some of the games are in far away cities because they are not going to build multiple football stadiums.

Alison: And the Winter Games historically have been regional because you almost always have a city venue and a mountain venue. They’re almost always split. So, you know, going back into Vancouver and now Milan. And even Lake Placid had, when we were there, we had the city and then you had to drive. I mean, it wasn’t far, it was like a half an hour, but into the mountains.

Alison: So they’re always somewhat split. So it, it’s easier to get there, I think with the Winter Games, with the regional idea, because we’ve always had to do that.

Jill: Yeah. Back to Russia, Russia also wants to host in 2036. And a foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov has said several cities have already prepared bids. Now mind you, they can’t do anything until their sanctions expire, but St. Petersburg and Kazan are in the mix. And Vladimir Putin said that Vladivostok was also being put in the mix for a Summer Olympics.

Alison: I am hoping the IOC is not so greedy that they would get back into bed with Russia to host so quickly.

Jill: It’ll be interesting to see how many cities pop up for 2036, especially now that you have this. Oh, we don’t really, we can talk with you and we don’t have to commit to much. And if you’re going to award Games that far out, why not? But it gets to the point where if you want to go to any continent or any country that could be a potential coming out place, you almost can’t award the games so early. You can’t award them like a decade in advance or 15 years in advance because you can’t be sure of what will happen in that country.

Alison: Government may fall.

Jill: That’ll be interesting. The Hungarian [00:34:00] Olympic Committee has also announced according to Inside the Games that it officially renamed the Budapest 2032 committee, which it formed this January only to be told you’re out of date by Brisbane getting the games in July. They’ve renamed this committee to the Budapest Olympic Games Commission.

Jill: So they will be looking at future games. They were in the running for 2024, but dropped out right near the end. And that was one of the cities that raised the red flag on the bidding process, being so expensive and problematic. And the fact that citizens didn’t necessarily want the Games because they had referendums.

Jill: And so what the IOC did was create a committee and big host city selection process where you didn’t need a referendum for it to happen. I do like how they just, like, I kind of like the element of the bidding, not being a formal process in that the formal process is so expensive, but I also, you know, like I see what you’re doing there, IOC by not getting citizen buy-in with your formal bidding process.

Alison: They’re asking for trouble by not getting your citizen buy-in though, because that’s how we end up with all kinds of protests, all kinds of bad publicity. And it’s so problematic. On the other hand, we want to have some Olympics

Jill: and it’ll be interesting to see if they decide to select 2036 anytime soon.

Alison: Well, we got 2030, we still got to figure out. I’m hoping we focus there first.

Jill: Well, again, hopefully we’re not going to get greedy and just start awarding Games cause we can.

Alison: I would like to award the 2090 Games to Mars

Jill: And in [00:36:00] 2090 they will be like, remember this guy named Thomas Bach? Yeah, he was behind all of this.

Alison: Maybe he’ll still be around. His consciousness will be downloaded into one of those Toyota robots.

Alison: Welcome to TKFLASTAN

Jill: Yes. It’s time to check in with our Team Keep the Flame Alive. These are people who have been guests on our show, and now they are members of our Team Keep the Flame Alive, who are citizens of our country, TKFLASTAN. And it’s nice. We haven’t had a TKFLASTAN check-in in ages.

Alison: Yes. So we have a very long list, but the best news is we have some new TKFLASTANIS!

Jill: Yay!

Alison: So Emily Cook had a baby boy, Charles Patrick Lauer in April. Congratulations to her.

Jill: And Tom Scott, and his wife Morgan have announced that they are expecting their first child in December.

Alison: We like TKFLASTANI babies

Alison: In some health updates. DeAnna Price has had surgery for her injured ankle, which we mentioned she was suffering from in Tokyo, which removed a bone chip from the tendon. If you want to see something really gross, check her Instagram. She’s got pictures. And Connor Fields has returned home from the hospital and will- will continue his rehabilitation. Both are healing well, but no word on when or if, either we’ll return to competition.

Jill: Well, it’s good to hear about Connor Fields because a head injury, really tough, glad he’s home. Obviously he’s still in rehab mode, so hopefully that process is going well. I’d be curious to know what kind of shape he’s in right now, but hopefully this will get him back to normal. I hate to say, I hate to say normal.

Alison: I know. What’s normal? But he did post something really, really sweet on Instagram. Apparently his elementary school [00:38:00] that he went to, the kids sent him a huge box of get well cards. All the kids in the school made him cards. So he went last week to visit the kids and brought his medal and just talked about being at the Olympics. So he’s doing well. I mean, he’s doing public appearances. He’s doing announcements, he’s doing interviews, but you could see the looks on these kids’ faces, the story they are going to tell mom and dad when they get home that night. So he looks good. He looks like himself, which is more than we could say a month ago.

Jill: Exactly. At the Women’s Decathlon Association championships held at the end of August, Jordan Gray smashed her American and North American, Central American and Caribbean record with a score of 8246, which was impressive.

Alison: Lauren Gibbs and Josh Williamson have been named to the U S bobsled national team for the 21-22 season, which means they’re on track to be on the Olympic team.

Jill: So excited! Hope they do well. I mean, all of sliding, at least the U S and Canada, those teams are having a tough time because I know that luge has canceled the North American stops on their tour, which means that everyone will have to be in Europe for the year until they go to China.

Jill: But it’s really tough on the sliding sports. And a lot of the winter sports where big world cup events are not held in your home area or region. And you just are living out of a suitcase for six to eight months out of the year. But congratulations to them. So exciting. Speed skater Erin Jackson, biathlete Claire Egan and snowboarder alex Debold are all back at training camps with their respective national teams in preparation for the upcoming Olympics.

Alison: Lukka Jones has announced she will no longer compete in C1 to focus on K1 and extreme slalom. Seems like a good idea [00:40:00] because Lukka has placed second overall for the K1 world cup series this season.

Jill: So exciting! I wonder what she thought of C1 versus K1, especially. I mean, when it got added to the Olympics, it seemed like a no brainer to add that, but I would not be surprised if extreme slalom shows up for 2024 or 2028.

Alison: I think that’s why she added C1 was because it was added to the Olympic program and she would get two bites at the apple, but K1 is what she loves.

Jill: Shot putter Michelle Carter was inducted into the Texas Sports Hall of Fame. Congratulations to her.

Alison: And can I just say how fierce she looked that night? She posted some photos on Instagram of herself getting ready and how good she looked. Nice job, Michelle.

Alison: John McCloud’s first installment of his Beyond Bronze, Silver and Gold docu-series called “The Steve Genter Story” has been given the green light to be broadcast on PBS. He’s still got some hurdles to cross before it gets to air, but this is great news for the progress of the documentary.

Jill: I was so excited to see this. He posted it on LinkedIn and, and congratulations and years of work, not just going into getting the film produced, but now trying to have it find a bigger audience beyond a film festivals is a huge deal that he can get this, and hopefully you will be able to see it.

Jill: Geologists and PhD student Derek Leung has entered a video into a Vertasium science communication contest. And this is on 3-D printed mineral blocks. We’ll have a link to the YouTube video in the show notes.

Alison: Oh good. ‘ cause I never knew I needed to know as much about rocks until we talked to Derek.

Alison: And photographer lou Jones has an exhibit called [00:42:00] distressed:memories at the Griffin Museum of Photography in Winchester, Massachusetts. And from the official statement, distressed:memories is my personal labor to document my internal world to investigate those things that I know have seen, but do not really exist.

Alison: And the exhibit runs through October 1st. There will be two artists talks first and one in person on Tuesday, September 21st. And the second will be virtual on Tuesday, September 28th. And we will have a link in the show notes about tickets and the show.

Jill: And finally, a figure skater. Meghan Duhamel is providing pairs commentary during Skate Canada’s Autumn Classic international.

Jill: Which will be interest–I’m glad she’s getting into the booth. Again, this is not her first time in the booth, but it’s nice to see that she is getting these opportunities to provide commentary.

Alison: The tour she was going to go on in the fall where she had a new mark– partner was canceled because of COVID restrictions.

Alison: So she is not skating this fall. So I’m glad she’s getting to you keep herself busy, cause having a toddler, it’s not enough for her. She’s really good at the commentary, so that’s even better.

Jill: All right. And that’s going to do it for this week. I feel like, oh, we finally like so many people doing stuff it’s so nice to catch up and now we’re really, I feel ready to take on Beijing.

Alison: Okay. You know what it is, and I understand what it is. It’s too hot, still where I am to think about Beijing. I will be in Beijing mode in October. When October hits, I will be ready for Beijing.

Jill: Gotcha. When, especially when all the winter sports startup,

Alison: Right. How can you have skating competitions in September? That is wrong. It’s not wrong. I know it’s not wrong, but in my head I’m not ready.

Well, let us know how you are coping with Olympic and Paralympic withdrawal. And if you are ready for Beijing.

Alison: Email [00:44:00] us@flamealivepodatgmail.com. Call or text us at 2 0 8 3 5 2 6 3 4 8. That’s 2 0 8. Flame it. We’re @flamealivepod on Twitter and Insta and Keep the Flame Alive Podcast group on Facebook, where we are still having so much fun!

Jill: Next week we will have book club, which will be our conversation about Ben Ryan’s Sevens Heaven. If you don’t have your copy, you’ve still got time to read it. Spoiler alert. Good read. You can get your copy through bookshop.org/shop/flamealivepod.

Jill: Thank you so much for listening and until next time, keep the flame alive.

Alison: (Easter egg) This is like beyond getting sent to the principal.