The Games of the 31st Olympiad in Rio, Brazil began yesterday with football but officially start today! The Games will run from August 5-21. Athletics begin next Friday, August 12.
The Opening Ceremony will start at 6pm this evening at the Maracaná Stadium and will be shown on TvJ with a Pregame show at 4pm. No station seems to have full rights to show the Games so no channel should be blocked.
Brazil’s Olympic Village may not be ready but our Jamaican athletes surely are ready.
However, Suga does not expect the level of magic that occurred in Beijing and London to occur in Rio. Jamaicans need to understand that our Athletics is going through a change in generation, where veterans are either no more such as Kerron Stewart or not as fast after rounds as they used to be, e.g. VCB, and most of the young, upcoming athletes are not quite ready to deliver the quality we have been spoilt with over the past 2 Olympiads.
However, enough of being a Debbie Downer. Even though that may be at the back of my mind, I remain positive and know that veterans like Usain Bolt can still deliver and newcomers like Elaine Thompson should deliver. Omar McLeod and Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce are on the ropes but there seems to be something about the Olympics that just puts a torch under our you know what and then sparks just fly.
We have newcomers to look forward to in Gymnastics such as Toni-Ann Williams, Yona Knight-Wisdom for Diving and Timothy Wynter for Swimming.
Will our Alia Atkinson finally get her Olympic medal? I sure hope so. She gets closer every time.
Swimming, Tennis and Basketball start tomorrow. Fret not for the hot races in Athletics because they are mostly in the evenings and on weekends. You can set in your calendars from now:
Women’s 100m FINAL:
Saturday, August 13 @ 8:35pm
Men’s 100m FINAL:
Sunday, August 14 @ 8:25pm
Women’s 200m FINAL:
Wednesday, August 17 at 8:30pm
Men’s 200m FINAL:
Thursday, August 18 at 8:30pm
The 4×100m Relay FINALS will be run on the Saturday before the Olympics end.
If you didn’t get your Free Jamaica Observer Olympics Supplement in the Sunday paper, you can be sure to stay tuned to Suga’s posted schedules, updates and commentary on this website and like Suga Lifestyle’s Facebook page.
There is also a Flow Rio 2016 App that you can download on your phones for free. Not sure if it is as user friendly as the London 2012 app yet but it seems to have a decent layout so far. Too early to endorse.
Well Suga Bears, let the Games BEGIN!!!
