Day four of the Paris Olympics included a bronze medal for USA's women's rugby sevens team, a silver medal for the internet's new favorite person ever, sharpshooter Kim Ye-ji, more bad news about the Seine, and whole lot of cheating. Allegedly.
Cheating is an Olympic tradition that dates back at least to the 67 CE Olympic Games when Emperor Nero rode a 10-horse chariot in the four-horse chariot race, fell off during the race, and was still declared the winner. In keeping with this example of the ancient games, here are some of the cheating scandals and accusations at the Paris 2024 games.
Canadian soccer team allegedly used spy drones. The Canadian women's soccer team is doing better than expected at this year's games, but the team's accomplishments are being overshadowed by underhanded help they may have had. On July 22, New Zealand's soccer team called the police over a suspicious drone hovering around their practice field. French authorities traced the drone to Joseph Lombardi, a staff member of Canada Soccer. Canada admitted they were spying. Lombardi and an assistant coach were sent back to Canada and FIFA is investigating. How the Olympic authorities will respond if Canada wins a medal isn't known, but it's not unheard of for medals to be taken back long after they're awarded.
USA fencing's alleged crooked officials. I find the rules of fencing to be incomprehensible, so how one would go cheat them is even harder to understand, but here's the gist: A lot of referees in the USA's Olympic qualifying contests have been accused of fixing results so that specific fencers will make the Olympic team. Two referees at an Olympics qualifying tournament were suspended for allegedly working together to fix matches so fencer Tatiana Nazlymov would make the U.S. Olympic team. Two other referees were accused of making calls that favored fencer Mitchell Saron. Disgruntled fencing fans allege that fixing results to help specific athletes is rampant in fencing, a sport that's doesn't seem to have a particularly powerful oversight body. The only saving grace of this scandal is that "helping" unqualified people make a fencing team isn't cheating in a way that hurts our competitors. It just hurts us! The USA!
Basketball refs allegedly hate The Lakers. The star of Japan's Olympic basketball team is LA Laker Rui Hachimura. In a game against France today, Hachimura was ejected from the game after a second unsportsmanlike conduct foul that many basketball fans are calling sus. Basketball twitter is chalking the ejection up to the refs hating The Lakers, which seems farfetched. But still, it was a very weak foul. Was it simply bad officiating? A cultural difference in how fouls are called in International competition vs. the NBA? Unconscious bias on the part of the refs? Could be a little of each or none of the above.
I told you yesterday that it was a good time to get into women’s rugby, and I hope you listened, because today in the bronze medal match for women's sevens, the underdog U.S. team pulled out a last-second victory against rugby powerhouse Australia with an all-time Olympic highlights play. Down 12 to 7 with only eight seconds left and backed way up to the opposing line, USA’s Alex “Spiff” Sedrick caught a pass, found a hole in Australia’s defense, and sprinted down the entire field. With no time left on the clock, Spiff crossed the line and snatched a historic victory for USA, the first medal the USA has ever won in any Olympic rugby competition.
Oh, and New Zealand won the gold, beating second-place finisher Canada.
As predicted, Olympic officials pulled the plug on the swimming portion of the triathlon today, pushing it back until Wednesday, dependent on whether the levels of E. coli are low enough for the water to be safe. A Wednesday race seems unlikely too, though. Rain is on the forecast Tuesday night through Thursday, which will likely dump more E. coli into the Seine. If the swim can't happen on Wednesday, officials say it will be held on Friday; surely the river won't be polluted on Friday, right?
Triathlete Seth Rider came up with his own (foul) strategy for dealing with bacteria. He told the New York Times, "I just try to increase my E. coli threshold by exposing myself to a bit of E. coli in your day-to-day life,” Rider said. “And it’s actually backed by science. Proven methods. Just little things throughout your day, like not washing your hands after you go to the bathroom.” Note to self: Do not shake hands with Seth Rider.
I love the cool personalities that bubble to the surface during the Olympics. This year, South Korean sharpshooter Kim Ye-ji has captured the world's imagination. She took home the silver medal in 10m shooting today, but she won multiple gold medal in looking like a complete badass. Check out the video of Kim setting a world record a few months ago. She has pure ice water in her veins. Her black outfit, tactical specs, and that stance, with one hand casually in her pocket? Come on.
