The 2024 Summer time Olympics will get beneath approach in Paris on July 26.
Al Jazeera picks out the highest 5 rivalries to look at on the upcoming Video games:
Ladies’s 400m Freestyle – a trio of the world report holders
Three of the largest stars in world swimming – Katie Ledecky, Ariarne Titmus and Summer time McIntosh – will collide within the 400 freestyle in a contest already being broadly dubbed as swimming’s “race of the century”.
Already one of many best swimmers ever and a a number of world report holder all through her profession, Ledecky will head to Paris wanting so as to add to her six particular person Olympic gold medals.
The 27-year-old certified within the 200-metre, 400-metre, 800-metre and 1,500-metre freestyle – though she expects to drop the person 200-metre to give attention to the 800-metre and 1,500-metre free, thought of her greatest pictures at victory. Ledecky is aiming for a fourth straight 800-metre free gold and one other 1,500-metre crown.
However it’s within the blue-ribband 400-metre freestyle occasion the place three of the best swimmers of the trendy period will collide.
Ledecky, the 2016 400-metre Olympic champion, faces stiff competitors from Australia’s Ariarne Titmus, who surprised the American within the 400-metre freestyle on the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and at present owns the world report.
Each Ledecky and Titmus can even should be cautious of sensational Canadian teenager Summer time McIntosh, who additionally held the 400-metre world report till early 2023, when Titmus snatched it again on the 2023 world championships.
The 17-year-old McIntosh is predicted to be a gold-medal contender in a number of occasions, together with the 800-metre free that has been dominated for greater than a decade by Ledecky. McIntosh snapped Ledecky’s 13-year undefeated run in that occasion at a sectional meet in Florida, posting a time that was quicker than Ledecky’s gold medal-winning efficiency in Tokyo.
Males’s Javelin – a South Asia duel
All eyes might be on reigning gold medallist Neeraj Chopra, however the Indian can count on loads of struggle from his South Asian opponent and good friend Arshad Nadeem of Pakistan.
Chopra catapulted himself into superstardom three years in the past when he threw 87.58 metres in Tokyo to earn India’s first-ever Olympic gold medal in athletics.
In 2023, the 26-year-old additionally grew to become the primary Indian to win a gold medal on the World Athletics Championships, when he pipped Nadeem with an 88.17-metre effort within the last.
Chopra’s private greatest throw is 89.94 metres, which he recorded on the Stockholm Diamond League in 2022. His coach Klaus Bartonietz advised Reuters in Might that Chopra is raring to affix javelin’s elite 90-metre membership however will fortunately accept a shorter throw in Paris if it proves sufficient for him to carry on to his Olympic title.
In contrast to Chopra, Nadeem has breached the magical 90-metre mark, throwing 90.18-metres on the 2022 Commonwealth Video games (CWG) in Birmingham to finish Pakistan’s 60-year watch for a CWG gold medal.
Nadeem, standing 1.9 metres (6 toes 3 inches) tall and blessed with unimaginable pure power, is one in every of solely 24 athletes worldwide within the 90-metre membership and solely the second Asian after Taiwan’s Chao-Tsun Cheng. He believes the Paris Olympics are his greatest likelihood to go for gold.
Ladies’s 100m Dash – USA vs Jamaica
Three years after a optimistic marijuana take a look at noticed her kicked off the US workforce for the Tokyo Olympics, Sha’Carri Richardson has earned an opportunity for Olympic redemption.
Richardson would be the one to beat in Paris as she arrives within the French capital following her gold medal triumph within the World Athletics Championships final yr in Hungary. The 24-year-old holds the world-leading report of 10.71 seconds this season, having gained the 100-metre last on the US trials earlier than the Video games.
With reigning Olympic dash champion Elaine Thompson-Herah out with an harm, Richardson can count on competitors from the unimaginable Shelly-Ann Fraser Pryce, because the traditional rivalry between the US and Jamaica might be rekindled in Paris.
At 37, Fraser Pryce is within the twilight of her profession, however as essentially the most adorned 100-metre sprinter with eight Olympic medals, the Jamaican dash queen has expertise on her aspect and might trigger issues for Richardson, who might be making her Olympic debut.
Males’s Marathon – two legends again within the race
The longstanding rivalry between Ethiopian working legend Kenenisa Bekele and reigning Olympic champion Eliud Kipchoge might be unexpectedly renewed on the males’s marathon in Paris.
The 41-year-old Bekele final competed on the 2012 London Olympics when he completed fourth within the males’s 10,000-metre earlier than being ignored for the 2016 and 2020 Olympics. Nonetheless, a outstanding second-place end on the London marathon in April earned him a spot within the Paris Olympics, the place he’ll line up towards 39-year-old Kipchoge, the previous marathon world report holder.
Whereas Bekele has gained three Olympic golds within the 5,000-metre and 10,000-metre, Kipchoge has gained two Olympic marathon golds and is aiming for an unprecedented third.
Bekele and Kipchoge’s rivalry dates again to their first assembly on the 2003 World Championships last and the final time they raced collectively was on the London Marathon in 2018 when Kipchoge gained.
Excessive Leap – inseparable favourites
Hardly ever have two athletes been so inseparable in world sport as Italy’s Gianmarco Tamberi and Mutaz Essa Barsham of Qatar.
These towering stars created historical past on the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo – and the Video games’ most heartwarming second – once they determined to share the excessive bounce gold medal after they might not be separated after each had jumped 2.37 metres.
Two years later, they have been nonetheless inseparable, topping the world rankings in 2023.
Anybody who witnessed Tamberi and Barsham’s unimaginable spectacle on the Tokyo Olympics will look ahead to these two spectacular athletes renewing their rivalry on the Paris Olympics 2024, the place each are once more the favourites for gold.
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