World champion Spain qualifies to Olympics for first time
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The United States Women’s National Team is certainly looking forward to this summer’s Olympics in Paris so it can quickly redeem itself for a round of 16 loss in last summer’s Women’s World Cup.
But the 12-team field in Paris certainly got a lot stronger last week when defending world champion and No. 1-ranked Spain qualified for its first ever Olympics with a 3-0 win over the Netherlands in the semifinals of the UEFA Nations League.
Spain joins the No. 2-ranked USWNT, No. 3 France, No. 6 Germany, No. 8 Japan, No. 10 Canada, No. 11 Brazil, No. 12 Australia, No. 23 Colombia and No. 30 New Zealand as qualifiers so far for the women’s soccer competition in Paris.
In April, Morocco, Nigeria, South Africa and Zambia will play a mini-tournament over eight days to determine the final two qualifying spots.
Gymnastics draw announced
Both the United States women’s and men’s gymnastics teams know what event they will start in during the opening stage of the team competition for this summer’s Olympics.
The U.S. women, who will be looking to regain its title as Olympic champion after taking silver in Tokyo (the Russian Olympic Committee won gold), will start on the balance beam in the qualifying stage of the team competition, which will take place on July 28.
From there, the order of the other three events to compete (vault, floor, bars) in will be determined by the team leader. The team finals will be held on July 30.
The U.S. men, which finished third at the 2023 world championships, its first podium finish in nine years, will start on the pommel horse. Defending Olympic and world champion Japan will start on on the vault. The team finals will be July 29.
Kenya mourns death of elite runner
It was a sad day in Kenya last Friday, as a state funeral was held for 24-year-old marathon runner Kelvin Kiptum.
Dignitaries in the country and from World Athletics joined in paying tribute to Kiptum, who was killed in a car accident on Feb. 11.
Kiptum was the world record holder in the marathon, breaking the record last October at the Chicago Marathon when he ran a time of 2 hours, 35 seconds.
He had never competed in an Olympics but was supposed to be one of the stars in the track and field competition this summer.