Olympics

Unlike most of Britain’s 2020 Olympic hopefuls, Alex Decunha does not have the luxury of coaches overseeing a tailored programme or nutritionists ensuring he sticks to a rigid eating regime. Dinner routinely comes from the chicken restaurant Nando’s, where he mans the grill twice a week for extra cash, and training is navigated around angry security guards attempting to clear him off their property. Decunha might be rated as Britain’s leading street skateboarder, but old stereotypes prevail and for many his artform remains a nuisance. “I’ll be skating around in town and security guards will come over and go ‘haven’t you got anything better to do, get a job’ and all that kind of rubbish,” Decunha, 22, told Telegraph Sport. “I can’t even be bothered to argue. “Everyone still looks at us like we’re hoodlums causing trouble, ruining all the ledges that we skate. “Even the other day I was skating in … [Read more...] about Skateboarding at the 2020 Olympics: Alex Decunha

Unlike most of Britain’s 2020 Olympic hopefuls, Alex Decunha does not have the luxury of coaches overseeing a tailored programme or nutritionists ensuring he sticks to a rigid eating regime. Dinner routinely comes from the chicken restaurant Nando’s, where he mans the grill twice a week for extra cash, and training is navigated around angry security guards attempting to clear him off their property. Decunha might be rated as Britain’s leading street skateboarder, but old stereotypes prevail and for many his artform remains a nuisance. “I’ll be skating around in town and security guards will come over and go ‘haven’t you got anything better to do, get a job’ and all that kind of rubbish,” Decunha, 22, told Telegraph Sport. “I can’t even be bothered to argue. “Everyone still looks at us like we’re hoodlums causing trouble, ruining all the ledges that we skate. “Even the other day I was skating in … [Read more...] about Alex Decunha skateboarding interview: ‘People still view us as hoodlums causing trouble

The embattled head of Japan’s Olympic Committee resigned on Tuesday amid a widening corruption investigation linked to Tokyo’s successful bid to host the 2020 Olympic Games. With a little over a year to go until the opening ceremony for the Games, Tsunekazu Takeda announced during a meeting of the national Olympic committee in Tokyo that he would step down when his 10th term ends in June.  Mr Takeda, 71, has denied any wrongdoing in the process of bidding for the 2020 Games and said he is cooperating with an investigation led by French authorities.  Mr Takeda was placed under formal investigation by France’s financial crimes office on suspicion of “active corruption” on December 10, Le Monde reported. Prosecutors suspect that the IOC vote in 2013 was swayed by secret deals that secured the support of committee members from African states for Tokyo to host the games over Istanbul or Madrid. French investigators began their probe in 2016 on … [Read more...] about Japan’s Olympic chief resigns over over corruption scandal in latest row to mar Tokyo Games

A record spanning almost a century could be broken at the summer Olympics in Tokyo next year when a 10-year-old skateboarder hopes to become Great Britain’s youngest ever competitor. Sky Brown, who on Thursday became one of five British athletes selected for support from Skateboard UK, is aiming to break the record of breaststroke swimmer Marjorie Hinton, who was 13 years and 43 days old when she competed for Great Britain at the Amsterdam Olympics in 1928. If selected, Brown, who will be 12 years and 155 days old on the first day of her competition, would become the second youngest British Olympian at either summer or winter Olympics behind only the figure skater Cecilia Colledge, who was 11 at the 1932 winter games in Lake Placid. “I just want to get out there and have fun,” said Brown, who was born in Miyazaki in Japan to a British father and Japanese mother. “I like it because it makes me feel happy and free, like I can do anything. I think girls can do … [Read more...] about 10-year-old skateboarder Sky Brown expected to become Great Britain’s youngest ever Olympian in Tokyo