Road to Tokyo 2020 - Irish Olympic News

The women’s team aren’t *strongly* fancied. They’re slight favourite because they’re at home. The rankings aren’t up to much. Ireland are high because of the World Cup silver last year. Those games were tight with some big shoot out wins. I’m not saying they were lucky but the rankings got a huge boost there

In the qualifying tournament earlier this year Ireland lost to South Korea while Canada drew with Spain (before losing their final to the same team)

Canada have been based in Europe for months and effectively train as a club team. This is a tough tie for Ireland.

As for the men, they’ve been in poor form this year. They lost to France in the qualifier and finished last of 8 in the European championships. They do, however, welcome back the worlds best goalkeeper David Harte and they always have a chance with him in the nets. Canada will be slight favourites here too. A little bit of luck may be needed by Ireland

Strazdas

Cosmo Kramer wrote: »

In the Hockey is it fair to say that the women are favourites and will bbc expect to qualify but the men's is a long shot really?

I'm no hockey expert but the women's team are playing two legs at home against a team ranked about eight places below them and in front of an expected 7000 home fans. You would imagine they would be strongly favoured to get through.

The men's play off looks trickier.

Cosmo Kramer

In the Hockey is it fair to say that the women are favourites and will expect to qualify but the men's is a long shot really?

Our hockey team is playing Canada this weekend over two legs. Winner on aggregate qualifies for Tokyo. Canada wouuld be slight favourites based in World rankings but Ireland has changed its head coach in the past few weeks and the match is way over in Vancouver so it would be a great acheivement to qualify. Matches are on RTE Newsnow at 10pm on Saturday and 9pm Sunday.

Athletics

Ciara Mageean (1,500m)
Alex Wright (20k walk)
Brendan Boyce (50k walk)
Fionnuala McCormack (marathon)

Canoeing - Slalom

boat (men's C1)

Robert Hendrick qualified the boat but himself and Liam Jegou are set to fight for it

Cycling - Road

Men's Road race (3 quotas)
Men's ITT (1 quota)

Equestrian

Eventing (team with 3 individuals)
Dressage(team with 3 individuals)
Show jumping (team and 3 individuals)

Gymnastics (artistic)

Rhys McClenaghan

Modern Pentathlon

Natalya Coyle

Rowing

w1x
w2-
m2x
lm2x

Sailing

Laser Radial

Aisling Kelleher won the quota but 4 are going for the boat including Annalise Murphy

Swimming

Darragh Greene (100m, 200m breast)
Shane Ryan (100m back)

Although these have the times, Swim Ireland has their own criteria so these may not be selected

Chivito550

What's the full list of Olympic qualifiers from Ireland to date?

Flights booked to Tokyo this morning.

Yesterday was the closing of the Rankings list for Olympic qualification for the Cycling Road Races. Ireland have qualified 3 riders for the mens road, one of whom can also enter the Mens time trial.

Team Ireland now up to 29.

We have our 4th qualifier in Athletics as Fionnuala McCormack was 5th in the Chicago marathon in 02:26:47

Well under the qualifying time

Skid X wrote: »

Bronze for Rhys McClenaghan , only 0.1 behind Max Whitlock who won Gold.

Great to see an Irish Gymnast on the podium and on another day he could have won, serious talent.

He and Lee Chih-Kai should have outscored Max, honestly. Every gymnastics fan I know is really upset about this final. Max does not extend his hips or point his toes on any element and he is not properly deducted. Yet, he got an 8.5 in execution and Rhys, who has beautiful extension and toe point, only got a 9.0 in comparison. It's not enough differentiation in execution. The same is true for Lee Chih-Kai. He and Rhys should have been your gold and silver medalists full stop.

But, it's great history for gymnastics in Ireland, and that bronze medal is very beautiful.

Skid X

Bronze for Rhys McClenaghan , only 0.1 behind Max Whitlock who won Gold.

Great to see an Irish Gymnast on the podium and on another day he could have won, serious talent.

Oldira wrote: »

What do you think her chances are of getting a spot? Luckily the quota is awarded to the gymnast rather than the NOC so there is a chance. However there are no Dutch or New Zealand ahead of her and they tend to only select potential top 8 performers in their teams. She will be relying on injuries.

So darn close too just .3 of a mark. And she fell on the beam. Pity.

50/50. She basically has to rely on someone getting injured or foregoing their spot for some reason. Injury is fairly common, but the alternate for Rio didn't get called up, so it's not certain.

She was so close, and Emma finished literally right behind her by 1 tenth (if Emma had only fallen once on beam, she would have qualified). The silver lining is, Ireland's never had one, let alone two, homegrown talents come so close to qualifying (Ellis O'Reilly lived and trained in England and only competed for Ireland after she failed to make the British team). The future is bright.

metaoblivia wrote: »

Women's qualifying is officially over and it looks like Meg Ryan will be the first alternate on the Olympic qualifying list. That means that right now, Ireland will not have a women's gymnastics representative in Tokyo, BUT if any of the individuals who qualified ahead of Meg get injured or their federations decide they won't compete for whatever reason, Meg gets the spot.

What do you think her chances are of getting a spot? Luckily the quota is awarded to the gymnast rather than the NOC so there is a chance. However there are no Dutch or New Zealand ahead of her and they tend to only select potential top 8 performers in their teams. She will be relying on injuries.

So darn close too just .3 of a mark. And she fell on the beam. Pity.

Dodge wrote: »

I love his attitude in interviews. Everything he mentions is about ‘going for gold’. Not going out to ‘do well’ or ‘win a medal’ but to win gold

Pommel is so hard that anything can happen but I just love how confident he appears and how much he wants to win

He's not afraid of the grind and he's not afraid to want it all. Whitlock is great, but his execution and technique have always been a bit lacking. Rhys puts just as much emphasis on execution and technique as he does difficulty. He's even sought out training opportunities with some of the best pommel technicians in the world. It'll pay off one day in a big way.

metaoblivia wrote: »

Dodge wrote: »

McClenaghan is officially qualified for Tokyo. He’s one of 9 finalists for the pommel but 7 of them are part of qualifying nations so he qualifies

Great news

He also became the first Irish gymnast to ever qualify for a finals at the world championships and is currently ranked 2nd, just a hair behind British gymnast (and reigning Olympic champ) Max Whitlock.

Whitlock did a routine with 8 tenths more difficulty than Rhys, but Rhys almost made that entire gap up with his superior execution. And Rhys can do a harder routine than what he showed in qualifying. If he performs well, Ireland could be looking at it's first ever medal at a world championships.

I love his attitude in interviews. Everything he mentions is about ‘going for gold’. Not going out to ‘do well’ or ‘win a medal’ but to win gold

Pommel is so hard that anything can happen but I just love how confident he appears and how much he wants to win

Dodge wrote: »

McClenaghan is officially qualified for Tokyo. He’s one of 9 finalists for the pommel but 7 of them are part of qualifying nations so he qualifies

Great news

He also became the first Irish gymnast to ever qualify for a finals at the world championships and is currently ranked 2nd, just a hair behind British gymnast (and reigning Olympic champ) Max Whitlock.

Whitlock did a routine with 8 tenths more difficulty than Rhys, but Rhys almost made that entire gap up with his superior execution. And Rhys can do a harder routine than what he showed in qualifying. If he performs well, Ireland could be looking at it's first ever medal at a world championships.

McClenaghan is officially qualified for Tokyo. He’s one of 9 finalists for the pommel but 7 of them are part of qualifying nations so he qualifies

Great news

Women's qualifying is officially over and it looks like Meg Ryan will be the first alternate on the Olympic qualifying list. That means that right now, Ireland will not have a women's gymnastics representative in Tokyo, BUT if any of the individuals who qualified ahead of Meg get injured or their federations decide they won't compete for whatever reason, Meg gets the spot.

Pierre de Coubertin

The Show Jumpers have done it!

First team qualification since Athens.

15.2 for Rhys McClenaghan on pommel today. That’ll easily be enough to qualify for the final. He went with 6.3 difficulty (lower than usual) and had a brilliant 8.9 on execution

Adam Steele did well in the all round but now he waits to see if it’s food enough for one of the last quotas (Edit: his score was 77.431 - anyone who scored 78 was expected to qualify. Fingers crossed)

Final for Rhys is next Saturday

Qualifications for Irish female gymnasts at the world championships just finished.

This was Ireland's one real shot to qualify a female gymnast to the Olympics, and unfortunately it doesn't look like it's going to happen. Emma Slevin was on her way to a qualifying score until the last rotation, balance beam, where she uncharacteristically fell twice (had she hit, she would have safely qualified).

Really unfortunate, but Emma's just 16 and this was her first year competing as a senior and first time competing at a world championships (same for her two teammates, Kate Molloy and Meg Ryan). I know she struggles with confidence on beam moreso than the other events, and it was bad luck she got drawn to end on that event. The pressure must have been really high. All of the Irish girls fell on beam after strong performances on the first three events. Beam is a killer.

But they're all young and hopefully this will be good motivation for them to come back next quad with more experience under their belts!

Pierre de Coubertin

Oldira wrote: »

Have to say the Columbians came out of left field. Hadnt counted them as a threat at all. All to play for though.

Are there 1 or two rounds on Sunday?

Wouldn't underestimate them at all for Sunday.

That was so tight, we were 1 rail from going home. The Italians survive by half a miserable second. A little bit sickened by that as it would have made our task so much easier.