“I have done way more in this sport than I ever imagined I would,” says Wog. “I’m satisfied with what I’ve accomplished and feel like it’s a great ending point.”

With her for the final swim will be long-time coach Vlastimil Cerny, head coach of the Bisons Sports swim program, who has worked with Wog her entire career and helped her prepare for her second Olympic appearance.

Wog diving in at the start of a race

Cerny himself is no stranger to the Olympics. He competed as an athlete in Seoul 1988 and four times as a coach for Team Canada. Cerny says they’re working to mitigate any added stress preparing for a final performance.

“The biggest difference in the performances at the Olympics is the mindset,” says Cerny. “And she’s always been good about enjoying everything else that goes alongside competing.”

Cerny says Wog has developed as an athlete over the years and thrived. He attributes her success to commitment and consistent training. He adds she is naturally skilled in the water.

“Kelsey has a tremendous feel for the water. She’s like a fish,” he says. “She’s also very professional about her schedule and never misses a day.”

Wog says it takes her a while to feel comfortable with people, so working with Cerny and the same team of coaches throughout her career has been incredibly beneficial.

“The process has been extremely smooth as I moved up through the [Junior Bisons] club program because they knew me and they knew what worked for me,” Wog says.

Wog and Cherney after a race

Wog is excited about her second trip to the games, which will have the full Olympics experience. Her last Olympic appearance was in Tokyo. Originally scheduled for the summer of 2020, the Tokyo Olympics were held in the summer of 2021 without spectators in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I’m so excited to go and see other events and cheer on Team Canada,” says Wog. “And to have my parents in the stands, being able to wave to them after my race will be special.”

Cerny says that even in the short Olympic cycle, Wog has made incredible strides. He says she has grown in her training, as an athlete and as a competitor.

“She’s been there before, so this time it’s just about the pursuit,” says Cerny. “It’s not about the results but about pursuing your performance and just letting it happen.”

Wog echoes her coach’s sentiments, hoping to race what she can on that day and execute what they’ve done in training. Wog says the hope is to “swim fast.”

“The goal is always to enjoy it and be grateful that I’m able to compete at this level,” says Wog. “Just soak it all in because it’s not something I’m going to get to do forever.”

The women’s 200-metre breaststroke heats air Wednesday July 31 from 1:00 a.m. to 3:30 a.m. (Central Time).

Want to watch the Olympics on campus?

You’re invited to the Paris 2024 Viewing Lounge in the Active Living Centre Agora!

Presented by the Canadian Centre for Sport Manitoba and the Faculty of Kinesiology and Recreation Management, come watch the CBC coverage on a big screen, every day from the Opening Ceremonies (Friday, July 26, at 1 pm) to the Closing Ceremonies (Sunday, August 11 at 1 pm). We’ll be showing events featuring former University of Manitoba Bison Athletes, Manitoban competitors and Canadian teams completing this July and August.

Can’t make it to the Agora? Tune into CBC Gem for full coverage of the Olympic Games Paris 2024 from Friday, July 26 to Sunday, August 11.

To listen to the full conversation, please visit CBC Manitoba.

Douglas Brown, dean of the Faculty of Kinesiology and Recreation Management, says he’s going to be keeping his eyes peeled for a few familiar faces, like Bisons swimming alum Kelsey Wog.

“I love to see the Canadians come in and see what athletes I recognize,” says Brown. “I really am a geek for these sports, particularly track and swimming.” 

Brown says his interest in the Olympics goes all the way back to high school, where he found out the mother of one of his physical education teachers competed in the 1938 Berlin Olympics. 

Brown says Betty Taylor, his teacher’s mother, once showed him the bronze medal she brought home. Seeing such a piece of such a historical event solidified an interest in the games beyond just watching it as a fan. 

“I was interested in the bigger picture of what the culture was, why [the Olympics] mean something to us and why are they the way they are?” Brown says.

Dean of the Faculty of Kinesiology and Recreation Management, Douglas Brown

Every four years, Brown tuned into the Olympics, remembering the fervour and excitement around Montreal in 1976.  

“I was collecting newspapers and watching it every day in school,” says Brown. 

Brown followed his interest in the Olympics throughout the years, completing his Master’s in Physical Education (Sport Administration) from the University of Ottawa (1988) and obtaining his PhD (Sport History) from the University of Western Ontario (1997).  

At Western, Brown was the first PhD dissertation of the International Centre for Olympic Studies, which encourages, generates and disseminates a broad range of social and cultural themes related to the Olympic Games, Paralympic Games and the Olympic Movement. 

Brown’s dissertation, Theories of Beauty and Modern Sport: Pierre de Coubertin’s Aesthetic Imperative for the Modern Olympic Movement, 1894-1914, explored the “father” of the modern Olympic games, Pierre de Coubertin and the origins of the origins of the games themselves. 

Pierre de Coubertin

“I was fascinated by this character and his singular vision of what modern sports should look like. He brought this to an international community, and they bought it,” says Brown. 

Brown says many of the complex relationships between the business and production sides of the games and how they relate to the competitions has been with the modern Olympics since their inception. Brown says it can be a challenge at times to talk openly and with a critical lens about an event that means so much to so many, both athletes and fans.

“How do you be a fan and at the same time look at it critically?” Brown says. “And that’s something I still wrestle with.” 

Brown researched his dissertation in the archives of the International Olympic Committee in Switzerland. The collection houses Coubertin’s writings and publications from 1894 and earlier. 

“It was my job for four months to go into the archives daily and read and research,” says Brown. “It was a tremendous experience.” 

Brown’s experience with the games extends beyond the archives. During the 1992 Winter Olympics in Albertville, France, Brown served as the clinic manager of the medical team. 

Brown says the experience was eye-opening, allowing him to see first-hand the behind-the-scenes pageantry that goes into broadcasting the games. He says it was fascinating to see athletes stepping over camera cables and loading onto cramp buses before performing on possibly the largest stage of their careers. 

“I was really enamoured with the whole experience,” Brown says. “I just thought the whole production was intriguing.” 

Brown says his experience at the games also highlighted that he didn’t want to be as hands on in Canadian sport for his entire career. And while today Brown says he isn’t as involved in the following the games as he once was, he will be tuning in and supporting the Canadian athletes, especially former Bisons.

Want to watch the Olympics on campus?

You’re invited to the Paris 2024 Viewing Lounge in the Active Living Centre Agora!

Presented by the Canadian Centre for Sport Manitoba and the Faculty of Kinesiology and Recreation Management, come watch the CBC coverage on a big screen, every day from the Opening Ceremonies (Friday, July 26, at 1 pm) to the Closing Ceremonies (Sunday, August 11 at 1 pm). We’ll be showing events featuring former University of Manitoba Bison Athletes, Manitoban competitors and Canadian teams completing this July and August.

Can’t make it to the Agora? Tune into CBC Gem for full coverage of the Olympic Games Paris 2024 from Friday, July 26 to Sunday, August 11.

She will need to finish second or better and under the qualification standard at the trials to solidify a spot on Team Canada for the upcoming Summer Games.

“This year, it’s just about racing and executing my races how I want to, so the more often I can practice them at higher level meets, the better. I’m going to treat this meet as a great opportunity to practice executing what I’ve trained and to fine-tune how I want to prepare for my races in the day,” said Kelsey Wog, who is studying to attain a master’s degree in microbiology (thesis-based) at the U of M.

For more on this story about future Manitoba Olympians, please visit this Winnipeg Free Press article

Kamila Valieva isn’t the first young athlete accused of doping at the Olympics, and she surely won’t be the last unless we start taking the special circumstances of youth athletes seriously.

Concerns about youth doping were amplified at the 2022 Olympic Winter Games in Beijing following the news that Valieva, a 15-year-old Russian figure skater, had tested positive for the banned substance trimetazidine. The delayed news of her positive test raised many questions, including whether it is time to add minimum age limits to Olympic participation.

Age limits at the Olympics are set by each International Federations (IF) — the international sports bodies that govern individual sports — and not by the International Olympic Committee. Specifically, Rule 42 of the Olympic Charter states: “There may be no age limit for competitors in the Olympic Games other than as prescribed in the competition rules of an IF as approved by the IOC Executive Board.”

Just like the IOC does for sex testing, eligibility rules for age are deferred to the IFs. Some IFs have decided that age matters, and imposed minimum age restrictions for Olympic participation — others have not. These range from 13 for fencing and 14 for taekwondo and bobsled, to 17 for wrestling, cycling and weightlifting, and 20 for the marathon.

How young is too young?

Many people believe Valieva is too young to have doped without adult involvement. But there is no “too young” to commit a doping offense. For example, a 12-year-old Polish boy tested positive for nikethamide and received a two-year ban from the Federation Internationale de L’Automobile. His lawyer argued he should not be sanctioned because he was too young to compete at the Youth Olympic Games (YOG). Despite his age, and the banned substance being traced to an energy bar, the Court of Arbitration for Sport only reduced his ban by six months, noting he was not too young for the anti-doping rules to apply.

At the inaugural YOG, two 17-year-old wrestlers failed doping tests and were required to forfeit their participation certificates and any medals won. Both were suspended from the sport for two years, and their names were entered into the public doping registry of the IF (now known as United World Wrestling), despite their legal status as minors.

Andreea Răducan was the original gold-medal winner of the women’s all-around gymnastics competition at the 2000 Sydney Olympics. She was stripped of it after testing positive for a banned substance that came from an over-the-counter cold medicine. (AP Photo/Amy Sancetta, File)

Two more examples illustrate that age does not protect an athlete from the consequences of doping at the Olympics. At the 1972 Summer Games, 16-year-old swimmer Rick DeMont of the United States lost his gold medal in the 400-metre freestyle when he tested positive for ephedrine. All involved in the case understood that the ephedrine was part of his prescription asthma medication. His team physician failed to disclose the athlete’s required use of the medication, yet the disqualification stood.

Sixteen-year-old Romanian gymnast Andreea Răducan was in the same boat at the Sydney 2000 Olympics, when a cold tablet given to her by her team physician contained a banned substance. Jacques Rogge, who was appointed president of the IOC a year later, acknowledged to reporters the injustice of the situation: “This is one of the worst experiences I have had in my Olympic life.”

The Olympic movement has long held the position that doping rules are firm. What’s different now is the increased awareness of athlete mental health, the role of the entourage and the risks associated with overtraining and specialization at a young age. The range of reactions to Valieva’s saga, from Tara Lipinski’s outrage to Katarina Witt’s compassion, highlights the need to consider different models of youth participation.

Age limits for athletes: yay or nay?

Banning young athletes from the Olympics would mean we miss spectacular performances like Chinese diver Fu Mingxia’s gold in the 10-metre platform diving at the Barcelona 1992 Olympics at age 13, and Romanian gymnast Nadia Comaneci’s perfect 10 at the 1976 Montreal Olympics at age 14.

Nadia Comaneci dismounts from the uneven parallel bars to score a perfect 10.00 in the women’s gymnastics competition at the 1976 Summer Olympic Games in Montreal. (AP Photo/Suzanne Vlamis)

But considering all we know about overtraining, exploitation and abuse in sport, that might not be a bad thing.

Protection-based age limits are unlikely to be effective. Youth who are ineligible to compete at the Olympics can still train the same number of hours as their older, eligible competitors.

Solutions must recognize that child athletes are the most vulnerable population affected by doping and, legally, have not developed the capacity to make rational, independent decisions. As the history and philosophy of childhood literature establishes, the division between childhood and adulthood, and the time in between, is hard to categorize and is culturally conditioned.

The inclusion of a protected persons category in the 2021 update to the World Anti-Doping Code is a step forward.

WADA now acknowledges protected persons as athletes who are under 16 years (or under 18 if the athlete is not part of a registered testing pool or has not competed at international events) or are otherwise not legally competent. The code states that mandatory public disclosure is not required when a protected person commits an anti-doping rule violation, but it does not go so far as to prohibit media reporting on the athlete. What this means in practice is unclear.

Many questions remain about why Valieva was permitted to continue competing, and more debate about what we owe “protected people” is needed.

Sarah Teetzel, Associate Professor of Kinesiology and Recreation Management, University of Manitoba

Though the Olympics (both summer and winter) often conjure up an idyllic image of countries putting their differences aside and gathering for some respectful, cooperative competition, they also come with a robust and complicated history.

Thinking about the Olympics through a political lens, Dr. Russell Field explains, is necessary in order to understand their full significance. He says that the Olympics tend to be viewed as a “mechanism for smoothing out difference, by asserting that sport is apolitical, and by attaching national value to that.”

But, rather than buying into the utopian notion that sport can heal all difference, it’s important to recognize that international events like the Olympics are often where we see these differences play out. This doesn’t mean that sport cannot be a powerful tool to forge connections between nations and work for peace, but simply that it not always successful in doing so.

This year, the Bejing Winter Olympics are kicking-off under “diplomatic” boycott instated by allied countries, including Canada, in protest of human rights violations committed by China.

Regardless of one’s stance on boycotting the games, it’s worth considering the fact that the Olympics have been tangled in webs of personal, national, and international struggle since their inception.

In light of the opening of Beijing 2022, here is a short list of facts related to the history of the Winter Olympics, indebted to innovative research being done in the field of Olympics history in our faculty and across the world. These facts are offered as an entry-point and as an exploration of the social, political, environmental and economic conflicts that have arisen in the world of international sport, and to demonstrate the fact that the Olympics, whether we like it or not, have always been political.

Enjoy.

.      .      .      .     .

1. The founder of the Olympics was hesitant to endorse the Winter Olympic games

Vicktor Balck, who ran the successful Swedish Nordic Games (a winter sport competition) sat on the International Olympic Committee (IOC) at the beginning of the twentieth century and was adamantly opposed to the IOC getting involved in winter sport. His perspective likely influenced Pierre de Coubertin—the founder of the Olympics—and his good friend, who also opposed the integration of winter sports under the Olympics umbrella. It was only after Balck’s retirement from the IOC, that de Coubertin endorsed the first “official” Winter Olympics, which took place in Chamonix, France, in 1924. Researchers Pedro Perez-Aragon and Alejandro Viuda-Serrano work to uncover this history in their paper “the Icy Road towards the first Olympic Winter Games in Chamonix in 1924.”

2. Hosting the winter games can bolster international reputations, especially for non-Western countries

Winter sports come with more cultural and economic barriers than summer sports do. Jung Woo Lee writes that because of these barriers, the divide between the global north and south is much more apparent at the Winter Olympics, with Western countries tending to host these games. However, in recent years, non-Western cities have been chosen to host the Winter Olympics, such as Sochi in 2014, PyeongChang in 2018 and Beijing in 2022. Woo Lee’s research explores how the Winter Olympics have been leveraged as a political tool by “non-Western industrial powerhouses, to demonstrate their desire to be recognized as advanced cultural economies.” It is likely that something similar is happening this year in Beijing, as Chinese officials continue to deny point-blank that any human rights violations are being committed against the Uyghur ethnic community.

3. In the 21^st century, referendums with negative results are becoming more common

Referendums are held when there is a reason a city may not want to host the Olympics. The public is then given the chance to weigh in on the issue, voting for or against the bid. Jean-Loup Chappelet writes that when a public votes against hosting the Olympics, it generally has to do with one of the following issues: environmental costs, economic factors, or the changing image of the IOC. His research shows that since 1968, 31 referendums have been held for the winter Olympics, with 58% of them ultimately rejecting the bids. Looking at the 11 referendums that have happened since the beginning of the 21^st century, that percentage has drastically increased, to 78% of the referendums producing negative results.

Recently, Calgary was “planning on bidding for the 2026 games until two-years ago when a civic referendum voted against (it),” notes Dr. Field, adding that this is not the only Canadian bid to have been pulled. Banff bid three times in a row and were the favourites to win for the 1972 games, but ended up finishing second in that vote due to a series of environmental protests.

4. In 1976, Montreal added an extra tax on tobacco to mitigate their debt

Did you know that the huge deficit run up by the Montreal 1976 Olympics may have contributed to a reduced interest in hosting the winter Olympics across the globe (for a few years)? During the Montreal 1976 Winter Olympics, the Quebec government added a tax on tobacco to relieve some of the deficit that was being run-up by their Olympics infrastructure costs. Following this, there were only two bids (each year) for the 1980 and 1984 winter Olympic games!

5. Conversations about sustainability are creating division

The environmental impact of the Winter Olympics is something to be considered. Activists have pointed out the amount of water it takes to produce fake snow and the way carving ski/lunge/skeleton courses out on mountains can impact environmental health and biodiversity. There is also the issue of architectural waste—the huge arenas, freeways, and trainlines that are usually built to support the influx of organizers, tourists, and athletes. Recent games—such as the Tokyo 2020 summer Olympics—have made significant efforts to reduce their environmental footprints, by using renewable energy and recycling architecture, among other things, but environmentalists have called this “greenwashing,” arguing that these efforts are largely superficial.

“Environmental protest has increasingly become a feature of the games, right up to the 2018 games in PyeongChang where there were local protests over a sacred site in the mountains,” says Dr. Field.

Is it possible that the Olympics and sustainability are at the core, incompatible entities? Opinions on this are split, with activists claiming that such gargantuan projects cannot possibly be sustainable, while others suggest that bid supporters and game organizers have simply struggled to adequately explain (to an increasingly skeptical public) how these complex sustainability initiatives function.

6. Canada has never fully boycotted the winter Olympics

Canada has been involved in boycotts of summer Olympic games—including the famous boycott of the 1980 Moscow games following the former Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan— but has never fully boycotted the Winter Olympics.

This year, however, Canada has already joined the United States, Australia, and New Zealand in a “diplomatic boycott” of the 2022 Bejing winter games, in protest of China’s human rights abuses against the Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in the Xinjiang region. A diplomatic boycott means that no government officials will attend the event, but that athletes will still be allowed to play. This decision has been met with support from athletes and organizers who appreciate how it affords athletes the right to choose whether or not they will compete. A full boycott, in the eyes of many Olympic athletes, is complete devastating, and strips them of the ability to compete in events that they have usually been training for for many years.

Still, Canadian activist groups like Vancouverites concerned about Hong Kong and Vancouver Society in support of democratic movement are asking citizens not to legitimize the event by watching it.

7. An Indigenous winter games may be on the horizon

According to Dr. Field, “the potential is being explored of an Indigenous-led bid for the 2030 Winter Olympics.” An announcement of whether a formal bid will be submitted to the IOC is expected this coming fall, which is something to watch out for. The idea behind this bid, Dr. Field explains, is that “local organizers will not only work with First Nations (as they did in 2010)” but that Indigenous communities will be leading the charge with a reconciliation-focused concept. He notes that “Between Canada and Russia and the Scandinavian countries [there are] a number of Indigenous peoples who live in the north, who live in winter climates. The idea of an Indigenous Winter Games is interesting, not unproblematic, but interesting”

.       .      .     .

Evidentially, the Winter Games, like their summer counterparts, come with a series of political, economic, social, and environmental factors to consider. Though Olympic athletes are certainly to be praised for their prowess, and supported in pursuing their passions, it is useful to consider the ways that a utopian vision of the Olympics is inaccurate, at best.

“[The Olympics] are inherently political from the ground up,” explains Dr. Field. “from debates about who gets to play, what kind of access they have, where community centres are.” He adds that in some places, people have to pay to play sports whereas in others there is public access to recreation.

“We get excited, we get all ra-ra about sport, and we get upset when people step into that, and we say: ‘don’t take this away from us,’” he says, noting that many folks are resistant to critical conversations about the Olympics.

But, this is a big year for the collision of major sporting events and human rights injustices, he explains. “Between the Beijing Olympics and the Qatar Soccer World cup, we’ve got some regimes that raise major concern for human rights activists.”

Rather than ignoring the fact that international sports events are political, it’s time we acknowledge it, and start to learn more. If any of the research mentioned in this article sparks interest, please see the following links for additional reading:

• Pedro Perez-Aragon and Alejandro Viuda-Serrano’s research on the IOC’s hesitance to include winter sports in the Olympics here.
• Jung Woo Lee’s article on the non-Western host cities using the Olympics to bolster their international reputations
• Jean-Loup Chappelet’s history of Olympics referendums here.
• Article: Olympics and environmentalism to learn more about how sustainability fits into the Olympic image

This year, the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics will be held February 4-20, while the 2022 Paralympics will run March 4-13.

The University of Manitoba community is absolutely thrilled for Scott, who had an illustrious five-year career playing midfield for the Bisons and was inducted into the Canada West Hall of Fame in 2019. She previously won Olympic bronze medals with the Canadian national team in 2012 and 2016.

“Congratulations to distinguished UM alumna and former Bisons athlete Desiree Scott on winning her third Olympic medal in women’s soccer,” says UM President and Vice-Chancellor Michael Benarroch.

“Representing Canada at the Olympics is an incredible accomplishment in itself; bringing home an Olympic gold medal is extraordinary. On behalf of our entire UM community, congratulations! We are truly so proud of you.”

“Watching Desiree win an Olympic gold medal and reach the summit of world sport has been an honor,” says Gene Muller, Director of Athletics and Recreation.

“It is hard to fathom her achievements after the gold medal and over the course of her elite career. She has won three medals in consecutive Olympic Games and has cemented her place as a legend of Canadian sport and the game of soccer. She has been an ambassador of women’s sport, the University of Manitoba and the Bisons. We could not be prouder of her!”

Scott is one of three members of Canada’s national team to be a part of all three Olympic medals, dating back to London in 2012, alongside soccer legend Christine Sinclair and Abbotsford’s Sophie Schmidt.

The match, pushed back to the evening to avoid Tokyo’s extreme heat went to beyond the regular 90 minutes into extra time with both teams even at 1-1 after 120 minutes. Canada went on to win the match in sudden death penalty kicks 3-2 against the 2016 silver medalists Sweden. Scott, wearing the captain’s arm band after Sinclair’s exit at the 85^th minute played all 120 minutes of open play, only coming off with seconds remaining.

As a member of the Bisons, Scott was the Bison Sports Female Athlete of the Year in 2009-10 and a four-time conference all-star. She set program records for career points (56) and assists (31) in 64 matches played and was a member of the program’s coaching staff in 2011 and 2012, following the end of her eligibility. In 2017, she earned the UM’s Distinguished Alumni Award for Outstanding Young Alumni.

“On behalf of Bisons women’s soccer, I would like to sincerely congratulate Desiree Scott and Team Canada for obtaining gold at the Tokyo Olympics,” says current head coach Vanessa Martinez-Lagunas.

“After such a challenging year, it’s great to see the resilience, hard work, and unity of this team. Their team motto was ‘change the colour’ after earning bronze in 2012 and 2016. They did it and with the best possible outcome! We are so proud of Desi and this team. For us, Desiree Scott is already a Bisons legend who is going to inspire ‘greatness’ for the new generation of Bisons student-athletes. She dreamed big and worked so hard to make those dreams become true. Thanks Desi for being who you are and for representing our country, our province, and city with so much pride. We love you!”

Besides three appearances at the Olympic Games, Scott represented her country at the FIFA Women’s World Cup in 2015 (Canada) and 2019 (France). Professionally, she has played for Vancouver Whitecaps FC, FC Kansas City, and Utah Royals FC in the National Women’s Soccer League.

Off the field, Scott is an athlete ambassador for KidSport Winnipeg, working to remove financial barriers to playing sport and has also been an ambassador for the Homeless World Cup since 2014.

#WEAREALLBISONS

1. I am happy that the Olympic Games are taking place and athletes are able to compete.
2. I’m really enjoying watching the 2020 Olympic Games – in 2021. In fact, I am enjoying them much more than I expected.
3. Although sometimes I think that elite athletes naively invest too much in competing at an Olympic Games, I don’t begrudge them setting a goal, training to achieve that goal and wanting desperately to fulfill the goal even when a global pandemic is taking place.

For most of the past year, I grew increasingly ambivalent towards the 2020 Olympic Games. In my darkest moments, I honestly wished that the Olympic Games would be cancelled. Like many people, the pandemic wore me down. I lost interest and engagement in many things that used to bring me pleasure. Following my favorite athletes and gorging on two weeks of Olympic Games TV coverage has brought me profound pleasure for many years. A week ago, I didn’t think I would even bother turning on the TV.

As the opening ceremonies drew closer, the International Olympic Committee more forcefully asserted that nothing would stand in the way of Tokyo Olympic Games. And so, journalists and Olympians started arriving in Tokyo and the Olympic bubble began to form. As they arrived, they began reporting on the extreme monitoring protocols and social restrictions implemented to protect the bubble from popping. It didn’t take long before people started reflecting on the reality of doing whatever it takes to hold the games.

I don’t think it is a stretch to suggest that many people, including athletes, have adopted a very functional approach to these Olympic Games. Figure out what needs to happen, do it and go home. Nix the Olympic Village experience. Come for your event and then leave. Put the medal around your own neck. Tell your family to stay at home. Only take your mask off when you compete or when a media liaison person gives you permission to smile for an official photograph. National delegations can’t participate in the opening and closing ceremonies. No live spectators at competitions.

For months, the idea the Olympic Games’ bubble fueled my ambivalence, but the day before the opening ceremonies I snapped out of it. A headline from the CBC news website engaged me in a way I hadn’t expected. Actually, I was agitated by the headline and story: “Senior IOC official says crowds at the Olympic events are ‘largely irrelevant.’” They were quoting Canada’s long serving and most provocative IOC member, Richard Pound.  I followed a link and found a second headline ‘Largely irrelevant’: IOC’s Dick Pound dismisses lack of spectators at the Olympics. The story didn’t provoke me because I think crowds of spectators are a good idea. I was agitated by the paradox of Dick Pound’s statement.

In the current context, in-person spectators are not essential if you are committed to just getting the games over with. However, in the historical context of the modern Olympics, in-person spectators are essential to the cultural performance, cache and mythology that the IOC has depended on for its self-preservation. Pound’s paradoxical statement is also ironic as it illustrates how cavalier the IOC is with its own history: use and flaunt it when it is convenient; ignore it or dismiss it when it is inconvenient.

IOC members swear oaths to defend the principles and traditions of the modern Olympic Games. Most contemporary critics of the IOC and the Olympic Games argue that the dominant principles and traditions guiding this 127-year-old sport organization are profits and self-preservation.

As the IOC prepared to stage an Olympic Games during a global pandemic, Dick Pound’s assessment of the value of spectators may be callous, but it is also accurate. He told reporters that “the lack of spectators at the Tokyo Olympics won’t hurt the games (…) that (the absence of spectators) should not affect the competitions and ceremonies.” It’s true. They can certainly hold sanctioned competitions without live spectators. And the IOC’s bottom line won’t be hurt too much either. The same can’t be said for the Tokyo organizing committee that is paying for the huge stadia whose spectator capacity is dictated by the IOC. When cities bid to host the games, they must commit to providing venues with spectator capacities that meet the IOC’s prescribed standards. It’s fair to state that the IOC’s expectations for competition venues do not ring of modesty or sustainability.

Pound’s comment about live spectators demonstrates how quickly the IOC is prepared to ignore its own history to manoeuvre its way through whatever current crisis its confronting. This is where the irony lies and Pound’s unwavering (desperate) commitment to the IOC’s self-preservation is exposed. His statement about the irrelevance of spectators contradicts the IOC’s self-spun origin story. He has effectively thrown the Olympic Movement’s founding father under the bus. That founding father is Pierre de Coubertin. He was a minor French aristocrat, passionate about moral and social reform and engaged with the International Peace Movement of the late 1800s. Coubertin was also an active sportsman. In the 1890s, he orchestrated the formation of the International Olympic Committee (1894).

The first iteration of the modern Olympic Games took place in Athens in 1896. The Panathenaic Stadium (dating back to the 600 BCE) served as the primary spectator venue. As a monument of ancient Greece, it provided an allusion of continuity between the ancient Olympics and the modern Olympics. In the decades that followed, Coubertin dedicated himself to manufacturing the mythology of the Olympic Games that the IOC relies on so heavily to keep the games going, decade after precarious decade.

Historians, like myself, attribute the enduring nature of the Olympic Games to the mythology that Coubertin superimposed on the event. Although the Olympic Games have always been a beacon of modernity, Coubertin cleverly imbued the sport competitions with historical gravitas. For example, they were framed as a revival of the Olympic Games from antiquity. Famed Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawm described the Olympic Games as an invented tradition of modernity. Coubertin cultivated the Olympic Games as a festival where sport was framed by a prescribed program of smaller cultural performances. The essence of sport was expressed on the playfield, but its meaning was amplified through a plethora of rituals, ceremonies and signs and symbols. Like the ancient Olympic Games, Coubertin also prescribed particular roles for athletes and spectators that were defined by real time and real space. The legacy is evident in torch relays, sacred flames, processions and recessions, anointments of winners, hymns, flags and much more.

Most serious cultural historians recognize Coubertin’s design as a hodgepodge of cultural signs, symbols and performances that reflect a loose, sometimes even whimsical, appropriation of history. In the end, like all cultural institutions, the modern Olympic Games are a manufactured event with comprehensive and prescribed modes of engagement. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but it’s worthwhile acknowledging that the Olympics were imagined and then produced. There is nothing sacred about their form or function.

However curious and eclectic Coubertin’s original curation of the games may be, some of Coubertin’s ideas about how the event ought to be experienced are worth contemplating in the context of Dick Pound’s comments. In particular, Coubertin’s ideas about spectators and their participation at the Olympic Games allow me to reassess my own ambivalence about these COVID Olympics. 

For Coubertin, the ideal Olympic Games spectator was a resting athlete. He saw athletes and spectators as a community of like-minded men who shared similar experiences and understood the nuances of the sport and the competition. The games were intended to be a festival, a community event that enriched and strengthen the bonds among members. He loathed the idea of the Olympic Games transgressing into a mere spectacle where people in the stands had very little knowledge or appreciation for the sportsmen’s performance beyond the outcome of the competition.

From an anthropological perspective, festivals are a type of meta-performance that affirms a community’s common values and bonds. Spectacles, on the other hand, are a type of meta performance that tends to magnify differences between the performers and the audience. The gladiator spectacles of antiquity drew a very clear line of distinction between the prisoners performing on the floor of the colosseum and the Roman citizens in the stands. Coubertin hoped that the Olympic Games would provide a festival context where sportsmen from different nations would recognize and appreciate their similarity rather than their differences. It’s a nice idea.

It’s not a stretch to argue that Coubertin’s vision of an Olympic Games festival has never been fully realized. I’ll go even further to suggest that the idea was never even viable given the inherent class-based, Euro-centric, colonial and racist roots of sport in the late 1800s. Still, it’s a nice idea.

Coubertin’s ideal was untethered from reality and yet it seems to endure. Even if the idea of the Olympic Games festival was a naïve aspiration, it lingers in the narrative, or mythology, that the IOC work hard at to sustain. Think of how often we hear the term “Olympic family.” The IOC is more than willing to lean into their mythology when imploring cities to host the costly event. The quadrennial cycle must be preserved, please host the next games. And then, as Dick Pound response to the spectator issue demonstrates, the IOC is also quite comfortable dismissing its own history to just get the job done and move on to the next crisis. In the case of Tokyo, the events needed to be broadcast to ensure that the IOC could retain their TV revenues. Ticket sales are not critical to the IOC’s long term financial well-being, but revenue from broadcast sales most certainly is critical.

The COVID 19 pandemic has been terrible. I feel awful for the athletes who will not have their families and community of like-minded and empathetic supports in the stands. A few days ago, I watched the winner of a swimming race interact with his family via ZOOM on the pool deck as he made his way to TV interviewers. My heart ached a little bit.

The decision to ban spectators from the games was a difficult but arguably necessary. It was functional in terms of getting the job done. And Dick Pound wasn’t wrong when he stated that the games could happen without fans in the stands. It is unfortunate, however, that he chose the words “largely irrelevant.” His comment discounted the very real potential of the Olympic Games to generate a festival-type experience where the athlete-spectator dynamic is central. He also discounted the value of athletes’ experiences participating at the Olympic Games.

For Pound, the true value of the Tokyo Olympics lay in the images of Olympic athletes competing in Tokyo rather than the performance of athletes competing in real time and real space. Ironically, in rationalizing the ban on spectators he missed an opportunity to reinforce the mythology that his organization so desperately tries to perpetuate one quadrennial to the next.

There is a final pleasant irony that needs to be exposed. By banning paying spectators from the competition venues in Tokyo, the organizers may have inadvertently brought the event much closer to realizing the ideal Coubertin had envisioned for the modern Olympic Games festival.

Television coverage shows us that the stands are not empty. Who are cheering on the athletes in Tokyo? They are, indeed, resting sportsmen and sportswomen. Teammates who have already competed or are waiting to compete are supporting the performances of fellow athletes with whom they have common and intimate knowledge of training and competing this extraordinary level. They bear witness to the event in real time and in real space. Coubertin’s visions, however untethered it may have been from reality, has been given a test run in Tokyo thanks to the global COVID 19 pandemic. Ironically, the ban on paying spectators has created a type of sport festival that Coubertin might have recognized as his vision come to life.

This essay was inspired by the work of John J. MacAloon.  MacAloon, John J. Rite, Drama, Festival, Spectacle : Rehearsals Toward a Theory of Cultural Performance. Institute for the Study of Human Issues, 1984.

“The University of Manitoba community is deeply proud of the UM athletes and coaches representing Canada in the Tokyo Summer Olympics,” said UM President and Vice-Chancellor Michael Benarroch. “We look forward to cheering them on as they demonstrate the skill and perseverance required to compete at such an elite level. I congratulate them on their success so far and wish them a safe and incredible Olympic experience.”

Meet the UM contingent heading to the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games!

Kelsey Wog

At 22 years old, UM student and Bisons swimmer Kelsey Wog has made her mark and is continuing to redefine success in the pool. After winning the 100 metre breaststroke at the Canadian Olympic Swimming Trials with a personal best record, she secured her position on Team Canada for Tokyo 2020.

Wog was also named the 2020 U SPORTS Female Athlete of the Year, recognizing her excellence as an athlete, a student and as one of Canada’s leaders.

Follow @kelseywog on her journey in Tokyo.

Vlastic Cerny

Wog’s coach, Vlastic Cerny, is an Olympic veteran and has been the head coach of the Bisons swimming program since 1993.

Cerny competed for Canada at the 1988 Summer Olympics in the butterfly and freestyle events. In 2021, the duo is eager to come out on top.

Skylar Park

Skylar Park’s childhood dream has always been to win an Olympic gold medal. One year after qualifying for Tokyo 2020, she is now days away from making that dream come true. Surrounded by a family of taekwondo masters, training and competing in the martial art was the natural path. Park’s love for the sport comes from her family’s lifestyle; her father, Jae Park, is also her coach.

Her exceptional performance at the 2016 World Taekwondo Junior Championships was just the beginning. Since then, Park has competed in international events and won multiple medals to add to her career achievements. Now as a 21-year-old Olympic athlete and Kinesiology student at UM, she is aiming for greatness.

Follow @skylar.park on Instagram and @skylarpark99 on Twitter.

Desiree Scott, [BA/16], DAA 2017

Two-time Bronze medalist Desiree Scott earned both medals as a midfielder with the Canadian women’s soccer team in the 2012 and 2016 Olympics. Scott was instrumental in every minute of Canada’s six matches in 2012 – her Olympic debut. She is returning to Olympic soccer for the third time this summer.

As a UM graduate, Scott is the first Bison to be inducted into the Canada West Hall of Fame in 2019 to celebrate 100 years of university sport in Western Canada.

Follow @msdscott on Instagram and @MsDScott11 on Twitter as Scott and the Canadian women’s soccer team chase Gold.

TJ Sanders

Sanders, a former Bisons setter with the men’s volleyball team has been a member of the men’s indoor national volleyball team since 2011. After a fifth place finish in Rio in 2016, Sanders is pursuing his Olympic dream for the second time in Tokyo. Follow Sanders on Instagram.

Tyler Mislawchuk

Tyler Mislawchuk made his Olympic debut in the 2016 Rio Olympics, finishing 15th in the men’s individual race. The former Asper School of Business student is also the first Canadian in the history of triathlon as an Olympic program to win the Olympic test event.

From completing his first triathlon at age 15 to representing Manitoba on the world stage at age 26, Mislawchuk will make his second Olympic appearance and compete in the men’s triathlon on July 26.

Follow @therealmislawchuk on Instagram and @Mislawchuk on Twitter.

Check out the schedules for UM athletes competing here.

Kelly Mahoney [ExtendedEd/02]

Kelly Mahoney has participated as an Olympic official in two previous years – as a transition official in Beijing 2008 and as the chief venue control officer in Rio 2016. For Tokyo 2020, she will be the head referee in the triathlon events. Mahoney is a UM alumna and is now the Director of the Career Development Centre in the Asper School of Business.

Read more on Mahoney’s experiences with the Olympics.

Jane Edstrom

Technical officials have a crucial role in sporting events, especially in the most elite sporting event in the world. Jane Edstrom, who is practicum advisor for teacher candidates in the Faculty of Education, will be one of the few Canadian track and field technical officials assigned to the 2020 Summer Olympics. She was also one of two Canadian technical officials in the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio. Edstrom is Chair of the National Officials Committee of Athletics Canada. For 16 years, she has been an International Technical Official (ITO). There are only 36 ITOs in the world and they have to re-certify every four years.

Connie Klassen [BPE/96, MSc/05]

Klassen is an athletic therapist and UM alumna who works with Team Canada’s karate and weightlifting teams. This will be her first Olympics.

Prior to the current accredited Athletic Therapy programs, Klassen had to complete a related degree and a 1200 hour internship program at UM where she was the student athletic therapist for women’s basketball and men’s hockey.

Photo by FIVB.

Dan Lewis

Former Bisons volleyball superstar, Dan Lewis who won the 1996 CIAU (now U SPORTS) Championship with the Bisons will be in Tokyo as the assistant coach of the men’s national volleyball team. Lewis was a long-time member of the team he now coaches winning bronze medals at the 2001 and 2011 NORCECA Championship and 2015 Pan American Games.

While Mahoney spends her days ensuring Asper students achieve their career goals, in her outside world, she has a close connection to triathlon, a sport that mixes swimming, cycling and running. Her career in the sport spans over 20 years. Starting with recreational involvement and then quickly transitioning to officiating the sport as part of her swim coordinator role with the 1999 Pan Am Games in Winnipeg.  
 
The Asper School of Business communications team caught up with Mahoney as she was preparing to leave for Tokyo. 
 
In your role as head referee, what are your responsibilities?  

As technical officials, our job is to ensure safety and fairness for all the athletes on the field of play. In my position as head referee, I am the person who makes the decisions about whether or not to apply penalties if an athlete makes a mistake on the course or something goes wrong on the course. 
 
For the most part, I’m sitting in a control room with another official whose job is video review. If we get a call, for instance, from the transition area that an athlete has mounted their bike before the mount line then I will take a look at that. I will go in, I will review, rewind the tapes, and watch in slow motion to see if the athlete actually did violate that rule of the competition. If yes, then I will apply a penalty. 
 
Which Olympics have you participated in?  

This is my third Olympics. I was at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, and I was a transition official in that Olympics. Then in Rio, at the 2016 games, I was the chief venue control officer. When you are in that role you sit in a room with television monitors around the course, and you are the liaison with all of the local organizing committee stakeholders from security, workforce, medical, broadcast, to volunteer lead.   
 
This time around the Olympics must look very different. What kind of rules or regulations do you have to follow when you get there? 
The requirements are very stringent.  We’ve been asked to monitor our health for 14 days before flying. We are reporting daily temperature checks and have to take two COVID tests within 96 hours of traveling. They both have to be negative or you will not be allowed onto the plane.  
 
Once you arrive in Tokyo, you have another test and then you are put into a quarantine area until that test comes back negative. You go through a dedicated Games entry point separate from regular travelers to Japan, and once that’s done you are put on a shuttle where you actually check in to your hotel to avoid a line-up at the reception. We are all staying in our own hotel rooms, which is different because we usually share a room with another official. We are isolated in our rooms unless we are at the venue working. We’ve had to submit activity plans about where we will be at any given time and we will be tested every day – it’s a saliva antigen test. 
 
I can only imagine the Olympics brings many athletes together that wouldn’t otherwise meet because they are playing different sports. It really is an opportunity to get to know people from different cultures and background. Are you going to miss that aspect? 
 
Oh, absolutely. Depending on where our event falls in the two-week sport calendar, we would attend either the opening ceremonies or the closing ceremonies and that is not being allowed. So, we’ll watch them on TV.  
 

David Markham, Chantal Givens, Kelly Mahoney, and Tyler Mislawchuk

Typically, at the games you get to see other sports. We are part of the Olympic family and often given passes to attend other sports. And certainly, we’re not doing that this year. When I was in Rio, we were up on Sugarloaf Mountain, we were on Copacabana Beach, we were exploring as a tourist would be, during our down time. In Beijing, we were at the Forbidden City and the Summer Palace, in addition to watching water polo, diving , to name a few events. When we weren’t actually working, we were being tourists. 
 
And often Team Canada athletes will support other Team Canada athletes from different sports. When you are in the Olympic Village, they get to meet each other, and so basketball players are eating with gymnasts.  
 
This year will be very unique, but it’s going to be a games that goes down in history. We have to try and enjoy it as much as we can, and be grateful to have been selected amongst officials from all over the world. 

___________

The Tokyo 2020 Olympics runs from July 23 to August 8 with the men’s individual triathlon taking place on Monday, July 26, women’s individual triathlon on Tuesday, July 27 and mixed triathlon on Saturday, July 31.  Watch for former Asper BComm student, Tyler Mislawchuk, ranked #8 in the world, winner of the Tokyo test event in 2019, as he competes for Canada in the men’s individual triathlon on July 26.