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≡ THE 5-RING CIRCUS ≡
● Olympic Winter Games 2026: Milan Cortina ● The Winter Games are over, but the torches remain.
There were some 10,500 torchbearers for the Games, for which 3,000 torches were produced. Now, those who carried the torch can ask to purchase one for €1,500 (about $1,737 U.S.), plus shipping and taxes. But there is only the existing production, and no more!
● Olympic Winter Games 2030: French Alps ● The 2030 organizing committee is proposing to continue ski mountaineering – a sport in which the French are dominant – for 2030 and to add to the Individual race to the Sprint and Mixed Relay.
The addition is to be considered by the IOC Session, meeting in a couple of weeks.
● International Federations ● The Association of Summer Olympic International Federations (ASOIF) released its sixth Governance Review report, updating the prior edition in 2024. The summer federations were graded according to transparency, integrity, democracy, development and sustainability and control mechanisms.
A perfect score would have been 240 and the target minimum score for continuing federations was 150. The distribution of the scores ranged from 150 to 228 for 31 full members, with five associate members (*) varying widely:
● A1 (14 federations: 210-228): aquatics, athletics, badminton, baseball-softball*, basketball, cycling, equestrian, football, rowing, rugby, table tennis, tennis, triathlon, volleyball.
● A2 (7:185-209): fencing, gymnastics, hockey, sailing, sport climbing, taekwondo, wrestling.
● B (13: 150-184): archery, canoeing, cricket*, golf, handball, judo, lacrosse*, modern pentathlon, shooting, skateboarding, squash*, surfing, weightlifting.
● C (1: 135-149): American football*.
● D (1: sub-135): boxing*.
The mean scores for all federations rose slightly to 192.7 from 189.4 in 2024.
● Athletics ● Auburn’s Ja’Kobe Tharp “apologized” for his 12.75 world record in the heats of the men’s 110 m hurdles on Wednesday at the NCAA Track & Field Championships in Eugene, Oregon:
“I’m speechless. I didn’t mean to.
“I knew going into this meet I would be in really good shape because we started deloading to hit my peak into this meet. It was about executing and doing it. I’m always only focused on me. I knew what I was capable of. I knew I had something faster than 13.0 in my legs.”
The world record was reported as the first at the NCAA Championships since Dwight Stones set one in the high jump in Philadelphia in 1976, competing for Long Beach State (and, of course, Stones was calling the meet for ESPN!). Tharp will be in the 110 m hurdles finals on Friday, trying to defend his 2025 title.
¶
The Sanlam Cape Town Marathon in South Africa was announced Wednesday as the eighth World Marathon Majors race and first in Africa.
Cape Town joins Tokyo, Boston, London, Sydney, Berlin, Chicago and New York, and will formally enter the series on 23 May 2027. The 2026 race had a reported 16,351 finishers with Ethiopia’s Mohamed Esa winning the men’s race in 2:04.55 and Dera Dida taking the women’s race 2:23:18.
World Marathon Majors status is expected to increase the economic impact of the race to possibly more than $48 million U.S. per year!
A ninth World Marathon Major is in the works – the Shanghai Marathon in China – which will be reviewed after its 6 December 2026 race.
¶
There were only maybe 1,000 fans at Saturday’s USA Track & Field Lone Star Grand Prix meet in College Station, Texas, but the meet did well on television.
NBC confirmed “a Total Audience Delivery of 757,000 viewers across NBC, Peacock, and NBC Sports Digital properties.” Track & field on NBC has consistently done well, with up to a million or so viewers, vs. other meets which draw around 300,000 on cable and smaller networks.
● Bobsled & Skeleton ● The International Bobsleigh & Skeleton Federation elected long-time federation Secretary General Heike Groesswang (GER), 56, as its new President at its Salzburg Congress.
She received 27 votes out of 45, to win over Ander Mirambell (ESP: 10), Dr. Nelson Christian Stokes (JAM: 5) and Martins Dambegs (LAT: 3). Groesswang has been the IBSF Secretary General since 2012 and replaced Italian Ivo Ferriani (2010-26).
Six IBSF Vice Presidents were elected, which included American Tuffield Latour as Vice President of Sport.
● Tennis ● Serena Williams’ comeback Doubles adventure at the Queen’s Club Championships in London (GBR) are over as partner Victoria Mboko (CAN) suffered a right knee injury in her Singles match and has had to withdraw.
Williams will play next he will also be competing in the Berlin Tennis Open in Germany that starts on the 15th, again in Doubles, this time with Czech Karolina Muchova.
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