US Olympic marathon trials set for Orlando on Saturday
The latest group of athletes to represent the United States at the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris will be determined on Saturday in Orlando, which will host this year’s U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials.
The men’s race will start at 10:10 a.m., while the women will begin at 10:20. The race will start and finish near Lake Eola Park in downtown Orlando, and in between will have a 2.2-mile loop through Orlando’s business district and three 8-mile loops through the Milk District. The finish line will be on Rosalind Avenue in front of the Walt Disney Amphitheater at Lake Eola Park.
For a map of the course, click or tap here.
Hundreds of runners will be on hand hoping to fulfill their Olympic dreams, and in the past, only the top-three finishers in both the men’s and women’s races make the U.S. team at the trials.
However, that’s not necessarily the case this year due to a more complicated process created by World Athletics, the international governing body for track and field.
An article on Runner’s World explains the process thoroughly, but we’ll do our best to give you the CliffsNotes version here, as confusing as it is.
First of all, a country can send a maximum of three marathoners in each gender to the Olympics, but countries aren’t guaranteed three spots.
Athletes can “unlock” spots for their country during the qualifying period from Nov. 6, 2022 to April 30 of this year by running a fast enough time, finishing in the top-five at a World Athletics platinum-level race or having a high enough ranking in the World Athletics ranking system.
Two men, Conner Mantz and Clayton Young, unlocked two American spots at October’s Chicago Marathon by running faster than the 2:08:10 qualifying time established by World Athletics.
Mantz and Young could very well be named to the U.S. team on Saturday no matter what, as long as they don’t completely fall apart. If they do or suffer serious injury, the spots they earned for the U.S. could eventually go to others.
Regardless, a third spot still for the men needs to be “unlocked,” whether it’s someone who can run at 2:08:10 or faster in Orlando, or at another race by April 30.
For the women, it’s a little more straightforward. Since November 2022, 13 women have run at or under the established qualifying time of 2:29.30, so the U.S. has already “unlocked” three spots for its Olympic team.
Given that, the top-3 finishers in Orlando who have already met the required qualifying time — whether in a previous race or by doing so in Orlando — will be named to the Olympic team.
Of note, Molly Seidel, who won an unexpected bronze medal at the Tokyo games in 2021, withdrew from the race on Wednesday due to a knee injury.
Sliding events for 2026 Winter Games to stay in Italy — for now
Last week, we reported how it was possible that a portion of the 2026 Winter Olympics hosted by Milano-Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, could be held in the United States.
The cost to renovate an existing, but shutdown, venue in Cortina d’Amepezza to host sliding events — bobsled, luge, skeleton — was roughly $100 million over projection by Italian authorities.
Because of that, the International Olympic Committee said it was considering bids from Austria, Switzerland and Lake Placid, New York, to host the sliding events, with the venue in Lake Placid being the most updated.
Determined not to outsource the sliding events to another country and going against the IOC’s wishes, the local organizing committee in Italy on Tuesday decided to move forward with plans to renovate the existing facility. But that doesn’t mean those plans are completely set in stone.
The committee said the plans will hinge on signing a contract with a local construction company that has reportedly offered to rebuild the venue for $89 million.
Even if the contract is signed, there will be quite a race against time to get the renovation done. The IOC will require mandated test events roughly a year before the Games take place in February 2026, so if the project isn’t done by March of 2025, then the “plan B” of hosting the sliding events in another country will likely happen.
Crowd for Paris opening ceremony downsized
Paris will be the first city to hold an opening ceremony outside of a stadium setting when it parades athletes on boats along the River Seine on July 26, but it won’t be in front of as many spectators.
Organizers initially hoped to have roughly 600,000 spectators, but French Interior minister Gerald Darmanin on Wednesday said roughly 300,000 will be now be able to attend.
Plans allow for 100,000 paying spectators with a water view, while the rest will be able to view the ceremony for free on the river’s embankments.
