Roy Tomizawa Others, Rio Olympics, Track and FIeld, Water Sports, Winter Sports

So You Want to be an Olympian: What’s the Easy Way?

US Olympic Marathon Trials 2012
US Olympic marathon trials in 2012. Credit David J. Phillip/AP

On Saturday, February 13, over 370 runners competed for a spot on the US Olympic marathon team. The USOC will send the top three finishers in the marathon race held in Los Angeles. It is considered a very American competition as the threshold was any American running a marathon in 2 hours and 45 minutes or less. As Amby Burfoot, an editor of Runner’s World said in this New York Times article, “Each of our runners must earn his or her bid for the Olympics — we tell them to line up, we’re going to shoot the gun, and you decide for yourself. It feels very American. One athlete, one vote.”

Apparently, other nations pick their marathoners through a committee of officials.

This made me think -“Hmmmm, can I qualify for a sport in the Olympics? Any sport?” Apparently, there are approaches to this, according to this article in Forbes Magazine.Kosovo olympic

  1. Move to a Different Country: Kosovo and South Sudan are entering the Olympics for the first time. You should look into their citizenship requirements and get in touch with their Olympic committees.
  2. Identify an Easy Position: the article points out that being a coxswain in rowing events that require one has low barriers to entry. You need to be light and have a strong voice, with some sense of race tactics, but you don’t have to row. You just need to be strong enough to steer the shell. Apparently, China ran an American Idol-like competition in 2006, in which they tried to find two coxswains for the China teams at the Beijing Olympics in 2008.
jamaican bobsled team
Jamaican bobsled team: Michael White, Dudley Stokes, Devon Harris and Frederick Powell

3. Enter a “Target Sport”: Shooting a rifle or an arrow apparently doesn’t require you to be in tip-top, high performance shape. You just need a steady set of arms and very good eyesight.

4. Start Your Own Team: The country you’re in may not naturally have athletes for a particular sport. Think the Jamaican bob sled team, or Eddie “The Eagle” Edwards in the ski jump – both of whom were the first to represent their nations in their sports at the Calgary Winter Games in 1988.

5. The Old-Fashioned Way: Identify what skills and physical attributes put you in the top percentile in your age group, and train, train, train.