Understandably enough, the triathletes in Paris aren’t too happy about the possibility of their event being turned into a duathlon due to the ongoing polluted Seine problems, those for whom swimming is the strongest of the three disciplines especially peeved.
After the men’s event was postponed due to the levels of E.coli in the river, Belgium’s Marten Van Riel let rip. “If the priority was the health of the athletes this event would have been moved to another location a long time ago. We are just puppets in a puppet show. Duathlon is no triathlon and changing the day like that in the middle of the night is disrespectful to the athletes’ years of preparation. What an appearance for triathlon on the biggest stage.”
The United States’ Seth Rider was more chilled about it all, though, because he, eh, came prepared. “We know that there’s going to be some E.coli exposure, so I just try to increase my threshold by exposing myself to a bit of it in my day-to-day life. Just little things throughout your day, like not washing your hands after you go to the bathroom.” Ew.
Former ambassador makes Israeli gymnastics gaffe
A widely shared video was posted on X by David Friedman, the former United States ambassador to Israel, which showed gymnasts performing a routine that features the Israeli flag and signs that read “Bring them home now”, in reference to the hostages being held in Gaza. “Israel’s Artistic Gymnastics team performing at the Paris Olympics. Watch until the end and have some tissues handy,” he wrote.
The Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) noticed a problem, though. “Israel only has two artistic gymnasts at the Olympics, the video features dozens.” The clip, in fact, shows an acrobatics club back in Israel performing the routine, and it has nothing to do with the Olympics. JTA highlighted a comment from X account @MaNishtana, who was not impressed: “While it is no doubt evocative ... Guys. Memes are fun. Misinformation isn’t.”
Kamala Harris saves her rambling for another day
US vice-president Kamala Harris is often accused of delivering occasional rambling comments that don’t appear to make a great deal of sense. So it was with no small amount of glee that her opponents chuckled at her salute to the Paris Games.
“Today we celebrate the Olympics. Because Olympians are Olympic, and they are at the Olympics being Olympian, so it’s more important now than ever to support their Olympianism.”
Except? You guessed right. “No, Kamala Harris didn’t say this about the Olympics,” said the fact-checkers at Politifact. “We rate this claim: Pants on Fire!”
Swimmer’s family hit by scam
Although a silver medal was no small consolation, British swimmer Matt Richards was left gutted to miss out on gold by just 0.02 seconds in the 200m freestyle final. “Excruciatingly frustrating,” he said. Mind you, he wasn’t half as frustrated as his family back in Worcestershire after they paid out €3,000 for tickets to the semi-finals and finals of his six events.
The website they bought them from, Richards’s mother Amanda told the BBC, looked “perfectly legitimate” ... so you know where this is heading. Yes, it was a scam. “We don’t have the money to be able to just buy another set of tickets. We’re devastated. I feel like a fool.” The poor Ma.
In words
“What appears to you as two players on the podium, they were actually three! It was me, my competitor, and my yet-to-come to our world little baby!” – Egyptian fencer Nada Hafez revealing that she competed at the Olympics while seven months pregnant. Some woman.
In numbers: 1.4
That’s how many billion euro the French spent on trying to clean the Seine. They should look for a refund.
