First came the cancellation of the Indoor World Championships. That somehow made sense since the championships were programmed for March in China. Then people started talking about a possible cancellation of the Olympics and after some hum and haw those also were cancelled. Well, to be honest neither competition was really cancelled: they were postponed, to be held in 2021. The real cancellation was that of the European Championships which were scheduled for the end of August in Paris. When the Europeans were cancelled I started fearing that 2020 was going to be a year without athletics' competitions.
To be fair, World Athletics had from the outset announced that they were going to try to organise competitions in autumn so as to give the opportunity to athletes to shape up for the coming olympic year. But then they went on to freeze the qualification period for the Olympics from April 6 (and till November 30). And on top of this, the June meetings of the Wanda Diamond League (Eugene and Paris) were 'postponed'. Mind you, the organisers of the Oslo Diamond League meeting (June 11) made public their plans to to host an alternative competition, an exhibition event which they named 'The Impossible Games', on the same date. (with K. Warholm making an attempt at a world record over 300 m hurdles). But even this competition was (and still is) highly hypothetical.
Then, all of a sudden, a sliver of hope appeared. World athletics, Wanda (and the meeting organisers) proposed an alternative calendar in order to save the 2020 season. The idea is to have the meetings start by mid-August and go on till October. Some of the meetings will be exhibition events, while others will be staged as adapted Diamond League meetings. Here is the provisional schedule:
14/8 Monaco
16/8 Gateshead
23/8 Stockholm
2/9 Lausanne
4/9 Brussels
6/9 Paris (?)
17/9 Rome/Naples
19/9 Shanghai
4/10 Eugene
9/10 Doha
17/10 China (venue ?)
The meetings in Rabat, London and Zürich are cancelled. The latter venue would have hosted the DL final, but under the current circumstances there will be no point system and no final.
Apparently the Diamond League meetings will not be the only ones. Most (8 out of 10) Continental Tour Gold meetings will (hopefully) take place as well. They will start with the Turku meeting on August 11 and go on till September 26 with the meeting in Nairobi. Moreover, on October 17 the World Athletics Half Marathon Championships will take place as scheduled, in Poland.
In the words of Sir Sebastian,
"... it now looks like we will be able to offer [our professional athletes] a solid international season between August and October where they can earn prize money and assess their training progress in preparation for next year’s Olympic Games, although we know this will not be easy for everyone".
Let's cross our fingers.
To be fair, World Athletics had from the outset announced that they were going to try to organise competitions in autumn so as to give the opportunity to athletes to shape up for the coming olympic year. But then they went on to freeze the qualification period for the Olympics from April 6 (and till November 30). And on top of this, the June meetings of the Wanda Diamond League (Eugene and Paris) were 'postponed'. Mind you, the organisers of the Oslo Diamond League meeting (June 11) made public their plans to to host an alternative competition, an exhibition event which they named 'The Impossible Games', on the same date. (with K. Warholm making an attempt at a world record over 300 m hurdles). But even this competition was (and still is) highly hypothetical.
Then, all of a sudden, a sliver of hope appeared. World athletics, Wanda (and the meeting organisers) proposed an alternative calendar in order to save the 2020 season. The idea is to have the meetings start by mid-August and go on till October. Some of the meetings will be exhibition events, while others will be staged as adapted Diamond League meetings. Here is the provisional schedule:
14/8 Monaco
16/8 Gateshead
23/8 Stockholm
2/9 Lausanne
4/9 Brussels
6/9 Paris (?)
17/9 Rome/Naples
19/9 Shanghai
4/10 Eugene
9/10 Doha
17/10 China (venue ?)
The meetings in Rabat, London and Zürich are cancelled. The latter venue would have hosted the DL final, but under the current circumstances there will be no point system and no final.
Apparently the Diamond League meetings will not be the only ones. Most (8 out of 10) Continental Tour Gold meetings will (hopefully) take place as well. They will start with the Turku meeting on August 11 and go on till September 26 with the meeting in Nairobi. Moreover, on October 17 the World Athletics Half Marathon Championships will take place as scheduled, in Poland.
In the words of Sir Sebastian,
"... it now looks like we will be able to offer [our professional athletes] a solid international season between August and October where they can earn prize money and assess their training progress in preparation for next year’s Olympic Games, although we know this will not be easy for everyone".
Let's cross our fingers.
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