2020 Olympics add 4x400 Mixed Relay... Another Easy Gold for the U.S.?

Borlee + Borlee + Borlee + ?

I feel like the Olympics should be becoming more streamlined. Bringing the focus back to the core sports and events seems like the necessary policy to rebuild interest. Adding novelty events/sports like mixed relays and 3-on-3 basketball seems like the exact opposite of what they should be doing.

"People are becoming less interested in the Olympics because they view it as a circus instead of a serious athletic event? Let's add 400m hurdles where everyone has to run in giant clown pants. That should fix things!"

Realistically I don't see any countries sending a legit team for this. Unless their stars want to run ANOTHER event (likely at least prelims and finals for the mixed relay) this will be a B level race at best. Could be cool to watch, but I agree that the Olympics need to get rid of events instead of adding.

Another chance for USA to drop the baton!

not so sure wrote:

Another chance for USA to drop the baton!

Lol

This is a really dumb idea for an event. If Olympic track felt like it needed to add another relay event, then it should be a distance relay, like DMR, 4*800, 4*mile, Ekiden... etc. Sprinters already have two relays, plus their individual events. For example, Marion Jones had a realistic shot at 5 gold medals in one Olympics. Even a major distance phenom would be unlikely to come away with 3.

I'm also not a fan of mixed relays... for one thing now male athletes would have the opportunity to be screwed over by having to compete against teams with XY individuals identifying as women.

It's mixed gender, not mixed sex. So, all the US has to do is put their 5th-8th best males on the team, and have two identify as females for the games, and they will go under 3 minutes and crush everyone.

Eventually, people are going to get how absurd splitting by gender instead of sex really is. Its a threat to women's sports as a whole!

Sprinter guy wrote:

It's mixed gender, not mixed sex. So, all the US has to do is put their 5th-8th best males on the team, and have two identify as females for the games, and they will go under 3 minutes and crush everyone.

Eventually, people are going to get how absurd splitting by gender instead of sex really is. Its a threat to women's sports as a whole!

So , who cares ?

Stupid idea.

Track is already so diluted with redundant events and doubling. They shouldn't follow swimming into this stupidity, with umpteen events won by the same people, including mixed relays.

If they do, at least put it on the last night so it is basically an exhibition, rather than messing with people's legitimate competition schedules.

Running events that would be in an ideal program:

100

400

1500/mile

5000

Marathon

XC in winter games

That's it. The 200 and the 10,000 are redundant, with fields diluted by other events, and diluting the fields of other events. The 10,000 is especially bad for this.

I can't completely form my opinion yet because I don't know what the rules are. I mean, is it minimum 1 male, or maximum 2 males, or minimum 1 female (instead of 3 trans-sexuals & a guy)? Without strict controls like that, it becomes a lot more like a JV high school meet where you have several people lining up against each other that are just way out of each other's leagues...which is the antithesis of what the Olympics is supposed to be.

In general, how many countries have 4 top-tier 400m runners per sex? Even the U.S. arguably does anymore. Maybe Bahamas? Now they have to have at least 5 to 7? How could that be good? Is it just a sneaky way to give medals to B-level elites?

What's even the point of a relay, anyway -- to get around the 3-per-country rule? Churning out medals to Jamaica for the 4 x 1 year after year is just boring, kind of like to the U.S. for the 4 x 4. A DMR would be similar -- with Kenya making inroads on the 400, I really don't see the point of offering them another medal on a silver platter.

The only relay that makes sense to me as a test of a team's overall fitness is 200 + 800 + 3200 + 8-mile, but it's impractical for numerous reasons.