🥇 Chasing Gold: Are the Olympics going to happen this year?

Greetings, everyone, and welcome to another edition of the Chasing Gold newsletter.

I’m Nancy Armour and I’m a columnist with Paste BN Sports. I like to say I write about a little bit of everything, and one of my favorite of those things is the Olympics. I’ve covered every one since 1996 – favorites: Sydney and Nagano – and have been fortunate enough to witness incredible displays of sport.

Phelps claiming the last of his 23 gold medals in Rio and Joannie Rochette winning the bronze medal in Vancouver just days after the sudden death of her mother.

But the best part of the Games are the incredible stories. One of my favorites will always be that of Ester Ledecka, a Czech snowboarder who crashed the Alpine skiing party with her gold in Super-G at the Pyeongchang Olympics. Ledecka was such a long shot that she hadn’t bothered wearing makeup that day, figuring there’d be no need for her to be camera ready. When she crossed the finish line and saw her time, she stared at the scoreboard for several long seconds, sure that someone would eventually put up her correct time. But no, the time was right and she was the winner.

We’ll bring you stories like that, and more, in the leadup to Tokyo. In this newsletter, however, we’re all about COVID-19, which is threatening to disrupt the Summer Games as it has so many other sporting events around the world. Some of the top headlines: 

• For the good of the athletes and the public, it's time to postpone
• If Games go on, it could be a free-for-all -- for cheaters
• Olympians' lives are being turned upside down
• Two Olympic and Paralympic training centers have been shut down