With just one month left before Olympic Trials, U.S. swimmers continue their prep at a pair of meets in Indianapolis and Atlanta. Elsewhere around the world, other members of Team USA can qualify for the Olympics in triathlon and rowing. Here's what's happening in the world of Olympic sports during the weekend of May 14-16.
Swimming: Team USA preps for Trials
Lilly King, Regan Smith and Nathan Adrian headline the final Tyr Pro Swim Series meet before the U.S. Olympic Swimming Trials, this weekend in Indianapolis. Live coverage of event finals begins Friday, 6 p.m. ET on Olympic Channel [LIVE STREAM] and continues Saturday at 6 p.m. on NBCSN [LIVE STREAM]. Both nights can also be streamed live on NBCSports.com.
Meanwhile, Caeleb Dressel, Ryan Lochte and Ryan Murphy will get their race reps in at the Atlanta Classic meet in Georgia, Friday through Sunday. That meet can be streamed live on Swim Atlanta’s YouTube channel.
Soccer: Women's Champions League Final
Sam Kerr leads Chelsea against Lieke Martens and FC Barcelona Femení in the final of the 2021 UEFA Women’s Champions League, from Gothenburg, Sweden. Both finalists have already secured their respective domestic league titles and boast two of the strongest squads in the women’s game. It’s Chelsea’s first appearance in the European cup final, while Barcelona has appeared once before, falling to Lyon in the 2019 finale.
This summer, Kerr (Australia) and Martens (Netherlands), along with Fran Kirby (England/Chelsea) and Magdalena Eriksson (Sweden/Chelsea), will all look to carry their respective national teams deep into the Tokyo Olympic knockout rounds.
Rowing: Final Olympic Qualification Regatta
It's the last chance to qualify in rowing for the Tokyo Games, with 163 crews competing across all 14 Olympic boat classes in Lucerne, Switzerland. Heats and most repechages will take place Saturday, and the remaining repechages and semifinals are scheduled for Sunday. Finals are after the weekend on Monday. Racing gets underway at 4 a.m. ET each day.
The U.S. has six crews – men's single sculls, men's double sculls, men's lightweight double sculls, women's lightweight double sculls, men's pair, and men's quadruple sculls – vying to punch tickets to Tokyo. The men's quad crew, in particular, will be worth keeping an eye on – they won the U.S. Trials race in mid-April, then about two weeks later placed fourth at the World Rowing Cup I in Zagreb, Croatia, less than 1.8 seconds behind the winning boat.
Watch Monday's finals live from 4 to 6:20 a.m. ET at worldrowing.com. Listen to live audio coverage of this weekend's events here.
Triathlon: 2021 World Championship Series Yokohama
It's a big weekend for the U.S. Triathlon Team as hopefuls compete at WTCS Yokohama, the second and final auto-qualifier event before the Tokyo Olympics. The U.S. has yet to fill three of its four available auto-qualification spots; places for two men and one woman are still up for grabs. The U.S. team can have up to six total athletes, three of each gender, with two men and two women competing in the mixed relay, an event making its Olympic debut this summer. Summer Rappaport, prior to Yokohama, was the sole American with a ticket to Tokyo – she qualified 20 months ago. In Yokohama, because Rappaport has a spot, only one woman can qualify for the U.S. team at this event. They'll need to reach the podium, and if more than one does, then the spot goes to the highest finisher. For the men, a top-eight finish earns a single spot. Two men can qualify if both get on the podium. All outstanding spots after Yokohama are selected via discretion by USA Triathlon's selection committee.
The U.S. women swept the podium at the 2019 edition of WTCS Yokohama; Katie Zaferes won gold, Rappaport took silver and Taylor Spivey earned bronze. All three are entered to race this weekend. Zaferes, the 2019 world champion, is the headliner. She placed 18th at the Rio Games but has since made and moved up the podium at each subsequent year's World Triathlon Series, sans 2020's one-off season – bronze in 2017, silver in 2018 and gold in 2019. She crashed out of the 2019 Tokyo test event at which Rappaport qualified. Matthew McElroy and Morgan Pearson are the highest-ranked U.S. men competing, No. 15 and No. 17, respectively, on the latest ITU World Ranking list.
You can watch the women's elite race Friday at 9:16 p.m. ET, and the men's elite race shortly after midnight Saturday at 12:06 a.m. ET, both at triathlonlive.tv.
Golf: Byron Nelson Classic
The PGA Tour's Byron Nelson Classic began Friday. While Justin Thomas, Bryson DeChambeau, Xander Schauffele and Collin Morikawa are all comfortably in position to head to the Olympics, this tournament allows for some of the other high-ranked American golfers, such as Brooks Koepka, for example, to make up ground with a good performance in McKinney, Texas.
Watch Live:
- Saturday: 1-3pm ET, Golf Channel [LIVE STREAM]
- Sunday: 1-3pm ET, Golf Channel [LIVE STREAM]
Track Cycling: 2021 UCI Nations Cup - Round 1
The Nations Cup is track cycling's biggest event to be held since 2020 worlds last February, and host region Hong Kong's first major sporting event since the COVID-19 pandemic onset. Americans Maddie Godby and Mandy Marquardt competed Friday in the individual sprint but neither made it past the quarterfinals. The event was won by 2019 world sprint and keirin champion Lee Wai Sze, a local Hongkonger and Tokyo favorite. Also Friday, Ashton Lambie of the U.S. won the non-Olympic individual pursuit, an event in which he won silver at 2020 Worlds. No Americans remain but Saturday's events include the men's Madison, men's keirin and women's omnium points race, and Sunday has the women's keirin, women's Madison, men's sprint and men's omnium points race.
Watch the first round of the Nations Cup on Saturday starting at 6 a.m. ET and Sunday beginning at 3 a.m. ET at tissottracktv.uci.org.
Mountain Biking: 2021 UCI World Cup - Round 2
The 2021 UCI Mountain Bike World Cup continues with its second round, moving 330 miles northeast from Albstadt, Germany, to Nove Mesto Na Morave, Czech Republic. Last weekend saw two French winners: Victor Koretzky, 10th at the Rio Games, who beat 2016 Olympic and eight-time world champion Nino Schurter in the men's race; and on the women's side, 21-year-old Loana Lecomte. American Kate Courtney was fourth. All four will race in Nove Mesto Na Morave, which serves as the last auto qualifier event for Tokyo.
The women's and men's XCO elite races will take place on Sunday at 5:20 a.m. and 9:20 a.m. ET, respectively.
Modern Pentathlon: UIPM 2021 World Cup Final
This week's World Cup Final in Szekesfehervar, Hungary, is the penultimate chance for athletes to earn Olympic world ranking points. The men's final – swimming, fencing bonus round, riding and laser run – takes place Saturday and features UIPM Olympic No. 1- and No. 3-ranked pentathletes Jun Woong-Tae of South Korea and Ilya Palazkov of Belarus, as well as 2012 Olympic bronze medalist Adam Marosi of Hungary, who's ranked sixth. Great Britain's Kate French, fifth at the Rio Games, won gold Friday in a close women's final with 1384 points. During the women's fencing bonus round, German Rebecca Langrehr broke the world record with 13 victories.
Watch the men's laser run Saturday at 12:30 p.m ET at uipmtv.org.
Taekwondo: Asian Qualification Tournament
Friday marked the start of the 2021 Asian Taekwondo Olympic Qualification Tournament. At this tournament, the winner and runner-up athletes in each division will qualify for Tokyo. While many notable taekwondoins have already qualified for the Games, this tournament gives some lesser known taekwondo athletes to punch their ticket to Tokyo.