Tokyo was the site for an international gymnastics event held on Nov. 8 that served as a test case for the postponed 2020 Tokyo Games amid the new coronavirus pandemic, and it yielded tangible benefits, while also exposing issues.
The meet, held at the Yoyogi National Gymnasium, featured gymnasts from four countries -- the United States, China, Russia and Japan. It was the first major international competition involving an Olympic event -- in which foreign athletes were invited to participate -- held in Japan since a nationwide state of emergency was declared in April amid the spread of the virus.
The meet, which drew attention both domestically and abroad as a test case for the postponed Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games, came with both positives and negatives.
Personal powdered chalk pouch
Kohei Uchimura, 31, who won the gold medal in the men's all-around at the 2012 London Olympics and the 2016 Games in Rio De Janeiro, went through a full-body mist shower of disinfectant after having to stand in front of a machine about 2 meters tall near the entrance to the arena to have his temperature checked. He also had to disinfect his hands.
Even after he put on a strong performance during the competition, he went only so far as to share a light fist bump with teammates. The event, which featured 30 gymnasts, obviously took on thorough measures to prevent infections.
All the international athletes, who arrived in Japan either on Nov. 4 or 5, were required to have PCR tests once a week in the two weeks prior to traveling, and also underwent COVID-19 testing each morning during their time in Japan, with their movements outside their hotels being strictly limited to competition venues and practice facilities.
Also, restrictions were placed on the magnesium carbonate, or powdered chalk that athletes commonly use during these events, as each competitor brought their own and was instructed not to touch powder belonging to other gymnasts.
The event was held under rules stripulating that any athlete who tests positive for the virus would be isolated from others and teams with a cluster of infections would be removed from the competition.
International Olympic Committee (IOC) President Thomas Bach awarded the event "a perfect 10" because there were no cases of infection found among the 90 athletes, staff and officials,.
There was a reason for his broad praise. At the IOC headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland, on June 22, an irritated Bach basically asked why has there only been talk of doubt about the holding the Tokyo Games coming from Japan?
That was during an exchange with Morinari Watanabe, an IOC member and president of the International Federation of Gymnastics (FIG).
According to IOC officials, pessimistic opinions about holding of Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games were beginning to prevail among senior executives of international sports organizations. Watanabe expressed the opinion of holding an international gymnastics competition.
Bach jumped on that, saying "That's it. I want this done right away."
The test event turned out to be successful in that it was pulled off with no new infections among the athletes, staff or meet officials, and "signaled" to the world a message that sports can be successful even under restrictions.
Massive cost of testing
On the other hand, officials involved with the test meet were shocked by the hefty amount of expenses incurred.
While Watanabe and other officials hastily made preparations -- including some behind-the-scenes-maneuvering -- the expenses in the initial stage of estimates for measures to deal with the coronavirus reached about 40 million yen, most of which was for some 700 PCR tests.
The total expenses normally needed to hold a gymnastics World Cup event at a similar scale are said to be less than 100 million yen. The cost for adding measures to combat the virus during a four-nation competition would equal half the total expenses needed to hold a single World Cup event.
Staff members involved in hosting and managing the latest event were busily engaged in reducing minor expenses and negotiating with PCR testing organizations over costs.
But the Olympic Games are expected to include some 11,000 athletes alone. Also considering the difficulty in securing the adequate number of staff members needed for PCR testing, an official involved in the latest event said, "The number of PCR tests would be immeasurably larger. Becasue the burden on front-line medical services would be infinite, it would be unrealistic to have the relevant measures at the same level as at this latest event, be sought [for the Tokyo Games]."
There is no shortage of those saying a new testing method should be established and that pre-departure PCR tests should be conducted thoroughly in countries and regions that send athletes to Japan for the Games.
Challenges have also emerged as to how to handle athletes with false positive tests, and ways to mitigate mental stress on athletes, whose downtime movements will be restricted.
Yoshiyuki Mano, a professor at Waseda University's Faculty of Sports Sciences and a scholar on sports policy theories, agreed a safe environement can be set up.
"We are reaching the understanding that sports events can be held if comprehensive measures are taken," he said, before pointing out, "The rest would be a subtraction [of thinning out items of the measures against virus infections]. The work from now on will be how the best solution can be found in balancing economic burden and safety."
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