More women than men in Team GB for first time at Tokyo Games
There will be more women than men in the Great Britain team in Tokyo for the first time at a summer Olympics.
Team GB has announced that it is entering its largest ever delegation for a Games on foreign soil, with 376 athletes set to compete across 26 sports.
Of the 376,201 are female (53.5 per cent) and 175 male (46.5 per cent).
Team GB said this is down to, “impressive qualification performances from British female athletes across sports and an increased number of female events at the Games”.
“I am delighted we will be taking more women than men to a summer olympic games ,” said Mark England, Team GB’S chef de mission .“it is a first for team GB in its 125-year history – 2021 is truly the year of the female Olympian.”
There are 42 Scottish athletes in the British team, seven from northern ireland ,18 from Wales and 309 from England.
The squad was finalised with three late additions, including Scottish canoeist Katie Reid.
Reid will compete in the C1 200m sprint event as it makes its Olympic debut on the Sea Forest Waterway in Tokyo.
It has also emerged that Scottish track star Laura Muir will focus on the 1500 m, opening up a vacancy in the 800m which will be filled by Alex Bell.
Bell will make her Olympic debut having run the 800m qualifying standard with a lifetime best performance of 1:58.52 at the end of May.
The third late addition to the GB team is table tennis player Paul Drink hall who will compete a this third olympic games after he was awarded a spot due to his ranking place and the withdrawal through injury of table tennis legend Vladimir Samsonov of Belarus.
Of the 376 British athletes selected there are 122 returning Olympians of which 51 are returning Olympic medallists.
Of those returning Olympic medallists, four leading female Olympians travel to tokyo looking to make history. No British woman has ever won gold medal sat three separate Olympics yet cyclist Laura Kenny, taekwondo player Jade Jones, rower Helen Glover and equestrian star charlotte du jar din all have the chance to achieve that feat after successes in London and Rio.
Glover will become the first British rower to compete at an Olympics after becoming a mum, while Kenny – a mother herself since Rio – is already Team GB’S most successful female Olympic athlete of alltime with four gold medals.
Sailor Hannah Mills, who is competing at her third Olympic Games, is also on the verge of making history in Japan. A Tokyo medal for Mills would make her the most successful female Olympic sailor of all time.
Meanwhile, Olympic venues in Tokyo will not be able to admit spectators for this summer’s Games after the coronavirus pandemic forced the declaration of a new state of emergency in the Japanese capital, organising committee president seiko has hi mo to has said.
Organisers had hoped that Japanese residents would be able to attend the Games, and last month announced that venues could be 50 percent full, up to a maximum of 10,000 people.
However, a rise in Covid cases has forced the japanese government to reimpose more stringent measures until August 22.