Where are we at? 6 months in, 12 to go. Olympic qualifying.

May 23, 2019

Written by Bart de Jong

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The Olympics qualifying period started on 1 November 2018 and will go until 11 May of 2020. That means we're 6 months in and we've got 12 to go. We decided to give you an update on who is doing well at the moment and who are on the bubble making it to the Olympic Games in Tokyo in 2020. But first things first. A little explanation of how this works is needed. Only 9 spots are available for Men and Women at the first Olympic Games in Tokyo. Clearly, that's not a lot, especially when you know hundreds of riders are trying to make it there. During the Qualification period several events count where riders can score points for their nation. The nation ranking in the end is used to see which countries have conquered a spot to ride in Tokyo. The two best ranked riders per nation form the Nation ranking. Their points get added up and that way it's clear to see where their nation is ranked. For the moment the nation ranking looks like this.

Men:
1 AUSTRALIA 6230
2 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 5390
3 GREAT BRITAIN 3458
4 BOLIVARIAN REPUBLIC OF VENEZUELA 3360
5 RUSSIAN FEDERATION 3300
6 COSTA RICA 2210

7 JAPAN 1994
8 CROATIA 1443
9 CANADA 882
10 MEXICO 860
11 FRANCE 649
12 LATVIA 635
13 GERMANY 519
14 ECUADOR 426
15 ITALY 188
16 ARGENTINA 131
17 NETHERLANDS 112
18 COLOMBIA 95
19 CHILE 71
20 CZECH REPUBLIC 63
21 BELGIUM 55
22 BRAZIL 54
23 SLOVAKIA 37
24 POLAND 18
25 KOREA 12
26 THAILAND 6
27 AUSTRIA 2

Women:
1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 8080
2 GERMANY 5510
3 SWITZERLAND 2650
4 RUSSIAN FEDERATION 2460
5 GREAT BRITAIN 2410
6 SPAIN 2357
7 JAPAN 2310
8 CHILE 1950
9 AUSTRALIA 1620
10 NEW ZEALAND 1320
11 BOLIVARIAN REPUBLIC OF VENEZUELA 1030
12 FRANCE 655
13 PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA 647
14 CANADA 437
15 ARGENTINA 350
16 NETHERLANDS 290
17 KOREA 215
18 COLOMBIA 160
19 CZECH REPUBLIC 82
20 SLOVAKIA 20
21 BRAZIL 20

Now keep in mind that the top ranked nation in the Olympic Qualifying rankings gets to send 2 riders. Also, one spot per gender goes to the host country (Japan). On top of that 2 spots per gender will be for the highest ranked nation at the 2019 UCI BMX Freestyle Park World Championships in Chengdu, China that are not already qualified. This leaves 4 spots per gender left so to automatically qualify for a spot, a nation has to finish within the top 5 of the nation ranking during the Olympic qualifying process.

Exact details can be found HERE.

With the next World Cup happening in Montpellier next week, followed by a final World Cup stop (of 2019) in China in November plus the UCI World's that following week, some big events are still on the agenda. With the 6 best C1 results counting for the ranking and the 2019 National Championship, things can get tactical in moving up a spot or two in the nation ranking.

Becoming a first time BMX Freestyle Olympian isn't easy.

BdJ
Pics by Bart de Jong/FATBMX