WGI’s expertise as Olympic Study Center in high demand during Tokyo 2020 Games
Prior to the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, which had been postponed by a year, the major sporting event in Japan was already the focus of several events organized by Willibald Gehbardt Institute, which is officially recognized by the IOC as an Olympic Study Center. On June 29th, the 2nd Olympic Study Day hosted by WGI was organized very successfully as an online seminar, where even contributions from the Japanese capital were presented and discussed.
The WGI’s expertise was also in high demand during the past few weeks when the competitions and events were taking place in Tokyo. Prof. Michael Krüger, head of the department Sports Education and Sports History at the Institute for Sports Science of WWU Münster and Vice President Olympic Sports of WGI, published several articles on the current occasion: In the university newspaper “Research and Teaching” there is an article by Michael Krüger on the Olympic Games (in German), which critically reflects on the question of how the major event will be held in the midst of the corona pandemic. “The opening of the Games to new sports as well as technical and aesthetic innovations could have become a trademark of the Tokyo Games in 2020 if it had not been for the pandemic games a year later. In addition to the Games in Munich, they will go down in the history of sport as the saddest and most memorable games of all time”, Michael Krüger sums up in his contribution.
In addition, Michael Krüger is represented with two articles in the Olympic edition of the online magazine of the German Gymnastics Federation “Sprossenwand”. In terms of sport history, Krüger classifies the eponymous “Sprossenwand” in one post (in German). Together with Prof. Annette Hofmann, Krüger also published another article (in German) on the Germany gymnastics team since 1896, “Gymnastics under the Olympic rings“.
Several press inquiries from print and radio media were also answered by the Executive Officer of WGI, Dr. Sebastian Brückner. Brückner spoke to Deutschlandradio for a podcast (in German) on the topic of “Tested positively – What is dangerous about dealing with Corona in Tokyo“. He provided insights on the topic of “positively tested at the Olympics” in the context of the daily corona tests and the psychological effects and handling of this situation from a sport psychology perspective. In addition, his expertise was requested by Stuttgarter Zeitung / Stutgarter Nachrichten in connection with the withdrawal of the American gymnast Simone Biles and the subsequent discussion about mental health of Olympic athletes as well as the reflection about the gold medal winning competion by the German Malaika Mihambo in the long jump.
“I am delighted that WGI’s expertise in matters of the Olympics has been met with such a great response in the context of the Tokyo Games,” said WGI President Dr. Heinz Aschebrock.