TOKYO — The Olympics, for all their charm, are a rather cruel setup. The world’s best athletes are assigned a date and a time to perform. They prepare, often in solitude and anonymity, for a single moment on the calendar. “The scale of everything is a bit hard,” Naomi Osaka said, after losing a third-round tennis match days after lighting the Olympic cauldron to open the Tokyo Games. Adam Ondra, regarded as the world’s best climber, recognizes this even before he arrives to his Olympic moment, as sport climbing makes its debut next week.

Source: New York Times July 28, 2021 18:27 UTC