2020 Summer Olympics facts for kids
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| Host city | Tokyo, Japan | ||
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| Motto | United by Emotion | ||
| Nations | 205 (+ EOR team) | ||
| Athletes | 11,326 | ||
| Events | 339 in 33 sports (50 disciplines) | ||
| Opening | 23 July 2021 | ||
| Closing | 8 August 2021 | ||
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| Cauldron | |||
| Stadium | Olympic Stadium | ||
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| Winter | |||
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The 2020 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXXII Olympiad and branded as Tokyo 2020, is an ongoing international multi-sport event that is currently being held from 23 July to 8 August 2021 in Tokyo, Japan, with some preliminary events beginning on 21 July.
Tokyo was selected as the host city during the 125th IOC Session in Buenos Aires, Argentina, on 7 September 2013. Originally scheduled to take place from 24 July to 9 August 2020, the event was postponed in March 2020 as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, and is held largely behind closed doors with no public spectators permitted due to the declaration of the state of emergency. Despite being rescheduled for 2021, the event retains the Tokyo 2020 name for marketing and branding purposes. This is the first time that the Olympic Games have been postponed and rescheduled, rather than cancelled. The Summer Paralympics will be held between 24 August and 5 September 2021, 16 days after the completion of the Olympics.
The 2020 Games are the fourth Olympic Games to be held in Japan, following the Tokyo 1964 (Summer), Sapporo 1972 (Winter), and Nagano 1998 (Winter) games. Tokyo was to host the 1940 Summer Olympics but pulled out in 1938 due to war. Tokyo is the first city in Asia to hold the Summer Games twice. The 2020 Games are the second of three consecutive Olympics to be held in East Asia, following the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea and preceding the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, China.
The 2020 Games sees the introduction of new competitions as well as competitions that once were held but were subsequently removed. New ones include 3x3 basketball, freestyle BMX and mixed gender team events in a number of existing sports, as well as the return of madison cycling for men and an introduction of the same event for women. New IOC policies also allow the host organizing committee to add new sports to the Olympic program for just one Games. The disciplines added by the Japanese Olympic Committee are baseball and softball, karate, sport climbing, surfing, and skateboarding, the last four of which make their Olympic debuts.
Bermuda and the Philippines won their first-ever Olympic gold medals, while Turkmenistan won their first ever medal.
Contents
Olympic bids
Six cities applied to host the Games. International Olympic Committee
Sports
The Sports played in the competition will be similar to those played in previous Olympic years. Popular sports that will be played include Athletics, Swimming, Tennis, gymnastics, and diving. The international Olympic committee said that there will be at least 25 sports played in addition to these. All sports competitions will feature athletes from many countries playing to try and win a medal, which is given to the winning player or team.
Stadiums
The Olympics is taking place at many stadiums and locations throughout the Tokyo area. National Olympic Stadium in Tokyo will be the main stadium and host the opening and closing ceremonies, along with athletics. Other sports will take place in new and already built stadiums in and around Tokyo. The athletes will sleep in an Olympic village.
Medals
In February 2017, the Tokyo Organizing Committee announced an electronics recycling program in partnership with Japan Environmental Sanitation Center and NTT Docomo, asking for donations of electronics such as mobile phones to be reclaimed as materials for the medals. Aiming to collect eight tonnes of metals to produce the medals for the Olympic and Paralympic Games, collection boxes were deployed at public locations and NTT Docomo retail shops in April 2017. A design competition for the medals was launched in December of that year.
In May 2018, the organizing committee reported that they had obtained half the required 2,700 kilograms of bronze but were struggling to obtain the required amount of silver; although bronze and silver medals purely utilize their respective materials, IOC requirements mandate that gold medals utilize silver as a base. The collection of bronze was completed in November 2018, with the remainder estimated to have been completed by March 2019.
On 24 July 2019 (one year ahead of the originally scheduled opening ceremony), the designs of the medals were unveiled. The medals for the Olympic and Paralympic Games were designed by Junichi Kawanishi following a nationwide competition. A new feature shared with the Paralympic medals is that the ribbons contain one, two, or three silicone convex lines to distinguish gold, silver, and bronze medals, respectively.
Due to COVID-19 protocols, athletes will be presented with their medals on trays and asked to put them on themselves, rather than have them placed around their necks by a dignitary.
Torch relay
The slogan of the 2020 Summer Olympics torch relay is "Hope Lights Our Way".
As determined by a 2009 IOC ruling that banned international torch relays for any future Olympic Games, the 2020 Summer Olympics torch was scheduled to only visit the two countries of Greece and the host nation Japan. The first phase of the relay began on 12 March 2020, with the traditional flame lighting ceremony at the Temple of Hera in Olympia, Greece. The torch then travelled to Athens, where the Greek leg of the relay culminated in a handover ceremony at the Panathenaic Stadium on 19 March, during which the torch was transferred to the Japanese contingent. The flame was placed inside a special lantern and transported from Athens International Airport on a chartered flight to Higashimatsushima in Japan. The torch was then expected to begin the second phase of its journey on 20 March, as it traveled for one week around the three most affected areas of the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami—Miyagi, Iwate and Fukushima—where it would go on display under the heading "Flame of Recovery". After leaving Naraha on 26 March, the torch would commence its main relay around Japan, incorporating all 47 prefectural capitals.
After the decision to postpone the Games was made, the torch was placed again in a special lantern on display in the city of Fukushima for a month. After that, the lantern was transferred to the Tokyo prefecture, where it was kept safe until the restart of the relay in 2021. On 23 July 2020 (one year ahead of the rescheduled opening ceremony), a promotional video was released featuring Japanese swimmer Rikako Ikee carrying the lantern inside Japan National Stadium, drawing comparisons between emergence from the pandemic and her own return to sport after being diagnosed with leukemia. On 20 August 2020, it was announced that the torch relay would begin again in Naraha, Fukushima on 25 March 2021, nearly a year later than originally planned.
The relay ended at Tokyo's National Stadium on 23 July, with tennis player Naomi Osaka lighting the Olympic cauldron at the finale of the opening ceremony.
Official mascot, emblems and music
The official emblems for the 2020 Olympics and Paralympics were unveiled on 25 April 2016; designed by Asao Tokolo, who won a nationwide design contest, it takes the form of a ring in an indigo-colored checkerboard pattern.
The official mascot of the 2020 Summer Olympics is Miraitowa, a figure with blue-checkered ichimatsu moyo patterns inspired by the Games' official emblem. Its fictional characteristics include the ability to teleport. Created by Japanese artist Ryo Taniguchi, the mascots were selected from a competition process which took place in late 2017 and early 2018. Japanese elementary school students were given the final decision to choose the mascot. Miraitowa is named after the Japanese words for "future" and "eternity", and Someity is named after someiyoshino, a type of cherry blossom. Someity's name also refers to the English phrase "so mighty".
Naoki Satō composed the music for victory ceremonies at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo.
Alongside the main Emblem blue, the five other colors used in the branding of the 2020 Games are Kurenai red, Ai blue, Sakura pink, Fuji purple, and Matsuba green. These five traditional colors of Japan are used as sub-colors to create points of difference in the color variations.
 Olympic Games |
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| Summer Games: 1896, 1900, 1904, 1906, 1908, 1912, (1916), 1920, 1924, 1928, 1932, 1936, (1940), (1944), 1948, 1952, 1956, 1960, 1964, 1968, 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020, 2024, 2028 |
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| Winter Games: 1924, 1928, 1932, 1936, (1940), (1944), 1948, 1952, 1956, 1960, 1964, 1968, 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1994, 1998, 2002, 2006, 2010, 2014, 2018, 2022 | ||
| Athens 2004 — Turin 2006 — Beijing 2008 — Vancouver 2010 — London 2012 — Sochi 2014 — Rio 2016 — Pyeongchang 2018 — Tokyo 2020 Games in italics will be held in the future, and those in (brackets) were cancelled because of war. See also: Ancient Olympic Games |
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| Youth Olympic Games |
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| Summer Games: 2010, 2014, 2018 | ||
| Winter Games: 2012, 2016, 2020 |
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| Singapore 2010 — Innsbruck 2012 — Nanjing 2014 |
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Images for kids
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Few pedestrians on the Shibuya Crossing during the state of emergency in the middle of Japan's first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, early 2020
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The Olympic rings on display at Tokyo Bay to promote the Games
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Police patrolling and watching from a rooftop near the tennis venue
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Temperature check and COVID-19 countermeasures at the tennis venue
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A scene from the Opening Ceremony at the Olympic Stadium, with drones flying around and creating the official logo of the Games
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Ariake Arena
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Ariake Gymnastics Centre
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Tokyo Aquatics Centre
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Saitama Super Arena
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Ryogoku Kokugikan
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Enoshima Yacht Harbor, Kanagawa
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Tsurigasaki Beach, Chiba
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See also
In Spanish: Juegos Olímpicos de Tokio 2020 para niños
