4X World Champ Carissa Moore and 2X World Champ John John Florence will have to wait another year.

“On the basis of the information the IOC has, postponement has been decided”

We knew it could -and likely would- happen. Covid19 spread is simply to fast and furious.

Only a month ago -end of February- rumors circulated about the possible cancellation of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics Games.  The long-time senior official at the International Olympic Committee, Dick Pound estimated that the committee had until the end of May to decide whether or not to call off the Games. A spokesman for the Japanese government, however, said the IOC was continuing with preparations for the Games as scheduled.

Yet only within the past few weeks, countries are going on full lock-down, sporting events are being canceled and the number of COVID-19 cases soaring each day… Thus, the IOC is had to make a difficult decision. In response to the ongoing outbreak, Pound said that the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games will be postponed, likely to 2021 – details to be worked out in the next four weeks.

IOC has been under pressure from athletes and coaches to postpone the Games. Plus, gyms, fields, and other training facilities had closed down around the world, so some Olympic hopefuls had spoken out about the inability of athletes to train. These were unprecedented circumstances.

Recently, Canada and Australia said in separate statements that they would not be sending athletes to the Olympics if  held this year and urged the IOC to consider postponing the Games to 2021.

Pound believes the IOC will announce its next steps soon. “It will come in stages,” he said. “We will postpone this and begin to deal with all the ramifications of moving this, which are immense.”

The ISA announced this past weekend that they would be postponing the Surf City El Salvador ISA World Surfing Games.

This is the final Olympic qualifier set to fill the remaining 12 spots up for grabs in the Olympic surfing event — to June 6 through the 14th.

The board was planning to reassess the status of the event on April 20th, but now it remains to be seen how (and when) the remaining qualification spots will be awarded.