Along with this historic time that we are living in, the Olympics are creating history by being the first Olympics to ever be postponed.

After being pressured for a long time, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) finally announced on March 24 that the Tokyo Summer Olympics will not be happening as originally planned for this year and will have to wait for another year.

They were originally going to start on July 24, 2020, but have been moved to July 23, 2021.

With coronavirus cases growing significantly each day, the IOC felt that postponing the Olympics, an event that more than 10,000 athletes participate in, not including the number of tourists and the doctors and coaches of each team, was the way to go. 

Previous to the postponement of the Olympics, many nations announced that they would not participate in the Olympics due to the pandemic. 

The Canadian Olympic Committee and Australian Olympic Committee announced that they wouldn’t go to Tokyo this 2020.

The USA Swimming team sent a letter to the US Olympic and Paralympic Committee pleading them to postpone the Olympics to next year. 

The Paralympic Games have been postponed as well to August 24, 2021. 

Andrew Parson, president of International Paralympic Committee, said, “The new dates provide certainty for the athletes, reassurance for the stakeholders, and something to look forward to for the whole world.”

“When the Paralympic Games do take place in Tokyo next year, they will be an extra-special display of humanity uniting as one, a global celebration of human resilience and a sensational showcase of sport.”

Instead of taking this postponement as something negative, the Olympic leaders are seeing this as something that will bring people together after being separated for such a long time. 

With this postponement the Olympic flame will stay in Japan.

Thomas Bach, president of the IOC, sees the Olympics as “the light at the end of this tunnel.”

What everyone hopes is that this calms down by summer, but the time of preparation for this event from both the athletes and organizers is being paused which leads to its postponement.

On a positive note, various athletes have been taking this positively.

American BMX racer and Olympic silver medalist Alise Post-Willoughby posted on Twitter; her tweet was filled with emojis of excitement and sharing the new 2021 Olympic dates. 

Mexican diver Rommel Pacheco also used Twitter as a platform to share his views. 

He shared the new Olympic dates as well as the importance of why they were postponed, urging people to stay home.

This postponement could potentially affect athletes that were going to say goodbye this year and retire.

However, Becky Downie, a British gymnast who was going to retire after the 2020 Summer Olympics, said, “Grateful to have the opportunity to try and continue doing what I love for another year.

“Ready for the final chapter.” 

With the millions of dollars that Tokyo and the IOC have invested in the Olympics and the amount of training the athletes have done, postponing the Olympics for another year means that they are going to have another year to prepare, which makes the 2021 Summer Olympics more exciting. 

Since the IOC is seeing the postponement of the Olympics as the light at the end of the tunnel, the audience and public can only do the same and look forward to the future.