Olympics: Hopes for more French gold in skateboarding
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00:00For the latest on what's happening on the Olympic front let's cross now to France 24 sports editor
00:04Selena Sykes who's at the Place de la Concorde and Selena the chance of yet another gold medal
00:10for France in the men's street skateboarding. That's right our hopes for the French lie here
00:18today with Aurélien Giroud he is a world champion last year and currently ranked a ninth in the
00:26world he finished in sixth place in Tokyo three years ago when skateboarding first made its
00:31debut at the Olympics he said that was a disappointing result for him he's made it
00:37quite clear that he's come here to win on home turf here today though he'll have a lot of
00:42competition from the Japanese who dominate this event as well as in the world rankings
00:49starting with Yuto Horigoma who won the gold medal at the Olympics in Tokyo in his home country
00:55three years ago he's joined by Shora Shirai who is also a world champion in this discipline
01:03and they're also joined by a young talent just 14 years old Yuto Onodera Jinwoo
01:11sorry who won a gold medal at the exit games in this discipline as well so we could have
01:18a very close competition here and also we have to bear in mind Annette that all of these
01:23skateboarders have had to keep themselves occupied for a few days because this event was
01:27supposed to take place on Saturday morning it was postponed because of heavy rain in the
01:32French capital and now they're having to battle with the completely opposite elements because
01:36it's very very hot today and that could affect some of the competitors Selena just tell us a
01:41little bit more about the venue where it's happening because it really is unique given
01:46its location isn't it that's right Annette Paris has been completely transformed before
01:54these Olympics with a lot of venues in the city center and this has got to be one of the
01:58most spectacular ones behind me as you can see in Place de la Concorde which is a very
02:03historic square here in Paris which has been completely transformed into an urban park it
02:08won't just be hosting skateboarding but also BMX freestyle and free-by-free basketball these are
02:14all sports that have been recently added to the Olympics in a bid to encourage more young viewers
02:20to watch the Olympics so we've got this real contrast of history and new here in the French
02:26capital it's quite an interesting thing to see and a spectacular sight lots of people obviously
02:30very excited to attend events here at Place de la Concorde it's a temporary venue that will be
02:36dismantled after the games and of course as most of Parisians will know it's caused a lot of
02:40disruption when it comes to traffic here in the French capital but I think a lot of people here
02:44today will say that it's been worth it