What does that mean, what are we gonna do?

[The global spread of coronavirus has led to officials postponing the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games.]

(Speaking Japanese) We agreed to proceed in detail with holding the (Olympic) Games during summer 2021, at the latest."

[We spoke to athletes around the globe to find out what the decision means for them.]

Okay.

Hello, mate, how's it going?

Is that okay?

Okay.

Oh, I mean, it's absolutely the right decision.

The focus wasn't there, obviously, the training facilities weren't there.

Everything, everything screeched to a halt, and it was the time for us to focus on family, but you're asking athletes to prepare themselves for, you know, the most important competition of their lives.

I think that the best choice is to do it, as I said before, the sooner they can, but the safer they can.

We started also to think of, if this Olympic Games will be really fair if they are seen in July and August for many reasons like, everyone cannot train the same way.

To be honest, there was a little part of me that's like, oh, thank God, you know?

At least we know, at least now we know.

I know it's the right decision.

This is something that's affecting everybody.

It would put a lot of people's health and safety at risk if it moved forward as planned.

How does it make me feel?

I mean, to be honest, I don't think it's fully sunk in.

You know, it's hard to take a little bit.

This was gonna be my last Olympics.

I started sport when I was nine years old with the goal of eventually going to the Olympics someday.

And then last year I punched my ticket, and I felt like I had so much to look forward to going into 2020.

I was on camp in Europe, with my husband for three months, just kind of in the mode where you put your nerves down.

Like, it's the final sprint towards something that you've been working towards your whole life, and...

We were worried they were gonna cancel, and if they cancel, for us, it's like someone just being like, "oh, you know what? you go back to the bottom now."

You start at the bottom of the mountain.

My personal frustration have to be put apart for something much more big.

[Athletes will get an extra year to train, but many are currently in lockdown or quarantine.]

Training in the living room, it's not so easy.

To fence in the house and the garage in a very confined space is quite difficult, and our fencing trainer is not with us here.

All have a good kit that we were hoping to use for the Olympics.

Is now in Japan.

I don't own a treadmill.

I'm on the second floor, so I don't think the downstairs neighbors would appreciate if I got a treadmill.

We will, over the next few weeks and months, be planning on how, how we approach the next year, the extra year, if you like.

We're young, we're lucky we're both healthy, and we were... kind of both stepped back and said, okay, if it doesn't happen now, we have more time to prepare.

I'm looking forward to spending some time with my husband.

There's not really any way I can isolate away from him, so he will be spending the next 14 days on self-isolation with me, so it'll be nice to have some quality time together.