DENVER – Even before the coronavirus pandemic wiped the Summer Olympics off the 2020 sports calendar, the U.S.
Olympic and Paralympic Committee was an organization in peril. In an online address Thursday, made necessary because the annual assembly cannot go on in person, leaders of the committee paid heed to how much more difficult things have become since the virus started shutting down sports, from the grassroots to elite levels, over the last seven months.“Last year I talked about evolution and ‘Jurassic Park,’” chair Susanne Lyons said, in a nod to the changes the USOPC had embarked upon, pre-COVID. "I know this year feels a bit more like ‘Apocalypse Now.’”Both Lyons and CEO Sarah Hirshland spent most of their speeches discussing.