The impact of COVID-19 on sporting events and high-performance athletes

The novel coronavirus COVID-19 outbreak has begun in later December/2019 and rapidly the pandemic was declared affecting people worldwide. Sporting events have been canceled worldwide and high-performance athletes needed to stay home in quarantine to avoid virus spread and care about their health. The Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympic Games postponement is one of the greatest examples of the pandemic severity in sports since postponement harms both sporting event logistics and athletes’ preparation for the biggest and most expected world sporting event. Social isolation has changed athletes training routine and, despite many of them keep exercising at home to keep fit, all changes in the usual routine caused by the quarantine may lead to several physical and physiological impairments, such as cognitive issues, mental fatigue, and changes in sleep patterns harming their immunologic system. Besides, the high-performance athletes should be watched carefully once they also represent many economic interests, which leads us to the discussion regarding how/when sporting events should return. In this sense, the public authorities, leaders of sporting leagues, and the high-performance athletes must pick the best strategy to returns with sporting events around the world and guarantee both athletes and audience health during competitions. So, the present article aims to discuss the main impacts of COVID-19 pandemic on sporting events worldwide, and the harms suffered by the high-performance athletes because of the social isolation.