TOKYO — Ariel Torres was a high school senior stuck in a journalism class when, on an unforgettable day in 2016, he got the news. His sensei, Robert Young, called him to deliver it: karate had been chosen as a new Olympic sport. Ariel’s mind initially shot to Paris 2024, but, no, Young told him. This was a one-time event. Karate would be on the Tokyo 2020 program, and likely none thereafter.
So Torres, 18 at the time, grabbed a sharpie. He ducked out of class and into a school bathroom. He took down his pants and took off his underwear, and wrote on them, in big black letters: “OLYMPICS 2020!