I already miss the Olympics. The daily dose of world best against world best was brighter than ever.

The Winter Games are a few years away and are of course still the Olympics, but my lack of experience in luge, skiing and figure skating usually dampens my interest in the athletes toiling in the snow and on the ice.

I’m from my old neighborhood, so I guess I’ll have to wait for the 2028 Summer Olympics… more on that below.

The 2024 edition of World Sport did not disappoint. Others have certainly watched more coverage or looked more closely at individual events than I have. Nevertheless, I was often fascinated by the best athletes in the world competing at the highest level and the drama of the competitions between them.

Whether on the track, on the sand, on the square, under the Eiffel Tower, around the velodrome, on the waves of Tahiti or on the streets of Paris, this group of Summer Olympians truly embodied “Citius, Altius, Fortius,” the Latin motto of the Games: “Faster, Higher, Stronger.”

I was also a relentless fan of our team and enjoyed not only the performances, but above all the obvious: The US team looked like the US team

At a time when the mere mention of DEI sparked suspicion among some, the best among us were called upon to test our mettle against the best in the world. The result was a team spanning colors and ethnicities and cultures and geographies and sexual orientations and immigration histories, all decked out in red, white, and blue, from the opening ceremony to the fireworks on the final night, and every venue in between.

I dare say that those of us chanting “USA! USA!” were cheering for as diverse a team as the Games could get, a diversity that went beyond petty political and cultural views that sought to divide us based on who we love or where we come from and such nonsense.

There were problems. The media didn’t leave a boxer alone. A reference to Dionysus at the opening ceremony drew criticism from religious leaders who watched The Last Supper instead. The water quality of the Seine was a daily lesson in chemistry as the number of E.Coli particles in the river skyrocketed.

Nevertheless, the sheer power and majesty of the competition drowned out the voices that wanted to make the Olympic Games in Paris something other than what they were: world sport at its peak.

Not that the Games should be free of controversy. In fact, the history of the Olympic Games is full of controversies. Some of them were deadly, like in Munich in 1972, others are among the sport’s finest moments, like the 1924 Paris Games – exactly a century earlier – when Eric Liddell and Harold Abrahams competed for England, as the film “The Hour of the Victory” so beautifully shows.

The 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles are giving me a second chance. I was living in the City of Angels in 1984 when the Games of the XXIII Olympiad came to town. I was one of the many Los Angeles residents who predicted that the freeways would be hopelessly clogged, the beaches would be flooded with people, and the Hollywood Hills would simply be overrun. So we spent a few weeks out of town.

My friends who stayed said Los Angeles was great and the games were… spectacular. So much for my prediction about flooded highways, etc.

So, yes, I plan to be there in 2028.

I will not only cheer on the diverse athletes in red, white and blue, but also the beauty of competitive sport at the highest level, regardless of the winner.

You may have a few favourite moments from Paris. Mine include Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone’s complete mastery of her race, the 400-metre hurdles; long jump gold medallist Tara Davis-Woodhall leaping into the arms of her husband, Hunter Woodall, himself a three-time Paralympic medalist; American Cole Hocker’s surprise victory and new Olympic record in the 1,500-metre race, where teammate Yared Nuguse took bronze; US gymnasts Simone Biles and Jordan Chiles bowing to gold medallist Rebeca Andrade of Brazil; French fans shouting “Allez!” (Go!) every time fellow countryman Leon Marchand, winner of four gold medals and four Olympic records, leapt out of the water on his way to winning the 200-metre breaststroke; and on the penultimate day of the Games, American Steph Curry helped the USMBT to victory in men’s basketball with four three-point shots in the final minutes of the gold medal game.

So I’m waiting for 2028 and I’m confident that the U.S. Olympic team will do their best to get to Los Angeles, and they’ll look like us.